Ukraine carried out its boldest attack on Russian territory in the nine-month war on Monday, targeting two military bases hundreds of kilometers inside the country using drones , according to the Russian Defense Ministry and a senior Ukrainian official.
The senior official said the drones were launched from Ukrainian territory and that at least one of the strikes was carried out with the help of Ukrainian special forces operating near the base, which helped guide the drone to the target.
These strikes demonstrate a new willingness in Kyiv to attack bases in the heart of Russia, raising the stakes of the war, and demonstrating for the first time Ukraine’s ability to mount attacks on such long distances. Shortly after the attacks on the bases, Russia sent a barrage of missiles towards Ukrainian cities.
The Kremlin said the weapons launched by Ukraine were Soviet-era jet drones and targeted bases in Ryazan and Engels, about 480 km from the Ukrainian border.
The Kremlin said its forces intercepted the drones and that “falling and exploding debris” had “slightly damaged” two planes, killing three servicemen and injuring four others.
Out of range of known equipment
Engels Airfield, located on the Volga River in southern Russia, is a base for some of Russia’s long-range, nuclear-capable bombers, including the Tupolev-160 and Tupolev-95. Ukrainian officials say it is also a staging area for Russia’s relentless campaign of missile attacks on infrastructure, which has left millions of Ukrainians without light, heat or water – or nothing at all – when winter arrives. Surveillance footage from an apartment complex near the base showed a fireball lighting up the sky.
The other explosion occurred at the Dyagilevo military base in the central city of Ryazan, just 100 kilometers from Moscow, according to the Russian Defense Ministry. This is where the deaths and injuries were recorded, Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported.
The Ukrainian government has refused to publicly acknowledge the strikes, consistent with its practice for other attacks on Russia and Russian-occupied Crimea.
Engels Air Base and the Ryazan military installation are between 480 and 725 km from the Ukrainian border, which is beyond the range of any known missile in the Ukrainian arsenal.
Even before the Russian Defense Ministry accused Ukraine of sending drones to attack, the explosion at Engels airfield had prompted some influential Russian bloggers, favorable to the invasion, to call for new strikes against Ukraine and to renew their criticism of the Russian armed forces. “Sometimes we feel like even if we put a bomb in these people’s pockets, they wouldn’t notice it anyway,” popular commenter Voenniy Osvedomitel wrote on messaging app Telegram. .
After the explosions, Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the Ukrainian president, appeared to take note of the strikes indirectly, as Ukrainian officials often did after unexplained explosions in Russia.
“The Earth is round – discovery made by Galileo,” he wrote on Twitter. “If something is launched into the airspace of other countries, sooner or later the unknown flying objects will return to the starting point. »
Just hours after the blasts, Ukrainian officials said more than a dozen Russian bombers took off from Engels air base.
Air raid alerts sounded in Kyiv and other cities. The Ukrainian Air Force said more than 70 missiles were fired, of which more than 60 were shot down.
This article was originally published in The New York Times.