MILITARY
Recente aanvallen op Rusland
May 31, 2023 - Kyiv is seeking to rattle the Kremlin ahead of its long-planned offensive. First came drone strikes on the Kremlin’s dome of the Senate and on an oil terminal in Russia’s Krasnodar region on May 3. The oil terminal blaze required 188 firefighters.
Three days later, a suspected Ukrainian drone strike caused a fire at a Russian oil terminal in Sevastopol, the naval base of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.
Next came an “invasion” of Russian territory by two anti-Putin militias -- the Freedom of Russia Legion and Russian Volunteer Corps -- both based in Ukraine, whose embarrassing implications for Moscow prompted it to divert frontline troops to border regions.
Then, late last week, Ukraine launched a marine drone attack on a Russian spy ship in the Black Sea.
Yesterday morning, as many as two dozen aerial drones attacked Moscow. And today, a drone struck the Afipsky oil refinery in Russia’s Krasnodar region, causing a fire.
The Afipsky refinery lies 80km (50 miles) east of the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk, one of Russia’s most important oil export gateways.
For its planned counterattack, Kyiv has built up a force of 40,000 troops trained at Western bases and armed with hundreds of new Western-supplied tanks and armoured vehicles.