Like the ousted defense minister, the commander-in-chief avoided direct personal attacks, but the point of much of his criticism was quite clear.

“Performances should not become self-performances,” he wrote, in a thinly veiled swipe at Federov’s long, detailed press conference last week.

“Behind each slide there must be a document, a budget and a procedure,” the general continued. “Otherwise, instead of making a decision, the army is disappointed.”

Syrskyi’s problem, however, is that most Ukrainians, especially younger ones, seem to trust Federov’s analysis of what needs to change for Ukraine to win the war, not the general’s.

Federov, more than anyone, is considered by many to be the driver of innovation in the military, gradually improving Ukraine’s chances of pushing back its numerically superior enemy.

“Right now the war is changing, so we need new ideas and a new structure,” Tetiana Makarenko, a 44-year-old law firm employee, told me at one of the weekend protests.

“It is often said that a small Soviet army cannot defeat a large Soviet army. It is time to change the mentality and start a new type of war.”

Federov’s six months at the helm of the Defense Ministry have coincided with a series of military successes that are attributed to the minister, perhaps not always fairly.

“We had this feeling because we saw the change in the situation,” Makarenko said. “We had a feeling we could do it.”

In his article, Syrskyi responded to those who accused him of lacking strategy or failing to adopt new technologies.

“The strangest reproach I’ve ever heard is that I supposedly don’t want to fight with drones,” he said, noting that he had presided over the creation of an unmanned systems force as a separate branch of the military.