AARON PATRICK: Ukraine’s drones and Western sanctions are draining Russia’s war machine

After securing the release of Hamas’s hostages, US President Donald Trump plans to meet his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in two weeks to seek an end to the war in Ukraine.

While many pro-Ukrainian observers are sceptical about the prospects for peace, they see a remarkable shift in the war: Ukraine is no longer losing.

Ukraine’s strategy to target the logistical network that delivers men, fuel and ammunition to the front from deep inside Russia is making it harder for Mr Putin to persist with costly assaults that have barely captured any ground over the past four months.

“Ukraine may not be winning outright but Russia is paying for every inch with an economy that can’t afford the war it’s waging,” Robert Potter, an Australian adviser to the Ukrainian defence forces, told The Nightly.

Drone swarms

Over the past two-and-a-half months Ukraine has used drones and missiles for at least 58 attacks on Russian refineries, pumping stations, storage depots and export terminals as far as 2000km from the Ukrainian border, according to research by the Open Source Centre cited by Reuters.

Each attack often starts with small decoys designed to fool or distract Russian air defences. Twenty to 30 larger drones then attack the target. Three refineries have been attacked at least three times, according to Reuters.

The attacks have cut Russia’s ability to process crucial oil into fuel and other products by around 500,000 barrels a day, according to a report this week by the International Energy Agency. The strategy is designed to cripple Russia’s oil and gas industry, which contributes about one quarter of the government’s budget and is the main financier of military spending.

Ukraine’s “Deep Strike Complex” has now “achieved a critical mass and momentum,” former Australian major general Mick Ryan wrote this week.

“It is hurting Russia’s economy, hurting Putin domestically, and demonstrating to Western political leaders that Ukraine retains agency in this war,” he wrote. “Indeed, the long, almost four-year process that has seen us arrive at this point is shifting the momentum in this war.”

Shadow fleet

Western sanctions are important too. The British government this week imposed sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil, which produce nearly half of Russia’s oil production and 6 per cent of the world’s.

The sanctions are designed to shut down an illegal “shadow fleet” of 44 tankers that transports Russian oil for processing in China. Britain also banned the purchase of oil products such as kerosene and diesel refined in other countries from Russian oil.

The campaign against the Russian energy industry has two effects: it restricts fuel supplies for the military, and reduces revenue from sales to China, India and other countries sympathetic to Russia.

Mr Putin has been forced to cut civilian spending and raise taxes. Fuel prices are up about 10 per cent and shortages have been reported at petrol stations.

Cruise missiles

While Russia’s refineries are in bad shape, experts say they are not on the brink of collapse. Which may be why President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appears to be lobbying the US for Tomahawk cruise missiles, which can destroy reinforced buildings from 2500km away.

President Donald Trump this week suggested he might allow the weapons to be transferred to Ukraine.

“I might say: ‘Look: if this war is not going to get settled, I’m going to send them Tomahawks,’” he told reporters on Air Force One.

During a conversation with Mr Putin on Thursday that Mr Trump said went for more than two hours, the cruise missiles came up. Afterwards Mr Trump sounded less interested in supplying the weapons to Ukraine.

“We talked about it a little bit,” Mr Trump said. “We need Tomahawks for the United States of America, too.

“Tomahawk is a vicious weapon. It’s a vicious, offensive, incredibly destructive weapon. Nobody wants Tomahawks shot at them.”

Instead, Mr Trump said he would meet Mr Putin in Budapest, the capital of Hungary, in two weeks to “see if we can bring this ‘inglorious’ war . . . to an end.”

Failed summer

First, though, he will meet Mr Zelenskyy in the Oval Office on Friday, giving the Ukrainian leader a chance to argue that Mr Putin has a history of taking about peace while waging unrelenting war. The Russian leader appears to have strung Mr Trump along by agreeing to negotiations with America while increasing the military pressure in Ukraine, which he has said is an illegitimate nation that should be part of Russia.

In March, before he launched an offensive that was seen as a potentially pivotal moment in the war, Mr Putin said that “there are reasons to believe we can finish off” Ukrainian forces.

Over the three summer months Russia captured an estimated 0.3 percent of Ukrainian territory and no major city. About 332,000 Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded this year, according to British intelligence, taking the total to 1.12 million.

Combat has become dominated by drones. Both sides produced between about 1.5 and 2 million last year, according to officials from both sides. Drone warfare appears to favour the defender by making attacks by infantry often suicidal.

After clear summer skies, poor weather has returned to Ukraine. Rain has turned the ground into mud on the front, making it difficult for tanks and other vehicles to move.

As the ground freezes over winter, it will become harder to get supplies to the front, increasing their vulnerability to drones, according to Mr Potter.

“The war has entered a new phase where economics, innovation, and endurance will decide outcomes more than territory,” he wrote this week. “And on that front, Ukraine’s ingenuity continues to outpace the empire that invaded it.”