Ukraine has removed the minister who had begun turning its drone advantage into a system – in the same week its drones were burning Russian refineries.
Mykhailo Fedorov ran the defence ministry for six months, coming to it as the driving force behind the ‘Army of Drones’.
He scaled drone procurement, backed the deep strikes reaching Russian oil, and launched the mid-range campaign against the logistics supplying occupied Crimea.
Fedorov is credited for SpaceX disabling the Starlink terminals Russian forces relied on, and launched fixed-term contracts and higher infantry pay.
There is criticism too, the reforms were slow to show results and mobilisation did not improve. But from the outside, this was clearly a minister who delivered.
