Volodymyr Zelenskyy has appointed Kyrylo Budanov as the new head of the presidential office of Ukraine. Budanov, head of the Ukrainian military intelligence service, now fills one of the posts that became vacant in the wake of a corruption scandal in the upper echelons of power in Kyiv. His predecessor, Andrii Yermak, resigned at the end of November.

Budanov is already the third chief of staff under Zelenskyy. It is considered a powerful post; Yermak accompanied the president to important international meetings, including negotiations on ending Russia's war against Ukraine.

First soldier to head office

This marks the first time a soldier has headed Zelenskyy's presidential office. As head of the secret service, Budanov is one of the most popular political figures in the country, and considered a potential rival to Zelenskyy in the next presidential elections. Only the president himself and the former commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian armed forces and current ambassador to the United Kingdom, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, score higher in polls.

According to a poll conducted by the Socis Center, a Kyiv-based research institute, in mid-December 2025, Budanov would come in third in the first round of a presidential election with 5.7%. Zelenskyy and Zaluzhnyi would each get just over 20% of votes. The poll also showed that both Zaluzhnyi and Budanov could beat Zelenskyy in a runoff election. Still, neither has officially declared presidential ambitions.

Veteran of missions in Donbas, Crimea

At 39, Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov is the youngest chief of staff during Zelenskyy's term. In 2020, Zelenskyy had already made him the youngest head of the Ukrainian military intelligence service, HUR.

According to media reports, Budanov comes from Kyiv and served as an officer in a special forces unit, with missions in Donbas from 2014 onward. He is said to have carried out missions in the Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine, particularly in Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014.

He became better known after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Budanov's name was also recognized in Europe after the secret service made international headlines with spectacular drone attacks on military airfields and other targets deep inside Russian territory. This was followed by attacks on Russian ships, refineries and oil terminals on the Black Sea.

After the HUR sank two warships, Zelenskyy awarded Budanov the Hero of Ukraine medal in February 2024.

Media presence

Budanov has taken part in various combat missions himself. In November 2025, he made headlines when he landed by helicopter with military intelligence units in the Pokrovsk area, in western Donetsk that the Russian army had already declared captured. Parts of Pokrovsk remain under the control of Ukrainian forces.

Budanov has also contributed to his own fame with a degree of self-promotion unusual for an intelligence officer. At the beginning of the Ukrainian counteroffensive in June 2023, a video of Budanov appeared in which he remained silent for half a minute in front of a running camera. "More to follow, plans love silence" was written on the screen.

In a video posted on the Day of the Security Service of Ukraine, he blew out candles on a cake to the sound of explosions. Later, images of a cake in the shape of a map of the Russia, which Budanov received as a birthday present, went viral.

Budanov has also been unusually accessible to media. Of Ukraine's senior leadership, only Zelenskyy has given more interviews.

Public criticism

But Budanov has also been criticized. In the fall of 2022, he predicted that the Ukrainian army would be in Crimea by the summer of 2023, which obviously did not happen. He has since become more cautious with such predictions.

And other operations have not gone so smoothly: One of the most famous missions led by Budanov was the recruitment of Russian military pilot Maxim Kuzminov, who flew to Ukraine in a Mil Mi-8 helicopter in August 2023. Kuzminov was killed in Spain six months later, presumably by Russian agents.

And at the end of 2024, reports appeared in Ukrainian media about Budanov's possible dismissal after several operations led to losses of highly qualified personnel.

In Moscow's crosshairs

Budanov has also been the target of assassination attempts by Russia. In the fall of 2023, Ukrainian military intelligence reported that Budanov's wife and several officers had been poisoned.

As the president's chief of staff, Budanov is expected to give the office a stronger military focus than his predecessors. However, he will also likely take on a diplomatic role. At the end of November, Budanov was in the United Arab Emirates during negotiations between representatives of the US and Russia. Details of these talks are not known. But in a recent interview, Budanov said he expected a "window of opportunity" for negotiations to remain open until February 2026.

This article was originally written in Russian.