Russia

Moscow is coming under direct drone attack, the Russian economy is creaking, patriotic bloggers are ever more apocalyptic in their predictions of military disaster and evidence is piling up that Russia’s elites are becoming seriously disillusioned with the war and Vladimir Putin himself. Is this the moment for Britain to desert Ukraine by easing sanctions and refusing to commit more money to Kyiv’s military? Last week, the British government issued licences for the import of gasoline products from Russia refined in a third country. No. 10 also approved  licences for British companies to continue to service tankers carrying Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG).

The long war in Ukraine has morphed into a new and decisive phase, one that could lead to Ukraine’s upset victory over its much larger, more aggressive neighbor. The global consequences of Russia’s loss – and Vladimir Putin’s humiliation – would be enormous. What is this new phase? Is there really evidence the tide has turned in Ukraine’s favor? To sort out the answers and understand what’s new about the war’s current phase, we need to do a brief tour of the three phases that preceded it. The first phase began well over a decade ago, in February 2014, when Barack Obama was president. Ukraine fatefully signaled it wanted much stronger ties with Europe and the United States, not Russia, at the very moment US deterrence was weak.

A top-level Kremlin policy document discussing post-war political planning and how to neutralize potential ultranationalist discontent has been leaked to the Russian investigative site Dossier Center. Entitled "Images of Victory," the paper gives a rare insight into the inner workings of Russia’s political machine. Crucially, it shows that while the Kremlin remains officially indifferent to peace talks, behind the scenes apparatchiks are working hard on selling an inevitable stalemate to the Russian people by dressing it up as a species of victory. The document was leaked before President Trump's announcement today of a three-day ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.

Last month, a mysterious drone swarm led to a lockdown at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. Nothing was damaged and none of the 40 B-52 bombers or their cruise missiles were hit. At least not this time. But modern war no longer starts with an open attack. Instead we see hybrid actions: cyberattacks, information and psychological operations, GPS disruptions, damage to undersea communication cables and, increasingly, drone incursions into military sites and critical infrastructure. There is rarely a formal declaration. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the largest war in Europe since the Second World War, was labelled a “special military operation.

Every drone Ukraine fires at a Russian oil terminal is meant to defund Moscow's war in Ukraine. Right now, each one may be doing the opposite. Ukraine's strikes on Russian oil export infrastructure are intended to starve Moscow of the budget revenues that fund its war machine. The logic is straightforward: disrupt exports, reduce revenues, constrain the war effort. Kyiv has been explicit about this: Ukrainian officials consistently frame attacks on oil terminals as direct hits on Russia's war chest, treating every barrel that cannot be shipped as a ruble that cannot be spent on missiles or mobilization. Reuters puts the scale of that disruption in stark terms – at least 40 percent of Russia's crude export capacity, roughly 2 million barrels per day, is currently offline.