" Ukraine struck Moscow yesterday with a furious drone attack that appeared to be the largest of its kind in the more than four years since the war began. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine was clear about its intent. "If Ukraine burns, then your Moscow will burn as well," he said. The strikes destroyed an oil refinery, filling the skies with greasy, toxic smoke. They shuttered four airports. They closed down part of the highway that rings the city, which is home to 13 million people.
The objective, my colleagues Paul Sonne and Nataliya Vasilyeva said, was to bring the war home for Russians who live far from the front lines of eastern Ukraine. The attack "seemed likely to feed fears among Russians that the Kremlin's ability to isolate society from the impacts of the war was sharply eroding," they wrote.
The effects are mounting. Ukrainian drone attacks on other refineries have led to lines and rationing at gas stations across Russia. The war has started to take its toll on the Russian economy, too. It has now run longer than World War I.
Russia is pounding Ukraine as well. Earlier this week it bombarded Kyiv, the capital, leaving a historic cathedral at one of Ukraine's holiest sites in flames, killing five people and injuring 35 others.
But the attack on Moscow has made Russian hard-liners apoplectic. They want the Kremlin to deploy the full might of Russia's military to stop Ukraine from continuing its attacks within the country. "We must strike the enemy mercilessly, without hesitation," one told the Russian news outlet RTVI. He called on Moscow to "eliminate the entire leadership, destroy all command centers, bring the entire industrial sector to its knees."
Which is a good reminder that this war is far from over, and could get much worse. Paul and Nataliya wrote a terrifying sentence about that: "How much further Russia, which has the world's largest nuclear stockpile, can go with its conventional arsenal is unclear."
NYT
*Ukrainian drones are successfully penetrating Moscow's dense air defenses by overwhelming Russian systems with mass swarms, utilizing advanced low-altitude evasion tactics, and integrating faster jet-propelled missile drones.
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