Ukraine has hit two Russian ammunition depots in two days – the latest in a deep attack on a military airfield

• Ukraine said it struck a military airfield in Russia overnight, marking its latest deep strike.

• On Wednesday, Ukrainian forces attacked an ammunition depot and a drone storage facility.

• Kiev continues to have success with its long-range targeting within Russia.

Ukrainian forces attacked an ammunition depot at a military airfield in Russia last night, the latest in a series of long-range attacks targeting Moscow’s war machine.

In the past two days, the Ukrainian military has said it has caused damage to a key Russian ammunition depot, a drone storage facility and now another ammunition depot at an airport.

The back-to-back-to-back strikes underline Ukraine’s reach and demonstrate the repeated inability of Russian air defense to protect its military installations, including during the most recent attack.

The Ukrainian army said on Thursday that in the latest attack on Russia, it had attacked Khanskaya airport, located in the southwestern Republic of Adygea, last night. Ukraine said it hit an ammunition warehouse at the site and caused “fire damage” to the airfield, which was home to Su-34 and Su-27 fighter jets. It is unclear whether the attack affected aircraft.

Russia’s Su-34 fighter-bombers have been particularly problematic for Kiev, as these aircraft can be released highly destructive glide bombs to devastating effect.

Glide bombs, which are ranged weapons, are notoriously difficult to intercept. Ukraine can actually only defeat this threat by focused on the ammunition and fighter planes at their bases, which Kiev has done several times in recent months. It is unclear whether the newest ammunition depot stored these weapons.

The attack in Khanskaya followed two other Ukrainian attacks deep into Russian territory.

On Wednesday, Ukraine said it was using drones attack an ammunition depot in Russia’s Bryansk region, where glide bombs, rockets and artillery shells were stored – including weapons from North Korea and Iran.

Ukraine has attacked several Russian ammunition depots since mid-September. Kiev has relied on domestically produced products long-range drones for these operations because the country is not allowed to use its inventory of cruise and ballistic missiles supplied by the West to invade Russia.

Hours after the Bryansk operation, Ukraine said it had destroyed a base in Russia’s Krasnodar region that housed about 400 Shahed-136 drones for one-way strikes. Some open-source intelligence accounts speculated that Kiev carried out the attack using its homemade R-360 Neptune cruise missiles, anti-ship weapons adapted for land attacks.

Western officials, the Ukrainian military and war analysts have said the in-depth offensive campaign in Kiev is likely to complicate Russian operations in Ukraine.

“In terms of long-range strikes, we have seen some successful one-way drone strikes by the Ukrainians on ammunition depots in Russia,” a senior US military official told reporters on Wednesday. “We have also seen some attacks against fuel facilities in Crimea. We believe these will have some impact on the battlefield.”

The official said the effects are not immediately noticeable and explained that it takes some time for them to become visible on the battlefield.

Conflict analysts at the Institute for the Study of War think tank said continued Ukrainian attacks on military facilities in Russia would exert more operational pressure on Moscow’s armed forces.

This development will “force the Russian military command to reorganize and disperse support and logistics systems within Russia to mitigate the impact of such attacks,” the analysts wrote on Wednesday. research.

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