“When you attack us you will see our faces – not our backs, but our faces.” Volodymyr Zelensky said that in an address posted on social media on 24 February 2022, hours before Russian forces began bombarding Ukrainian cities. He spoke partly in Russian. He said he had tried to phone Vladimir Putin to head off a war and got silence.
Three years earlier he had been a comedian with no political experience.
From sitcom to the presidency
Zelensky was born in 1978 in Kryvyi Rih, in central Ukraine. He took a law degree, co-founded a successful TV production company and spent most of his time until the mid-2010s on television and film. Some of those shows were made for a network owned by the billionaire Ihor Kolomoisky.
His best-known role was a school teacher who lands in the presidency in the series “Servant of the People”. When he entered the 2019 race at age 41, some voters took it as a joke. His party carried the same name as the show.
He won with 73 percent of the vote, on promises to fight corruption and bring peace to eastern Ukraine.
Doubters feared he would be a puppet of Kolomoisky, who had backed his campaign and had been investigated for fraud and money laundering. Zelensky turned out to be more independent than they expected, and his administration’s anti-corruption drive has had some success.
Many Ukrainians, however, thought he was too timid on Donbas and on Russia, according to communications consultant Yaryna Klyuchkovska. He kept stressing diplomacy even as Ukraine reported a sharp rise in ceasefire violations along the front line. Talks with Moscow produced prisoner exchanges and some movement on parts of the Minsk agreements, but no breakthrough. His approval rating slid through 2020.
The turn in tone
At the Munich Security Conference in February 2022, Zelensky laid out the threat his country faced and accused the West of appeasing a resurgent Russia. Klyuchkovska said no Ukrainian leader had spoken so bluntly to the West before.
After the invasion began, he appeared in military fatigues. That evening he warned Western leaders that without help, “war will knock on your doors”.
When Russia falsely claimed he had fled Kyiv, he posted a video of himself with senior advisers. “We are here,” he repeated. “We are in Kyiv. We are protecting Ukraine.” His nightly video addresses became a source of comfort for millions, and approval ratings reached a high of 90 percent right after the invasion.
His wife, Olena Zelenska, and their two children spent months in secret locations. The four have seen very little of each other since the war began.
Lobbying abroad
Zelensky made it his mission to rally support, pressing allies for aid and for faster Nato membership. Between trips to the front he phoned foreign leaders and appeared at conferences around the world. One of the lasting images of the early months was his April 2022 visit to Bucha, outside Kyiv, where Russian troops are suspected of committing hundreds of war crimes.
His first trip abroad after the invasion came in December 2022, to see then-President Joe Biden. Addressing Congress, he drew several standing ovations and said that “against all odds… Ukraine is alive and kicking” and will “never surrender”. Biden promised more support.
He was often frustrated, though, by how slowly Western help arrived and by reluctance to approve the use of certain weapons.
A rift with Washington
With Donald Trump back in the White House, the picture changed. At the end of February, three years into the war, Zelensky went to Washington expecting to sign a minerals agreement. He was told to leave the White House after an angry exchange with Trump and Vice-President JD Vance.
The US had also sided with Russia in UN votes marking the third anniversary of the invasion. American officials met Russian counterparts to discuss the war without Ukraine in the room, which Zelensky had long said should never happen. He accused the US of helping Putin “break out of years of isolation” and said Trump lives in a “Russian disinformation space”.
Trump called Zelensky a “dictator”, echoing Russian claims, and pointed out that Ukraine had not held an election since 2019. A vote set for May 2024 was suspended because the country has been under martial law since the invasion, a decision the opposition and most Ukrainians broadly backed. Zelensky has suggested he would resign in return for Nato membership.
Trump also went after his approval rating. It has dipped, Klyuchkovska noted, but from such a high start the only direction was down. Polling is limited, since millions have fled and Russia occupies about a fifth of the country. One recent survey still put his support at 57 percent.
Putin had hoped to take Ukraine within days. Three years in, Russia was still gaining ground, though Ukraine had slowed the advance and even mounted a counter-offensive inside Russia itself.
