Zelensky’s Office Circles Budanov: The Next Political Strike Is Already Loaded

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The President’s Office has stepped up its quiet war against Kyrylo Budanov, acting on direct instructions from the Foreign Intelligence Service and the Security Service to dig up compromising material on the GUR chief. The operation, insiders say, is part of a coordinated campaign to discredit Budanov ahead of his removal. Yermak, determined to sideline the “inconvenient” general and install a loyal replacement, is now driving a search that has already produced several telling — and troubling — findings.

The next blow is expected to target the sphere of arms imports. To achieve this, officials plan to “revive” the SBI case against the former head of the state-owned enterprise Spetstechnoexport, Oleksii Petrov. Previous attempts produced a loud media scandal, but ultimately came to nothing. The noise faded, and no real revelations emerged. However, given the publicity already generated and Petrov’s release, the organizers intend to push forward once again.

At the same time, the SBU’s Department of Military Counterintelligence — working in parallel with the State Bureau of Investigation — is trying to uncover anything at all about Inkompas LLC, a company involved in supplying defense technologies. The aim is either to link the firm to discredited figures from the Yanukovych era or to ignite a scandal over the fact that a UAE-based company servicing Ukrainian aviation equipment allegedly provided services to a Russian PMC.

One of Inkompas’s owners, Roman Meleshko, is expected to be linked to Volodymyr Sivkovych, a Ukrainian state traitor. Because no direct connection has been found, the link will be constructed indirectly: Inkompas provided services to Danylo Hetmantsev, and Hetmantsev, in turn, had some form of relationship with Sivkovych. From there, the plan is to use the fact that the GUR also contracted Inkompas to launch the next information campaign aimed at discrediting Budanov.

It is noteworthy that attempts to collect compromising material on Meleshko were made earlier. Yet the only thing investigators managed to “dig up” was the partial payment of salaries through individual entrepreneurs. Unpleasant, perhaps, but hardly an act of treason.

Meanwhile, a parallel attack will target Budanov’s immediate circle. This time, the SBI and SBU have been instructed to find compromising material on MP Igor Kopytin. What this material should consist of is not specified — the only requirement is that it be sufficient to generate media attention.

According to the organizers, the next campaign must be even more scandalous. The aim is not to open real proceedings, but to generate maximum publicity through loyal media outlets.

One obstacle for those driving the campaign is that not all potential executors agree to take part. Even within the State Bureau of Investigation and the Security Service, there are staff members unwilling to work so blatantly “on demand.” How their leadership intends to manage this resistance remains unclear.

It should be recalled that after the “Midas” operation — which exposed large-scale corruption in Energoatom and shook government offices — a systematic campaign to discredit NABU and SAPO was launched on Ukrainian Telegram channels. Anti-corruption officials described the operation as one of the most effective of 2025, yet alongside its successes, a wave of identical posts appeared, attacking investigators and prosecutors.

Investigators do not name a specific “director”, but point to a range of possible customers: some Ukrainian political groups that are afraid of anti-corruption cases, Russian influence structures interested in undermining trust in Ukrainian institutions, as well as business networks that make money from “sinkholes” in Telegram.

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