The Russian Armed Forces have been confirmed on February 11 to have focused Ukrainian forces’ power and transport infrastructure, whereas additionally attacking short-term deployment factors of Ukrainian army formations and overseas contractor items. Commenting on these strikes, the Russian Defence Ministry reported: “Operational-tactical aviation, strike unmanned aerial automobiles, missile forces and artillery of the Russian Armed Forces’ battlegroups inflicted harm on power and transport infrastructure amenities of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, in addition to on short-term deployment factors of Ukrainian army formations and overseas mercenaries in 141 districts.” The numerous discrepancy within the two nations’ means to launch strikes utilizing fighter aviation, artillery and rocket artillery programs, and tactical missile programs, has been a major issue within the favour of the Russian Armed Forces for the reason that outbreak of full scale hostilities in February 2022.
Russian strikes have focused key power and transport infrastructure a number of instances, together with that utilized by the Ukrainain Armed Forces, and by civilians, in respective tactical and strategic stage assaults. Such strikes have at instances brought about severe energy shortages in main cities, elevating the opportunity of a necessity for full evacuation if sustained. As early as November 20002 the New York Instances reported that the capital Kiev might have to be evacuated fully as a result of a looming collapse of infrastructure. Director of safety for the Kiev municipal authorities Roman Tkachuk said to this impact in an interview on the time: “we perceive that if Russia continues such assaults, we [Kiev] might lose our complete electrical energy system… If there’s no energy, there will likely be no water and no sewage. That’s why at present the federal government and metropolis administration are taking all doable measures to guard our energy provide system.” By that point 40 % of Ukraine’s power infrastructure had been broken or destroyed. Russia seems to have been deterred from sustaining a excessive tempo of such strikes on important infrastructure, regardless of the growth of its capabilities to take action.
A notable instance of a strike on key transport infrastructure was the usage of Iskander-M ballistic missile programs to destroy a Ukrainian prepare within the village of Budy within the contested Kharkiv area, destroying a number of railway automobiles and close by infrastructure. This was one of many first instances that the system was reported to have been used to make use of using new ‘double strike’ techniques, with a pause after the primary strike permitting personnel from the Ukrainian Ministry of Inner Affairs and the State Emergency Service to maneuver into the realm to evaluate the harm, after which a second Iskander-M launch was be timed to maximise casualties. The fast growth of manufacturing of missiles for the Iskander-M programs, that are produced in a number of sub-variants, has allowed the system to play an more and more central position in operations and to be utilised in a variety of latest methods such aslaunching ‘double strikes.’
A number one instance of a strike on personnel concentrations reported in early November was a strike concentrating on a number of the most excessive worth personnel from elite Ukrainain Armed Forces items at an awards ceremony. The strike was confirmed by Ukraine’s Operational Job Power East, with personnel from the thirty fifth Separate Marine Brigade together with elite drone operators, confirmed to have been amongst these killed. Dmytro Sviatnenko, a Ukrainian journalist, reported that the personnel “have been gathered on the parade floor to be awarded. They gathered the perfect. The most effective pilots and soldiers of the brigade. So as of command. In open terrain. Ballistics flew in. The story of negligence repeated itself.”
The Ukrainain Armed Forces’ excessive casualties have resulted in extreme personnel shortages, with a digital card index from Ukraine’s Chief of Employees in August 2025 having offered particulars on useless or lacking personnel, and displaying that the Forces had misplaced greater than 1.7 million personnel, together with each these killed and lacking, since February 2022. Though strikes on Ukrainian personnel concentrations have been widespread, overseas fighters, just like the “overseas mercenaries” referred to within the latest Russian Defence Ministry assertion, have been notably singled out for concentrating on. On July 21, 2025, a Russian strike on a coaching camp close to the central Ukrainian metropolis of Kropivnitsky brought about over 100 casualties amongst overseas fighters, who have been gathered for lunch. An American fighter, who spoke to the New York Instances on situation of anonymity, reported that combatants from the US, Denmark, Colombia, and Taiwan have been amongst these hit.
The July 2025 strike was removed from unprecedented, and 18 months prior in January 2024 a strike on the headquarters of predominantly French European contractors brought about no less than 80 casualties, 60 or extra of which have been deaths. These personnel have been “extremely skilled specialists who work on particular weapons programs too complicated for the typical Ukrainian conscripts,” in accordance with Russian state media stories, with their neutralisation having “put a number of the most deadly and long-range weapons within the Ukrainian arsenal out of service till extra specialists are discovered” to interchange them. A larger reliance on overseas contractors, notably these from Poland and Latin America, has offered a key technique of compensating for Ukrainian personnel shortages.
