Major General Mykhailo Drapatyi was appointed as the new Commander- in-Chief of Ukraine’s Armed Forces. Ukraine strikes 13 Russian shadow fleet vessels, warehouses of the Wildberries online retailer. Ukraine will start producing L119 light guns under license from UK’s BAE Systems.
Mykhailo Drapatyi appointed as new Commander-in-Chief of Ukraine’s Armed Forces
In a nightly address on Tuesday, Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelenskyi, named 43-year-old Major General Mykhailo Drapatyi as the new Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The outgoing army chief, General Oleksandr Syrskyi, took the post in 2024, succeeding General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi.
Syrskyi was dismissed following days of protests in Kyiv and other cities across Ukraine over the removal of Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov on July 16. Speaking at a news conference in Kyiv after his axing, Fedorov accused Syrskyi of blocking his team’s initiatives and “weaving intrigues.”
In a message on social media Wednesday, announcing that he was leaving office after almost 2.5 years, Syrskyi listed the results of his work, saying: “Today I am leaving the post of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. (…) I earlier said it and I repeat it today: my job is the war. Positions change, and this principle doesn’t. I will serve Ukraine until the victory in whatever capacity I am.”
In February 2024, when Syrskyi took office as the army chief, the Ukrainian military was carrying out a defensive operation of Avdiyivka, in Donetsk region. One of his first decisions was an order for the half-encircled troops to withdraw from the city. In the year that followed, Ukraine’s defense forces stopped Russian advances in the regions of Kharkiv and Sumy, and carried out the Kursk incursion.
Syrskyi also said that during his time in office the Unmanned Systems Forces were established, the army changed into the corps system, the country’s air defenses were reformed, there were operations in the Black Sea, Russia’s shadow fleet was destroyed and Ukrainian troops carried out offensive operations in Donetsk region.
“The main thing is the situation in the battlefield that I’m handing over [to successors]. This year, 700 square kilometers of our land have been liberated under my commandership. An army that two years ago was conducting difficult defensive operations, is on the offensive today,” Syrskyi said.
Major General Mykhailo Drapatyi said Wednesday that he took office as the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Major General Ihor Skybyuk, former commander of the Air Assault Forces will become the head of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Drapatyi said.
“Difficult work lies ahead, so we are working with no clamorous promises, but with responsibility over our decisions and respect to the people who are holding the front lines and are helping Ukraine to keep standing,” he said in a post to Facebook Wednesday.
He added that Zelenskyi formulated “clear tasks” for him and Skubyuk that include ones to continue and reinforce offensive operations in all domains, plan new operations in the enemy’s rear, develop the army and technology, and build up capacities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces.
Drapatyi said he first met Skybyuk in southern Ukraine in 2022 when the two directed an operation to recapture Kherson region from the same command post.
“Since then I have known him as a commander who can be trusted in difficult circumstances and whose decisions, experience and personal principles can be relied upon. His commandership of the Air Assault Forces grew strong commanders, including Oleh Apostol, Dmytro Voloshyn, Yevhen Lasiychuk, Svyatoslav Zayits, Emil Ishkulov, Andriy Tkachuk and many others,” Drapatyi said.
Ukraine strikes 13 Russian shadow fleet vessels, warehouses of Wildberries online retailer
The Ukrainian military struck a total of 13 Russian shadow fleet vessels and 13 energy facilities in Crimea and in other occupied Ukrainian territories on Tuesday and Wednesday, Commander of the Unmanned Systems Forces, Major Robert Brovdi who goes by the call sign Magyar said in a post to social media.
The vessels include a tanker, 10 dry cargo ships and two tugboats. They were hit in the Black and Azov seas as part of the MoLoCHKa operation, Brovdi said.
The Ukrainian military identified and struck a total of 196 Russian shadow fleet vessels between July 6 and July 22 as part of the effort. He added that 126 vessels were hit in the Azov Sea and 70 in the Black Sea.
“Crimean Power Switch Off. +13 energy nodes in Crimea and other temporarily occupied territories were successfully struck during July 21–22. The operation’s overall tally for July 1–22 has now reached 117 energy targets,” the 414th Separate Unmanned Strike Aviation System Brigade “Magyar’s Birds” said in a post to X on Wednesday.
Drone attacks on Russia’s Krasnodar and Nevinnomyssk, in the Stavropol region overnight on Wednesday hit warehouses of Russia’s Wildberries online retailer.
The Astra Telegram Channel said a warehouse in the north-eastern part of Krasnodar was on fire. The Wildberries company said early on Wednesday that its warehouse in Krasnodar had been “evacuated according to safety standards.”
Writing in English on X on Wednesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi said: “Today, Ukraine’s long-range sanctions successfully struck important targets in Russia’s Krasnodar and Stavropol regions – logistics hubs involved in supplying the Russian army with drone components, navigation equipment, and other gear – as well as another oil depot.”
“We are, quite justly, bringing the war back home – to Russia. Peace is needed, and Ukraine has presented the Russian side with every proposal. They must be forced to turn to diplomacy,” he added.
Ukraine to produce L119 light guns under license from UK’s BAE Systems
The UK’s BAE Systems has signed a licensing agreement with a strategic defense partner to produce its L119 105mm Light Gun in Ukraine.
The agreement, signed at the Farnborough International Airshow, will provide access to BAE Systems’ technical information and the support needed to manufacture an initial gun for testing, the company said in a press release on Tuesday.
The L119’s maximum firing range is between 11 and 19 kilometers. It can be towed or carried by a helicopter.
“The strategic partnership will support the development of a variant of the L119 Light Gun for use by the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” the company said, adding that the agreement “builds on BAE Systems’ long-term support to Ukraine and its work with Ukrainian industry to strengthen the country’s sovereign defence capability.”
The name of the Ukrainian partner company was not disclosed.
Giles Ambrose, Engineering, Technology and Strategy Director at BAE Systems Weapon Systems UK, was quoted in the company’s press release as saying: “Strong defence capability depends on trusted industrial strategic partnerships. This agreement brings together BAE Systems’ artillery expertise and our strategic defence partner’s knowledge of Ukraine’s operational requirements to support the development of sovereign capability where it’s needed most.”
In an interview with Ukrainian news site Novynarnya last autumn, the commander of the 147th Separate Artillery Brigade of the 7th Rapid Response Corps of Ukraine’s Air Assault Forces, Colonel Viktor Dovhal, praised the L119 gun for its precision. He described several episodes that included the weapon when he served in the 46th Separate Airmobile Brigade as artillery chief between 2023 and 2025.
“When I was the head of the 46th Brigade’s artillery [branch], we used to work with L119 guns and D-30 Soviet guns. There was a case when an adversary’s mechanized convoy was trying to carry out assault actions. We fired a gun, and the first shot hit a moving tank and destroyed it. There was another case when a L119 gun fired at a tank near Maryinka [in Donetsk region]. An FPV drone that was diving to strike the same tank filmed the moment of the hit,” Dovhal said.