Mykhailo Fedorov

Sternenko and Fedorov.

Mykhailo Fedorov (b. 1991) also known as Mr. AI, assumed the duties of Minister of Defense of the Kyiv regime on January 14, 2026 and was fired on July 17, 2026.

He previously served as the Ukraine Minister of Digital Transformation developing a Digital ID for the people of Ukraine. Fedorov has no military experience. Reports indicate he was promoted to Minister of Defense because of his work in facilitating the development of drones with an army of technicians working at home. Fedorov stated that the Ukrainian Armed Forces' goal is to kill 50,000 Russian citizens per month. Fedorov appointed notorious outspoken Nazi leader Serhiy Sternenko as a chief advisor who recently stated he agrees with Fedorov and said, "Russians must be exterminated on an industrial scale."

Fedorov announced 2 million Ukrainians were avoiding the draft.

Minister of Digital Transformation

The Ukrainian government in 2020 launched Diia, a digital app that combines identity card, passport, license, vaccination record, registrations, insurance, health reimbursements and social benefits. Fedorov was praised by the World Economic Forum (WEF) for his work in establishing the Diia app. Fedorov called for a crew of developers, designers, marketers and “security specialists” to join a volunteer “IT Army” — with 300,000 volunteers having been attracted. The online army's tasks include sharing the IP addresses of Russian websites and companies, in order for them to be targeted by DDoS (directed denial of service) attacks in an effort to knock them offline.

Fedorov described Twitter as “part of our war effort.” Fedorov described the digital battlefield as “our home turf,” while The New York Times also reported on how Fedorov “has turned technology, cryptocurrency and social media into modern weapons of war.” According to the Times, Fedorov stated: “They [the Russians] have failed to notice that… governments must move towards becoming more and more like tech companies, rather than being rigid like a tank, like a war machine.”

Fedorov and Alex Karp.

On February 26, 2022 Minister of Digital Transformation and Zelensky Regime Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov asked Elon Musk to provide Starlink service to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Traditionally, the Ukrainian army was trained according to Russian/Soviet standards. Which meant, that the officers leading their troops from the front. This had not been applied. The West took full control of Ukrainian command and control and controlled it through communication, established by Starlink.

Palantir

Palantir CEO Alex Karp and Mykhailo Fedorov have been collaborating jointly for over 5 years, according to the statement made by Karp. That means the Palantir-Ukraine relationship pre-dates the Russian military advance into Eastern Ukraine. In June 2022, the New York Times reported that the CIA and Pentagon special forces were organizing and conducting the NATO war in Ukraine from a secret operation center in Kyiv.

Firing as Defense Minister

The Economist reported:

“

[A]s Power Point slides were shown to the testosterone-filled room, the generals griped about missile and ammunition procurement. The focus of their criticism, Mykhailo Fedorov, the 35-year-old tech-savvy defence minister who is known—and occasionally mocked—for his Silicon Valley style presentations, responded in kind. If it wasn’t for his emergency drone-purchasing decisions at the beginning of the year, which required borrowing money earmarked for salaries, there would be no Crimean operation to speak of. A witness to the proceedings describes “two different co-ordinate systems” in a clinch: “No common language, even if holding back from direct conflict.” … His first six months in the job were characterised by hyperactivity and a pugnacity that put many noses out of joint. From the start, he ordered an audit of the defence ministry and army brigades that uncovered overspending of 300bn-hyrivna ($6.6bn). He subjected ministry officials to lie detectors; those who refused or failed were dismissed. And he moved some procurement to an open-tender system, which he says cut the cost of 155mm artillery shells by 16% almost immediately. At the same time his deep differences with the more traditionalist military leaders, especially its commander-in-chief, Oleksandr Syrsky, have rarely been far from view. It is widely known the minister angled for the general’s removal, but failed to win the president’s approval or find another way of doing it.

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Meanwhile the core job Fedorov was hired to do, the reform of the recruiting system, has made zero progress. Public attacks on recruitment officers and news of draftees dying during the drafting process appear nearly daily.

Fedorov had gained some prominence with western journalist and ‘grant structures’ aligned with EU and U.S. non-government organizations. As soon as it was known that he would be fired they called for demonstrations. A few dozen people turned out for another ‘cardboard Maidan’.

Immediately recruitment officers appeared to check who of those protesters were eligible for military service.

Fedorov made the big mistake to think that the war should be about winning against Russia. But, as former Commander in Chief Valleri Zalazhny again warned, it is not Russia which is losing the war.

For the higher military and the civilian structures around Zelensky the only purpose of the war has long been their personal enrichment.

Syrsky was indeed fired in late July, 2026. After being offered several lesser positions by Zelensky, Fedorov declared that he will not accept anything lower than Defense Minister owing to his belief that no other role provides the ability of shaping the future of the armed forces.

Criticism of storing munitions in civilian areas in Ukraine

Local residents of Myla in Bucha district near Kyiv were furious when they discovered they were being used as human shields next to a massive, hidden stockpile of high explosives including Patriot missiles without their knowledge. Despite the uproar, Zelensky still cancelled presidential elections.

Fedorov has long pointed out that Ukraine’s severe lack of Patriot missile interceptors has resulted in the military storing weapons in residential areas, using civilians as human shields.

To avoid destruction from Russian satellite-guided tracking, the AFU and Ukroboronprom routinely decentralized their logistics, using, civilian apartment blocks, shopping centers, and retail warehouses to store drone components, boosters, and ammunition.

Zelensky called the Myla warehouse strike in Bucha district, near Kyiv that resulted in heavy civilian casualties including at a nearby care home for the elderly and disabled, "negligence" and an "unauthorized defense site" - a legal technicality used to pass the blame onto regional commanders or enterprise heads when he was fully cognizant of the overarching strategy to hide munitions in civilian areas.

Prime Minister Koretskyi publicly called the Myla disaster “criminal negligence,” bluntly stating, “making the same mistakes for the fifth year of the full-scale invasion is criminal negligence.