Battering Ukraine, Hitting Russia

"Every downed Russian missile is concrete proof that terror can be defeated."
"Air defence shot down most of the missiles. In total more than 60 invaders' missiles were shot down."

Power engineers have already started to restore electricity. Our people never give up."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

 

"If something is launched into other countries' airspace, sooner or later unknown flying objects will return to departure point,"

Zelenskyy adviser, Mykhailo Podolyak

 

"[Ukraine used drones to attack two Russian military airfields on Monday morning. Russian air defenses intercepted the attacks] in the Saratov and Ryazan regions." 

"On the morning of December 5, the [Kyiv] regime, in order to disable Russian long-range aircraft, attempted to strike with Soviet-made jet unmanned aerial vehicles [drones] at the Diaghilevo military airfields in the Ryazan region and Engels in the Saratov region."

Russian news agency RIA Novosti

 

"[Ukrainian air defenses were able to shoot down over 60 of the more than 70 missiles launched.]"

"We also have information on the use of Tu-22 M3 bombers with rocket launchers, which are the most powerful in terms of combat weight."

"Guided air missiles were also launched from Su-25 fighters." 

Ukrainian Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat

Russian President Vladimir Putin, second left, visits the Crimean Bridge connecting Russian mainland and Crimean peninsula over the Kerch Strait, on Dec. 5, 2022. (Mikhail Metzel, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)

 Russia just doesn't seem to be able to get a break. Ukrainian resolve not to melt under the Russian military's relentless missile barrages keep throwing Moscow's plans for a quick wrap-up into the 'special military operation' onto its back foot. Rumours proliferate that Russia is running out of missiles, that it has exhausted its inventory, most of which Ukraine has been able to shoot down. Those that do hit their target unleash catastrophic damage on the nation's ability to provide its population with the basic services required to endure a winter. Power and water suddenly cut off.

The Kremlin hasn't bargained with the Ukrainian military employing guerrilla methods in modern military conflict, mysteriously blowing up Russian ships, the pride of the fleet, bombing a bridge in the Crimea, Russia's vital direct link from Russia to Ukraine, to resupply its forces with food and medicine and munitions and raw recruits. The ship sank, the bridge was fixed, and Russian President Vladimir Putin himself drove a vehicle across the bridge, to restore Russian pride and honour, Russia-style.

Great perturbation over the fact that Ukrainian forces have been able to shrink the distance between the Ukraine border and well within Russia to further crimp their enemy's capacity to deliver reinforcements and supplies. The Dyagilevo air base, hit by drone explosives houses tanker aircraft used to refuel other planes in flight, the base located about 500 kilometres (over 300 miles) northeast of the Ukrainian border.

Firefighters work outside an office building destroyed by shelling in Donetsk, Ukraine, on December 5.2022

As for the attacks on the Engels base in the Saratov region on the Volga River and the Dyagilevo base in the Ryazan region in western Russia, this strategy represents part of Ukraine's determination to curtail Russia's long-range bomber force, explained the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence.The Engels air base located over 600 kilometres (over 370 miles) east of the border with Ukraine, houses nuclear-capable bombers.

Moscow is furious. This should not be happening. Ukraine's newfound capacity to deliver strikes deep inside Russia assaults Russian sovereignty and cannot be allowed. Exemplifying the Russian mentality that it is perfectly reasonable to massively assault Ukraine, under the Russian game plan of extreme punishment earned by a neighbour with the unforgivable effrontery of rejecting Russian hegemony over Ukraine. It becomes a war crime to turn the tables by attacking Russian air bases located on Russian soil.

The Russian strikes constituting a 'massive missile attack" ranges right across Ukraine, striking homes and buildings, killing civilians, disrupting electrical power and water supplies around the Black Sea port city of Odesa and stretching further into the country; permissible by Russian accounts of the games of war. Since the truck bomb in October so embarrassing to Moscow putting the bridge link to the Crimean Peninsula out of commission temporarily, Russian rage has been unappeasable. NO amount of civilian destruction is too much.

Citizens sheltered in the metro in Kyiv on Monday, as Russia released another missile attack towards Ukraine.  Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

 

"The enemy is again attacking the territory of Ukraine with missiles!", Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Ukrainian president's office wrote on Telegram as air raid sirens sounded cross- country and Ukrainian media reported explosions south of Kyiv, including Cherkasy, Kryvyi Rih and Odessa. In the southern Zaporizhzhya region people were killed and injured, including an infant. About three miles from the Ukrainian border away from the front lines, a missile hit a town in Moldova. 

According to the Moldovan Interior Ministry: "The area where the rocket was discovered has been isolated by police patrol and border police. The specialized services of the interior ministry" are on the scene. Following Monday’s attacks on Ukraine, Defense Intelligence stated their opinion that Moscow still has missiles enough to inflict heavy damage on Ukrainian infrastructure – despite stocks potentially falling to "critical levels".