Former Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said in a statement on the morning of 22 July that he is passing on to his successor an army that not only holds the defense but is also on the offensive. He has seen this war "from its first day in 2014," he wrote, has "lived the front," and knows the price of every liberated kilometer of Ukrainian land.
The statement is Syrskyi's own account of his tenure, published the morning after Zelenskyy replaced him with Mykhailo Drapatyi following six days of protests.
Syrskyi claimed that 700 square kilometers of Ukrainian land were liberated this year under his command, and an army that two years ago fought a hard defense now attacking "with initiative, with structure, with people who know how to strike the enemy."
"I sincerely hope this offensive will be continued. Everything for it is in place," Syrskyi wrote.
"Destruction of most combat-capable part of Russian army"
In February-March 2022, Syrskyi said he had the honor of commanding the defense of Kyiv, and the capital held. That spring, the threat of a full siege of Kharkiv was lifted, too.
Then came the Kharkiv counteroffensive, when Balakliia, Izium, and Kupiansk were liberated in a matter of weeks, and later, in Donetsk Oblast, what he called the destruction of the most combat-capable part of the Russian army, the Wagner private military company, happened.
He took command in February 2024 "at a very difficult time," with Avdiivka's defenders standing half-encircled. One of his first orders was the organized withdrawal from the city.
"It was a hard decision. But I made it, because for me one main priority applied: preserving people's lives," he wrote.
Then, he said, came "a year that changed the course of this war": stopping the Russian offensive in Kharkiv Oblast, preempting the one aimed at Sumy, and conducting the Kursk operation. This was the first transfer of combat operations onto enemy territory in this war.
The goal was never to occupy foreign land, he stressed, but to derail the prepared Russian offensive on Sumy and Kharkiv, draw off Russia's most capable troops, and replenish the exchange fund to bring Ukrainians home from captivity. All of it, he said, was accomplished.
He lists structural changes alongside battles
Syrskyi claimed the army's transformation as well as its operations.
Ukraine became the first country in the world to create a separate branch of unmanned systems forces, he noted, growing them "from individual units to a system that today makes the enemy feel it has no safe rear."
A new air defense was built: a separate command for unmanned air-defense systems, staffed interceptor-drone crews, and an echeloned shield over the rear.
"What was recently the experiment of enthusiasts today shoots down every night what was considered undownable," he said.
He cited the closure of the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, the systematic destruction of Russia's shadow fleet, the army's transition to a corps structure, and combat officers arriving on staff, with a new rule that "the path to leadership positions runs through the front."
This year's Dobropillia operation and the offensive on the Oleksandrivka direction, he said, continue. Of some operations, he still has no right to speak: "History will tell of them. I will say only: the enemy remembers them."
