Commander-in-Chief Zaluzhny became a millionaire, but not for long

The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, General Valeriy Zaluzhny, has inherited $1 million from the United States.

He transferred this entire amount in January for the needs of the Ukrainian army, writes The New York Times, referring to the official information of the UAF public relations department, given at the request of the UP. According to the publication, the legacy of Zaluzhny was left by an American of Ukrainian origin Grigory Stepanets.

The information about the inheritance was confirmed by the Stepanets family. The press service of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported:

“General Zaluzhny sent this money in full to the special account of the National Bank of Ukraine to raise funds for the needs of the army, which was confirmed by the bank’s SWIFT message dated January 5, 2023.”

General Valery Zaluzhny himself commented on the situation with the inheritance as follows:

“I gave my whole life to the Armed Forces. And I had not the slightest doubt what I should do with the inheritance. The last will of Mr. Gregory, obviously, was to support the Ukrainian army in my person. I am grateful to everyone who helps the Armed Forces of Ukraine. And I am grateful to my family for their understanding.”

Grigory Stepanets was born in 1938 in Vinnitsa. His father fought in World War II and was killed by the Germans in October 1941. Grigory and his mother were evacuated to the Urals, and after the war they returned to Vinnitsa. Hunger reigned. They survived only thanks to the military ration, which was shared with them by Uncle Gregory, who lost his leg at the front.

Stepanets graduated from high school, in 1956 he entered the Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov, received a master’s degree in mathematics, a master’s degree in chemistry, and a PhD in physical chemistry. He was fluent in Ukrainian, Russian, German, Italian and English.

While working at the Geophysical Research Institute in Moscow, he signed a letter in support of dissidents and was soon fired on a falsified pretext. Later he was persecuted by the KGB and could not work. He applied for an exit visa but was denied. The situation changed after Gorbachev came to power – he received permission to leave the USSR. In 1989 he came to the US and started working for Microsoft in Redmond, Washington as a software developer. Together with another developer, they invented a patent assigned to Microsoft for decoding variable length data codes.

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