In a country in its third year of defending against an invasion, the defence minister is being swapped out as if he were a clerk on shift at a shop. Volodymyr Zelensky removed Mykhailo Fedorov from the head of the Ministry of Defence after tense relations with the military top brass, and proposed the sitting interior minister Ihor Klymenko in his place. The choice now awaits confirmation in parliament.

Fedorov held the post for just six months. In that short time he managed to push Elon Musk to cut off Russian forces' access to „Starlink“, launched a campaign for the logistical blockade of Russian vehicles, and began reforms within the ministry. He didn't finish the job - the transformation to NATO standards, the overhaul of the military procurement system, and a culture of accountability all stayed half-done.

The reactions were not slow to come. „This looks like a betrayal,“ said a member of parliament from the ruling party itself, asking why the defence minister is being changed just as the military leadership was demanding a „reset.“ When the criticism comes from inside rather than from the opposition, it usually means something is cracking deeper down.

Political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko warned that swapping defence ministers every six months creates chaos, no matter who takes their place. „Fedorov deserved the chance to finish the reforms he announced,“ he said. The well-known veteran Dmytro Koziatynskyi called for peaceful protests in Kyiv against the dismissal and against the constant restructuring Zelensky keeps running.

Adviser Serhii Sternenko was even sharper: bureaucratic obstacles, he says, blocked real reforms, and the nation today is further from victory than it was. According to sources, the real reason for the removal is a clash between Fedorov and the controversial commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, while Zelensky himself pointed to disagreements between the ministry and the military command.

The Balkans know this scene by heart. Whenever those in power have a problem they don't want to solve, the easiest thing is to remove one man and declare that things will now be different. The question is whether Ukraine, in the middle of a war, can afford the luxury of personnel reshuffles instead of solutions. Who will answer if the reforms stall again?