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Ukraine seems to have set its sights on Russia's oil and gas industry, using small, inexpensive drones to disrupt the country's supply lines. Suspected drone strikes have resulted in fires at various energy infrastructure locations across Russia in recent weeks, including an oil refinery in Tuapse owned by Rosneft, a storage facility in Klintsy also belonging to Rosneft, and Novatek's Baltic Sea Ust-Luga terminal.

The motive behind Ukraine's actions appears to be aimed at disrupting Russia's military operations. Olena Lapenko, an energy security expert at Ukrainian think tank DiXi Group, stated that "strikes on oil depots and storage facilities disrupt logistics routes and slow down combat operations." She added that targeting these supplies, which are vital to the Russian economy, is part of a broader strategy to counter Russia on the battlefield.

Additionally, the attacks aim to damage Russia's lucrative oil industry, which has been relatively unaffected by economic sanctions imposed by the West. Lapenko informed The New York Times that Moscow has earned over $400 billion from oil exports since the war began in February 2022.

The recent attack on the Baltic Ust-Luga terminal, combined with adverse weather conditions in the region, has hampered Russia's crude oil shipments, leading to a decrease to their lowest level in nearly two months, as reported by Bloomberg.

If confirmed to be carried out by Ukraine, the attacks demonstrate that Kyiv is capable of hitting targets deep inside Russian territory with domestically produced drones, as per Reuters. The fact that Ukraine reportedly flew a drone over President Vladimir Putin's palace during an attack on a St. Petersburg oil depot adds further insult to injury.

Russia's air defense systems have proven to be less effective against small drones, struggling to detect them. Samuel Bendett, an analyst and expert in unmanned and robotic military systems at the Center for Naval Analyses, explained that most of Russia's defenses were designed to identify and destroy larger targets like missiles and helicopters and were not equipped to identify smaller unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).

Ukraine's approach to utilizing small, low-cost drones in its warfare strategy has proven effective. T.X. Hammes, a Research Fellow at the National Defense University, noted that even a small amount of explosives directly delivered to a target can initiate a secondary explosion, causing significant damage to flammable targets.

As the situation continues to unfold, the use of small drones by Ukraine to disrupt Russia's oil and gas industry marks a significant development in the ongoing conflict between the two nations, with potential implications for both military operations and the economic stability of the region.