The President's Daily Brief - PDB Afternoon Bulletin | July 22nd, 2026: Zelensky Just Fired Ukraine's Top General & Saudi Nuclear Pact

Episode Date: July 22, 2026

In this episode of The PDB Afternoon Bulletin: Ukraine's wartime leadership is thrown into turmoil after President Volodymyr Zelensky dismisses the country's top military commander following days of rare public protests and growing divisions over how the war against Russia should be fought. The Trump administration reaches a landmark nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia that could allow the kingdom to enrich its own nuclear fuel, raising fresh concerns in Washington and Israel about the risks of nuclear proliferation. To listen to the show ad-free, become a premium member of The President’s Daily Brief by visiting https://PDBPremium.com. Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of The President's Daily Brief. YouTube: youtube.com/@presidentsdailybrief Wild Alaskan Company: Get $35 off your first box of wild-caught, sustainable seafood—delivered right to your door. Go to: https://www.wildalaskan.com/PDB Goldbelly: Impress your family and friends - get free shipping and 20% off your first order at https://GOLDBELLY.com with code PDB. HomeServe: Protect your home systems from expensive repairs with https://HomeServe.com/dailybrief and get 50% off your first year of coverage. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Thanks, Beth 365. Must be 19 or older Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or the gambling of someone close to you, please go to connectsuntario.cate and C-A-T-Supply. It's Wednesday, the 22nd of July. Welcome to the PDB afternoon bulletin. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First up, Ukraine's wartime leadership has just undergone another shake-up as President Zelensky dismisses his top military commander following days of protests. I'll have the details. Later in the show, the Trump administration reaches a landmark nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia. But critics warns.

that it could put the kingdom on a path toward developing nuclear weapons. But first, today's afternoon spotlight. We're beginning today with a major update on a story that we've been tracking here on the President's Daily Brief since it first broke last week. Ukrainian President Zelenskyy has now dismissed the country's top military commander, General Alexander Siersky, bringing an abrupt end to one of the most turbulent weeks inside Ukraine's wartime leadership. The move marks a major reversal for Zelensky.

As we've been reporting over the past several days, this saga began when the president unexpectedly fired his popular defense minister, Mihailo Fedorov, after an escalating dispute between Fedorov and General Siersky over how Ukraine should fight the next phase of the war against Russia. At the time, Zelenskyy sided with General Siersky, keeping him in command while removing Fedorov. That decision quickly triggered protests from supporters of Fedorov. thousands of Ukrainians took to the streets in some of the largest wartime demonstrations the country has seen, arguing that Fedorov's dismissal represented a step backward, just as Ukraine was beginning to regain momentum on the battlefield. For many Ukrainians, particularly younger soldiers

and military reformers, Federov had become the face of a new vision for the armed forces. Rather than relying primarily on manpower and grinding attritional warfare, Federov pushed for a military increasingly built around drones, autonomous warfare systems, artificial intelligence, electronic warfare, and rapid technological innovation. Many credited that strategy with helping Ukraine strike hundreds of miles inside Russia, damaging logistics hubs and fuel depots, air bases, and other critical infrastructure, while avoiding the enormous casualty rates associated with traditional offensive operations. General Siersky, meanwhile, had increasingly come to symbolize the opposite approach. A veteran commander, trained under the Soviet military system,

Siersky earned praise for helping defend Kiv during the opening weeks of Putin's invasion and for leading Ukraine's successful Kharkiv counteroffensive back in 2022. But in recent years, he had also become a deeply polarizing figure. Critics accused him of relying too heavily on costly attritional tactics, particularly during the brutal Battle of Bakhmut, where heavy Ukrainian losses earned him the nickname the butcher, among some of his detractors. That's a label that he consistently rejected. Well, there's no surprise there. It's not exactly a flattering label. As protests intensified, the disagreement expanded far beyond a

personal rivalry between two senior officials. Senior military officers publicly sided with Federov. Several commanders criticized the military's existing leadership, while protesters carried signs declaring, quote, Federov as innovation, old grandpas are degeneration, end quote. For President Zelensky, the dispute increasingly threatened something far more dangerous than bad headlines. It threatened the unity that has helped sustain Ukraine throughout more than four years of Vladimir Putin's war. Over the past several days, Zelensky reportedly met with senior commanders, political advisors, and military officials in an effort to resolve the growing crisis. And ultimately, he changed course. On Tuesday evening, Zeletsky announced that General Siersky would be removed as commander-in-chief,

replacing him is 43-year-old Major General Mikhailo Dropati, one of Ukraine's most respected battlefield commanders and a man who, in many ways, embodies the reforms that protesters were demanding. Drapati belongs to a younger generation of Ukrainian officers shaped by this war rather than by Soviet military tradition. Reuters reports that he's built a reputation for integrating drones into frontline operations, encouraging tactical innovation, and giving subordinate commanders. greater flexibility to make decisions on rapidly changing battlefields. He's also earned considerable respect among rank-and-file troops for his leadership style. Unlike many senior commanders, Dropati has

demonstrated a willingness to publicly accept responsibility when things go wrong. Last year, after a series of deadly Russian strikes hit Ukrainian training facilities, he resigned from his position as head of Ukraine's ground forces, arguing that military leaders must be accountable for their failures. In that same resignation statement, he criticized what he described as a lingering Soviet-style command culture marked by bureaucracy, fear, and a lack of innovation, many of the same criticisms now being leveled against the military establishment that Siersky came to represent. However, despite the optimism surrounding Drapati's appointment, military analysts are warning against expecting immediate miracles. Ukraine still faces enormous structural challenges.

Russian forces continue pressing along key sections of the front. Ukraine remains short on manpower, its mobilization system continues to generate controversy, and shortages of Western air defense interceptors have left cities increasingly vulnerable to Russian missile attacks. Simply replacing the country's top general obviously won't solve those problems overnight. Still, the political significance of this decision is difficult to overstate. In the span of just a few days, President Zelensky went from backing Ukraine's old military guard to replacing its top commander with one of the country's leading

advocates for modernization and technological innovation. Whether that shift helps to change the course of the war, well, that, of course, remains to be seen. All right, coming up next, Washington is preparing to let Saudi Arabia enrich nuclear fuel under a new agreement. We'll explain why the deal is raising alarms in both Congress and Israel. I'll be right back. Hey, Mike Baker here. Now, getting High-quality seafood used to mean, well, settling for whatever the grocery store near you managed to stock. But now you've got a much better option. I want to tell you about the Wild Alaskan Company. The Wild Alaskan Company delivers wild caught, premium seafood straight to your door on whatever customized schedule you want. It's that simple. Unboxing that first delivery is a

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The Trump administration is taking a major gamble in the Middle East, betting that keeping Saudi Arabia inside America's orbit is worth accepting greater nuclear risk. The White House announced today that it's reached a landmark civilian nuclear agreement with Riyadh, one that could eventually allow the kingdom to enrich its own nuclear fuel. Enriching uranium is how countries, of course, produce fuel for civilian nuclear reactors, but it's also the key pathway to building a nuclear weapon, The same process that can power a city's electrical grid can also move a country much closer to building a bomb. And that's why this agreement is generating so much controversy.

Normally, American nuclear agreements are designed to prevent that risk. Take the United Arab Emirates, the UAE. When Abu Dhabi signed its civilian nuclear deal with Washington back in 2009, it permanently gave up the right to enrich uranium on its own soil. It also accepted tougher international inspections, giving the International Atomic Energy Agency, the IAEA, expanded authority to search for undeclared nuclear activity. Saudi Arabia isn't making those same commitments.

Instead, the framework announced today would eventually allow the kingdom to enrich uranium and reprocess plutonium domestically. Those technologies can absolutely support a peaceful civilian nuclear program, but they can also dramatically shorten the path to producing weapons-grade nuclear material. Riyadh is also declining to adopt the IAEA's additional protocol, meaning international inspectors would have fewer tools to detect undeclared nuclear activity than they would under the UAE agreement as an example. So why would Washington, you ask yourself, agree to this arrangement?

Well, the answer is basically geopolitics. The Trump administration wants Saudi Arabia firmly aligned with the U.S. as the conflict with Iran continues to reshape the Middle East. But over the past several years, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has made it clear that Riyadh intends to pursue its own interests, even when they don't perfectly align with Washington's. That was on display during the recent conflict with Iran, when Saudi Arabia reportedly refused to allow U.S. aircraft to use Saudi airspace during operations near the Strait of Hormuz. That left Washington with two choices.

It could continue insisting on restrictions that the Saudis have rejected for years and risk watching Riyadh turn to China or Russia for nuclear technology, or it could accept a greater proliferation risk while keeping the U.S. at the center of Saudi Arabia's nuclear program and preserving American influence over how that program develops. That decision also reflects a broader shift in U.S. policy. During the Biden administration, civilian nuclear cooperation was tied to a much larger diplomatic package that would have required Saudi Arabia to normalize relations with Israel, but after Hamas's October 7, a terrorist attacks, those negotiations, of course, collapsed. Rather than wait for a broader regional agreement, President Trump separated

the nuclear talks from Saudi-Israeli normalization. He and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman revived negotiations during the Prince's White House visit last November, and today's announcement marks the result of months of negotiations over one of the most sensitive issues in modern nuclear diplomacy. Critics, including lawmakers from both U.S. parties and also Israeli officials, warn the agreement could eventually fuel a regional nuclear arms race. Those concerns are reinforced by comments that MBS made several years ago when he said Saudi Arabia would pursue nuclear weapons, quote, without a doubt, if Iran ever acquired one. The administration, however, sees the issue differently. Its argument is that Saudi Arabia is almost certainly going to develop civilian nuclear

power regardless. The real question is whether the U.S. helps build it or leaves that job to Beijing or Moscow. And that, my friends, is the PDB afternoon bulletin for Wednesday, the 22nd of July. Now, if you have any questions or comments, and I hope you do, just reach out to me at PDB at thefirsttv.com. To listen to the show ad-free, that is a very simple thing to do, just become a premium member of the president's daily brief by visiting pdbb premium.com. I'm Mike Baker, and I'll be back tomorrow. Until then, stay informed. Stay safe. Stay cool. Hey, Mike Baker here with an important message for homeowners. Now, think about the last time one of your home systems or appliances failed you, right? A pipe burst or your AC quit during a heat wave. Remember that sudden panic? Scambling for a plumber

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