Russia Ukraine war: Sunday's drone attacks known as Operation Spider's Web shift modern-day strategy. Step-by-step explained

Economic Times

03-06-2025

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Ukraine said it secretly planted a swarm of drones in Russia and then unleashed them in a surprise attack Sunday, hitting airfields from eastern Siberia to Russia's western border. The assault set several Russian aircraft on fire, stunned the Kremlin and dealt a strategic and symbolic blow to Moscow's relentless bombing campaign in Ukraine. However, Russian officials said that there were no casualties and that some of the Ukrainian attacks had been repelled.Russia's Defense Ministry said Sunday that Ukrainian drones had attacked airfields in five regions stretching across five time zones: Murmansk, Irkutsk, Ivanovo, Ryazan and Amur. Several aircraft caught fire in Murmansk, near the border with Norway, and in Irkutsk, in eastern Siberia, the ministry said, adding that attacks on the three other regions had been repelled.Ukraine said that 117 drones were used in the attacks. An official in Ukraine's security services, the SBU, said dozens of aircraft were damaged in the strikes. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive intelligence operation.The plan was called Operation Spider's Web. Drones were planted across Russia, near military bases, the Ukrainians said, and then activated simultaneously. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine said on social media Sunday that planning began a year and a half ago. He called the results "absolutely brilliant." Those involved in the attack, he added, were withdrawn from Russia before it took place.On Monday, the Ukrainians offered more details about the operation. Over many months, they said, dozens of drones were secretly transported into Russia.The drones were packed onto pallets inside wooden containers with remote-controlled lids and then loaded onto trucks, an SBU statement said. Ukrainian officials said the crates were rigged to self-destruct after the drones were released. There was no indication that the truck drivers knew what they were hauling, Ukrainian officials said.Ukraine said 41 planes had been hit, or about one-third of the strategic cruise-missile carriers at Russian air bases across three time zones. Russian military bloggers said the Ukrainian damage estimates were inflated. One influential Russian military blogger, Rybar, put the number of damaged Russian aircraft at 13, including up to 12 strategic bombers.American and European security officials said that they estimated that as many as 20 Russian strategic aircraft may have been destroyed or severely damaged -- with Russia's losses including six Tu-95 and four Tu-22M long-range strategic bombers, as well as A-50 warplanes, which are used to detect air defenses and guided missiles. Ukraine has been gunning for those warplanes since the start of the war because Russia uses them to strike Ukrainian cities.The attack in Irkutsk, on the Belaya air base, was the first time that any place in Siberia had been attacked by Ukraine's drones since the war began with Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.The Olenya base in the Murmansk region is also one of Russia's key strategic airfields, hosting nuclear-capable aircraft.Ukraine has executed ambitious drone attacks on Russian territory before. In late 2022, Kyiv targeted two airfields hundreds of miles inside Russia using long-range drones. But Russia adapted, building protective structures around depots at bases, bringing in more air-defense assets and routinely repositioning its fleet. Car tires seemingly used as defensive measures are visible in satellite imagery from two bases hit.Ukraine -- which has banked on expanding the use of domestically produced drones -- turned to a new approach. The idea behind Operation Spider's Web was to transport small, first-person-view drones close enough to Russian airfields to render traditional air-defense systems useless, officials said.Although the full extent of the damage from Ukraine's strikes is unknown, the attacks showed that Kyiv was adapting and evolving in the face of a larger military with deeper resources.The Ukrainian strikes came a day before Russia and Ukraine met in Istanbul for further peace talks. Zelenskyy said Monday that the operation had showed Russia that it was also vulnerable to serious losses and "that is what will push it toward diplomacy."But analysts say the attacks are unlikely to alter the political calculus of Russia's president, Vladimir Putin. There was no indication that the attack had changed the Kremlin's belief that it holds an advantage over Ukraine, as it counts on the weakening resolve of some of Kyiv's allies and its ability to grind down outnumbered Ukrainian troops.A1. President of Ukraine is Volodymyr Zelenskyy.A2. Russian President is Vladimir Putin.