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Yes, there's probably something like that going on. What's funny about his martial-casual attire is that I very distinctively remember it being a truism when I was growing up that any head of state who routinely wore military attire was most likely a dictator or a warlord. It was even a pretty easy media trope in action and espionage movies to quickly establish that a ruler was evil by dressing the character in military uniform or some kind of martial aesthetic. There was supposed to be something unnerving and almost pathetic about a man not actively fighting on the frontline nor being an active member of the military in the conventional sense and still choosing to wear army garb each day. It's not like Thatcher wore a uniform during the Falklands War when she was in London governing, only when visiting the fighting troops.
I also remember - having gone to a French school - learning about how amidst the worsening Algeria crisis, De Gaulle responded to the erection of barricades in Algiers by appearing on state television wearing his old army uniform as a show of force and reminder of his past role in France's liberation. This move apparently shocked French society, especially on the political left, and strongly nourished already present fears that he was an authoritarian who might dismantle French Democracy.
Funny to see how quickly this association vanished with Zelenskyy, although maybe it was already an outdated 20th century relic anyway since most dictators today just wear business suits.
Zelensky doesn't wear a military uniform though, he just wears a sort of grey tracksuit style thing? It reads less like military and more like guy spending a lot of time in the sauna while pretending to go to the gym.
Looks more like the guy who shops at the PX of the local army base and then hangs around nearby bars to me:
https://assets.weforum.org/sf_account/image/responsive_small_webp_2pPb1R7-GRMljQdfgjneh3e6AYb2QP2XAxAunEbA69A.webp
"I'm not saying I'm a soldier, buuuuut...."
It looks like a T-shirt and a cheap north face jacket to me.
An army green t-shirt and an cheap bomber-style jacket, yes -- that's kind of the point being made here.
I think it might have gone gone over better if had worn his usual green fatigues. The one he wore to the White House looks too much like a track suit.
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I am by no means a fashion expert, but that is not a bomber jacket. Maybe in some esoteric fashion world it is. In the world I live in, these are bomber jackets.
Even some of those are kind of not that classy. "Cheap bomber jacket" is a total loser move.
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Grey Man Chic.
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I thought he was going for military-adjacent without transparently pretending to be an actual soldier.
Maybe. He doesn't hit any marks for me and I doubt anyone would know these "intentions" and make this argument for him without him repeating it over and over to friendly press. He looks like halfway between a tech billionaire that stopped giving a fuck and an 80s mobster.
Like I said, the closest I've got is, "guy who goes to the gym all the time but never works out and just sits in the sauna."
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There is a related-but-distinct line of clothing chic with Zelensky, and that is that a suit is not as benign / respectable in his context, since suites are often associated with the rich, powerful, and connected- i.e. the corrupt oligarchic class, whose reputation for selling out Ukraine is so well known that it shapes American doubter perceptions of Zelensky.
Americans like Trump want suites because it's seen as the normative / proper thing to do at high-level engagements, and being underdressed can be insulting as a sort of claim of 'I'm so important I can ignore it.' But this is not a universal view, and Zelensky breaking character not only at Trump's behest, but specifically for a very one-sided natural resource deal that could be characterized as selling out Ukraine, would be an obvious propaganda attack line.
Put another way- if the first time Zelensky put on a suit was to give the Americans a potential veto of 50% of future Ukrainian mineral projects going forward, it would not be seen by the Ukrainian home audience as a respectable and uncontroversial business attire, but something appropriate for an oligarch.
Worth also remembering that Zelensky became a Presidential candidate in the first place because he was caught on camera ranting about corrupt politicians, IIRC. His fashion choices are indeed most likely motivated by him wanting to distance himself from the politicians of yore.
That was the teacher character he played in his TV show, Servant of the People
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Amusingly, you've confused him with the fictional character he played.
...Ah.
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Most of the examples I can think of that would have suggested this wear dress military uniforms: Franco, Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi, and such. Although I suppose there is an association of more field-style uniforms (usually with a rifle or equivalent) with something like an African coup. I don't think Zelenskyy's attire really embodies either, but that is just my opinion. The association I remember learning also involved dictators frequently giving all their yes-men medals to wear on excessively elaborate uniforms: somewhere there is a picture from North Korea of comical numbers of medals.
Off the top of my head, Castro, Noriega, and Thomas Sankara come to mind as wearing everyday military attire, and I think Saddam usually wasn't wearing ceremonial uniforms. But yes Zelenskyy is definitely doing something more toned down and palatable.
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Zelensky did earn it to some extent. Staying in Kyiv when it looked in imminent danger of falling to the Russians and famously telling western leaders trying to convince him to flee "I don't need a ride, I need ammo" was pretty heroic and effectively created the image in most people's minds of a leader close to literally fighting on the front lines to defend his nation. His habit of wearing military attire seemed a lot more appropriate in that context.
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