A political earthquake just hit Ukraine.
Andriy Yermak—the chief of staff and right-hand man of Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky—resigned on Friday after anticorruption watchdogs raided his home and office. Such investigations have heated up in Ukraine the last few weeks but until now haven’t burned anyone nearly as prominent as Yermak, whose political power arguably rivaled that of the president himself.
Assuming you’ve read my article on Yermak from October, you can probably guess that I consider this a salutary development. Depending on how Zelensky handles the crisis, Yermak’s ouster could signal a beginning of the end of the war with Russia and even herald a post-war Ukraine that is sovereign, free, and democratic.
If that seems hyperbolic, consider the multifaceted and extremely damaging role that Yermak has played in Ukrainian politics since Russia’s 2022 invasion.
He has consolidated power to an outrageous extent, sidelining political opponents, appointing allies to top government positions, and controlling access to the president. Yermak is even reported to sleep near Zelensky in the presidential bunker, an indication of the strange codependence that has developed between the two men.
When word broke recently about a $100 million embezzlement scandal in the energy sector, suspicions arose that Yermak was implicated. Long before this latest scandal, Ukrainians had worried that Yermak was using his immense power to revitalize the corrupt, post-Soviet oligarchic structures for which their country is sadly known.
He’s done little to disabuse them of this notion. This summer, Yermak devised a crackdown on the very watchdogs that are now investigating him—a power grab that Zelensky reversed following street protests. “Yermak out!” the demonstrators yelled. “F— Yermak!”
Yermak hasn’t always responded well to dissent. He’s even created lists of domestic political enemies for national security organs to sanction.
This month, Zelensky, facing growing pressure to fire Yermak amid the corruption scandal, instead made him head of the Ukrainian team negotiating a new U.S. peace plan for Russia–Ukraine. This was a setback for the White House, which was plainly trying to use Zelensky’s weakened position as an opportunity to push a plan that makes concessions to Moscow.
Yermak has long enforced a hardline bargaining position and opposed the kind of concessions that analysts say would be necessary to get a peace deal. This week he declared that Zelensky will never exchange land for peace, though the U.S. proposal had allowed that some Ukrainian territory be evacuated and turned into a demilitarized zone. Last year, Yermak coauthored a Foreign Affairs article that presented “victory” as the only path to peace for Ukraine—a pipe dream considering Russia’s military advantages.
Yermak’s departure from the negotiating team increases the chances that Kiev will take a more concessive approach to negotiations, closing the gap between the Ukrainian and Russian positions.
Yermak hasn’t just hampered the peace process but also the war effort. He is widely believed to have engineered Valery Zaluzhny’s removal as commander-in-chief last year. In the war’s early years, Zaluzhny came to be regarded by Ukrainians as an almost mythic national hero—and by Yermak as a political threat.
Back in America, the DC political class has found rare bipartisan agreement in deeming Yermak an irritant and political malefactor, and the Trump administration has certainly been no exception to that consensus. When Vice President JD Vance’s office phoned Zaluzhny in March to probe whether he’d be a worthy successor to Zelensky, whose term officially had ended one year prior, Yermak intervened, convincing him to reject the calls. Now that Yermak is out, the Trump team will find fewer obstacles to their geopolitical maneuvering around Ukraine.
So, does Yermak’s resignation mean peace is at hand and Ukraine’s democracy will bloom? Not necessarily.
Announcing the resignation, Zelensky said that Yermak had represented well Ukraine’s negotiating position. Thus, a change in diplomatic strategy might not be forthcoming. And even if Ukraine becomes more concessive, President Vladimir Putin may still prove averse to making peace while Russia has the battlefield momentum. Nevertheless, Zelensky should seize this chance to reverse course and embrace the U.S. peace plan, which Yermak had worked to modify in ways unpalatable to Moscow.
Of course, much hinges on who Zelensky chooses to replace Yermak as chief of staff. One rumor says that person will be Yuliia Svyrydenko, Ukraine’s prime minister and a strong ally of Yermak. This would be a serious mistake by Zelensky. To truly take Ukraine beyond the sordid Yermak era, he should choose a more credible successor, someone hailing from outside the orbit of the disgraced former chief of staff.
Whatever happens next, the investigation and resignation of Yermak are good signs for Ukraine. Though he and Zelensky increasingly governed Ukraine as a wartime diarchy, the stunning spectacle of independent watchdogs searching Yermak’s office showed that the country’s liberal institutions remain strong. This is a fragile and uncertain moment for Ukraine, but also a hopeful and necessary one.
The post Zelensky’s Top Adviser Is Out. What’s Next? appeared first on The American Conservative.
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