Alexander Sirski was born in Russia to ethnic Russian parents. When he was 15 his family moved to Kharkov in Ukraine when his father — a military man — was transferred there.
After graduating high school in Ukraine he attended a military school in Moscow. Upon graduation in 1986 he won commission to the Soviet Army and served in the Soviet War in Afghanistan.
As a Soviet officer he would have been a member of the Communist Party.
When the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991 Sirski was stationed in Kharkov in Ukraine, thus his unit passed into the Ukrainian military.
In February Sirski was appointed the overall commander of the Ukrainian military, replacing Valeri Zaluzhni.
It is said Zelensky replaced Zaluzhni because of Zaluzhni’s great popularity. He was starting to be seen as someone who could easily become Ukraine’s next president.
Zaluzhni had also candidly spoken about the necessity of mobilizing hundreds of thousands more, which initially shocked Zelensky.
At the start of the war until his promotion Sirski was the overall commander of the Ground Army. A post he held since 2019.
He is a veteran of the 2014-15 Donbass war, and was the overall commander of the Ukrainian forces in Donbass in 2017.
Zaluzhni is a capable military officer and an effective leader. Replacing him in the middle of a war is an epic blunder.