Ukraine’s Long Range Drones Break Records to hit Russia’s Olenya base

The air base is more than 1,900 kilometers north of Ukraine

After a brief lull, Ukraine’s long-range drones have started to fly and inflict severe damage on Russian assets, both in the occupied territories and inside Russia. Over the last 48 hours, Ukraine targeted an oil refinery in Ryazan Oblast, Russian airfields in Engels, Saratov Oblast, Dyagilevo Airfield in Ryazan Oblast, and Olenya Airfield in Murmansk Oblast with its drones.

Olenya Airfield is situated in the northwest part of Russia, near the Arctic Ocean. The airfield, which lies close to Finland, serves as a base for long-range bombers, including the Tu-95 and Tu-160, which are capable of carrying long range missiles. The airfield’s facilities support the operations of these strategic bombers, enhancing Russia’s long-range strike capabilities.

Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR) claimed on July 27 that its drones attacked the Olenya airfield in Russia’s far northern Murmansk region, saying it struck a TU-22M3 strategic bomber. It also said that three Russian Army helicopters had been destroyed on Russian territory over the previous week.

According to multiple media reports, it was from Olenya Airfield that the Russians launched their strategic bomber, which fired long-range missiles against the children’s hospital in Kyiv. The Ukrainian attack on Olenya Airfield is a clear demonstration of their ability to strike deep inside Russian territory. These drones traveled nearly 2,000 km and successfully delivered their payload to what was supposed to be a highly secure location in Russia.

Despite Ukraine’s drones increasing in size and range, the Russians have not been able to stop them. There were reports that Russia is planning to build highly mobile and nimble troops that can quickly bring down Ukrainian drones, but that is easier said than done. Russia is a vast country. If Ukraine can reach as far as 2,000 km with its drones, it brings a significant amount of Russian territory under threat.

The area of a circle with a radius of 2,000 km is approximately 12,566,370 square kilometers. For our calculation, if we consider half of this area, it amounts to nearly 6 million square kilometers.

There is no way on earth that Russia, facing huge labor challenges and losing more than a thousand soldiers every day in Ukraine, can afford to create nimble and highly mobile units to defend the economic and military assets spread out across Russia. They do not have manpower.

This explains why Russia continues to struggle against the low single-digit long-range drone attacks mounted by Ukraine.

Yes, Ukraine keeps firing one or two drones, or sometimes three, at Russian facilities, and they are still getting through. The last time I noticed Ukraine launch a swarm attack was against Russia’s A50 repair facility in Taganrog, where more than 50 drones participated in the attack.

Ukrainian drones that attacked a Russian aviation plant in Taganrog, Russia, on the night of March 9 succeeded in damaging at least one Beriev A-50U AEW&C (airborne early warning and control) aircraft.

It was wave after wave of drones, as the attack lasted for nearly an hour and a half. Since that attack, I have not seen Ukraine launch drones at scale against Russian targets.

I am not sure why Ukraine is holding back. They are possibly manufacturing and storing these long-range drones to reach volume. They are also not attacking Russian refineries with the same ferocity that they demonstrated in March this year.

There is a small possibility that the Biden administration, fearful of an oil price escalation, pushed Ukraine to keep its hands off the refineries, and they may have chosen to reduce the intensity of their attacks against Russian refineries. If this were the case, I think it is a bad decision by the allies to limit Ukraine’s ability to increase the cost of war for the Kremlin.

Nevertheless, Ukraine manufacturing and storing its long-range drones as a countermeasure to Russia’s growing missile arsenal is not a bad idea. It has its utility. It will keep Russian air defenses under intense stress, and Ukraine can always choose the time and place to mount its long-range large volume drone attacks.

If Ukraine does unleash its fury on Russian refineries, things will become extremely hard for Russia. The Russian economy is struggling to keep a lid on its cracks.

As expected the Russian Central bank raised its interest rates.

Russia’s Central Bank announced on July 26 that it is to raise the interest rate from 16% to 18%, as the Russian economy continues to experience accelerated inflation amid its war in Ukraine.

“Inflation has accelerated and is developing significantly above the Bank of Russia’s April forecast,” the press service of Russia’s Central Bank said in a statement.

“Growth in domestic demand is still outstripping the capabilities to expand the supply of goods and services,” the statement continued. “Labour shortages continue to grow.”

Data from Russia’s Federal Statistics Service shows that the country has faced six months in a row of growing prices that particularly impact the cost of fuel and food. On average, vegetables cost around 19% more than in June 2023.

Russia’s annual inflation rate for June was 8.59%, up from 8.30% the previous month.

These are numbers released by Russia. There is an extremely high likelihood that they have lowballed the real numbers. But even their own data shows that inflation is voraciously eating into disposable income.

A 20% spike in one year is the kind of price increase that would send any democratic government packing. But in Russia, people cannot even voice their disappointment.

The Russian central bank is trying to control a problem that it cannot control anymore. Russia has already hit a ceiling on its production capacity. The shortage of labor is only increasing every day, not decreasing. So whatever the Russian society was able to produce in January 2024, it cannot produce in June 2024.

Between January 2024 and June 2024, Russia would have lost 200k to 250k workers to the war. If production capacity was 100 points in January, how can it remain the same in June? It can’t. As production continues to fall and there is no pathway to arrest the increasing labor shortage, wages have no choice but to increase. Combining all of this, inflation has only one way to go: up and up.

That is exactly what is happening in Russia. The central bank is trying to slow down the pace at which the Russian economy is moving towards collapse by increasing the interest rate, but how much more space do they have to go further from here? Maybe up to 21%. Beyond that point, they are already at the “jump over the cliff anytime” territory.

Now would be the best time for the Western world to seriously look at sanctions as a way to end this war. Putin does not have the money. He is grasping at straws. Even if the Western world manages to bring down daily revenue by a few billion dollars, it will have a monstrous impact on the way Putin conducts his war.

There is a clear path to end this war in a bloodless manner: put Putin’s cash flow under pressure now, and he will have no choice but to withdraw. A strong sanctions regime will work now.

The time has come for the Western world to take a closer look at economic sanctions to bring this war to an end — workable and enforceable ones. While it did not work before, it will work now. Putin does not have the cash cushion to absorb the blow, and his central bank does not have any room left to control the economy.

Either do that, or let Ukraine impose drone sanctions on Russian refineries.

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