The Guardian: Ukraine Launches Smart Offensive Against Russia
- 28.01.2024, 13:36
What is Kyiv's new strategy?
Ukraine's new attacks are part of a growing asymmetric campaign by Kyiv aimed at crippling the oil industry and depriving Moscow of billions of dollars in revenue.
Ukraine intensifies the struggle by striking drones deep into the territory of Russia. Not being able to compare with Putin's military power, Ukraine is engaged in a "smart confrontation", attacking the enemy's oil and gas supply lines.
This is reported by the British edition of The Guardian.
Last week, a motorist driving in Russia’s Leningrad region came across something unusual. Men had blocked off the road. In front, a large olive-green military vehicle with cigar-shaped missiles on the back was reversing and then parked up on a snowy verge.
“Fuck! It’s an S-300,” the driver exclaimed, then added, “So guys, let’s prepare for the worst.” This surreal roadside encounter took place outside St Petersburg, more than 620 miles (about 1,000km) from the border with Ukraine and Russia’s near two-year all-out war.
The Kremlin security services were obviously not going to take any risks. They deployed the S-300 anti-aircraft missile system to protect St. Petersburg from small but dangerous drones.
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Over the past three weeks, Ukraine has weakened Russia's energy infrastructure.
Shortly after the New Year, someone attached explosives to train carriages in the Ural city of Nizhny Tagil. The explosion occurred near facilities owned by Gazpromneft, the country's third-largest oil producer.
Then a kamikaze drone crashed into an oil depot in the Oryol region.
On January 18, another oil terminal in St. Petersburg, Putin's home city, was attacked.
For the first time since the invasion in February 2022, unmanned aerial vehicles reached the Leningrad region.
Then there was more. A large-scale fire broke out at the oil depot in the city of Klintsy, not far from Belarus and Ukraine.
Three days later, drones attacked the Baltic port of Ust-Luga in the Gulf of Finland and the main oil terminal belonging to the Novatek company.
It supplies fuel for the Russian army, and other cargoes go to Asia. An orange fireball lit up the sky. Eyewitnesses described the explosion in apocalyptic terms. By last week, evidence of a new and sustained attack on a critical part of the Russian economy could no longer be ignored.
On Wednesday, a drone hit the Tuapse oil refinery in southern Russia, on the Black Sea coast.
The flames from the burning plant could be seen above the black sky. Nearby, the airport of Sochi, Putin's favorite resort, famous for its pebble beaches, was forced to close.
These attacks are part of Kyiv's growing asymmetric campaign to cripple the industry and deprive Moscow of billions of dollars in global revenues it uses to fund the conflict.
About half of Russia's $420 billion in export revenues last year came from oil.
"Russia finances its military from oil exports. You can’t persuade countries like India and China to stop buying it. So you knock out Russian oil refineries,” Ukrainian military reporters say.