Putin’s home city under attack - Is Russia losing control of its airspace? | DW News

Ukraine's President Vladimir Zelensky has described Kyiv's drone and missile strikes on Russia as fair and has promised more to come. His statement follows drone strikes by Ukraine on the Russian city of Saint Petersburg just as a flagship economic forum was about to get underway there. The city's authorities said air defenses had shot down dozens of drones and confirmed that several districts in the city had been hit. Ukraine's government claimed it hit a naval ship as well as Saint Petersburg's oil terminal. Thick pillars of smoke rise over Saint Petersburg, the result of a long-range Ukrainian drone strike that stunned the Russian city in the early hours of Wednesday. This oil terminal on the edge of the city was left ablaze by the volley. Saint Petersburg's governor said drones hit infrastructure across several districts, causing widespread damage and injuring several people. Ukrainian footage shows the moments before the drones struck a naval base. On social media, Ukraine's leader said important facilities on Russian territory were hit, with the oil terminal of particular importance, given that it serves the Russian war machine. Ukraine's attack follows Russian strikes that killed at least 18 people and injured dozens more. Yet there appears to be added significance to their response, given its location and timing. For one thing, Saint Petersburg is Vladimir Putin's home city. It's also the location of a glitzy economic forum. Described as Russia's Davos, in reference to the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, the exhibition aims to attract foreign investment by showing Russia at its best. This attack, just a few miles away from the forum's venue, has made a major city appear vulnerable at a bad time. Russia's response to the attack was stark. I'd like to remind you of the statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that our responses will be systematic. In fact, they are already systematic. It was just a month ago that both Zelensky and Putin spoke of finding a peaceful end to a war that began more than four years ago. Major attacks from both sides this week make the chances of that seem remote. Auriga Bureau Chief Yuri Reshetov is covering this story. Yuri, tell us more about the attacks in Saint Petersburg. What's been hit there, exactly? Well, Terry, we've been getting reports from across the Leningrad region, the whole region, basically the wider Saint Petersburg area. Local officials say air defences shot down 59 drones. In Saint Petersburg itself, drones targeted infrastructure in several parts of the city, including a naval base in Kronstadt, so the military part of Saint Petersburg. The governor of Leningrad Oblast says several people were injured. Flights at Pulkovo International Airport were briefly restricted overnight. Local media report damage to a residential building and a fire broke out at the Saint Petersburg oil terminal, one of the largest in the Baltic region. Thick black smoke has been rising over the city and all of this is happening, you mentioned it, just as the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum gets underway, a key showcase event for President Putin personally. He is going to have a speech on Friday there. Photos show guests arriving while smoke rises in the background. The venue is close to the airport, giving the whole situation a strong symbolic edge. Now, Saint Petersburg is over one and a half thousand kilometers from Ukraine. How did Ukraine's military succeed in carrying out this attack, Yuri? Well, look, over the past six months, I would say Ukraine has narrowed the gap with Russia in drone warfare, both in the size of attacks and how often they happen. That's thanks to a major push in domestic production, backed by Western support. Now, the Ukrainian military and the can carry out regular large-scale drone strikes, in some cases several times a week, still behind Russia, but much closer than before. In effect, Ukraine has drawn Russia into a kind of technological race where it no longer has a clear edge. And in some situations, that can favor Ukraine because drones make large troop movements more risky and harder to sustain. So, instead of a purely slow war of attrition, Kyiv is obviously trying to wear Russia down and to make the war more visible at home, targeting key sites deep behind the front lines. It appears that the drones may have flown via Belarus, passing close to the Baltic border where I am right now. Air raid alerts were issued here in Latvia and Estonia. Well, we already heard the Russian spokesperson there saying there will be a systematic response, but how is Russia responding to this particular attack? Well, so far there has been no official word on any specific Russian retaliation, military retaliation, but based on past cases, Moscow has rarely left attacks like these unanswered. Kremlin spokesman Biskov, you said it, only said any response would be systematic, likely hinting at exactly that. He added that what Russia still calls its military operation is meant to prevent attacks like these altogether. At the same time, these Ukrainian drone strikes carry a strong symbolic punch. They show Russians that the war is reaching their own territory, but they are also used by state propaganda to push the opposite message, saying, look, Ukraine is attacking us, so we have to keep fighting. So, in a way, there is a double effect at play. Yuri, thank you very much. Our Riga bureau chief there, Yuri Reshetov. Let's get some analysis now with Orysia Lutsevich, she's deputy director of the Russia and Eurasia program at the think tank Chatham House. Orysia, what do you make of Ukraine attacking St. Petersburg just as President Putin was about to kick off a major economic forum there? Well, I think the whole face in Russia-Ukraine war has changed since Ukraine developed this technological capability to inflict long-range strikes deep inside Russia's territory. We have seen threats to a Russian Victory Day parade that was a serious blow to Putin's confidence and projection inside Russia of his power. And now we are seeing this large attack on the oil refinery right at the time when it's trying to convene its international conference to project Russia's economic power, not so much towards the West, but to the global South and the Middle East. And it is quite striking to see all those flames all over the city. To be honest, I think these dignitaries who are coming, especially from the Middle East, are quite unsettled by this environment. What do these strikes tell you about Ukraine's offensive capabilities and, on the other hand, Russia's defensive capacity? Well, absolutely. Russia is a large territory and it does not have enough air defense systems to simultaneously fight the war inside Ukraine, in Ukraine, in the southeast of Ukraine, in all these territories that it's trying to occupy, and at the same time defend both political centers of decision-making and strategic industries. And we see that Ukraine is systemically targeting oil refineries. Eight out of ten were targeted several times, and it is already causing problems with export. It's decreasing with shortages in processed materials, in gas for cars, but also Russia trying to reach to its neighbors and partners, Belarus and Kazakhstan, to patch some of these deficits. So Ukraine is demonstrating that Russia's strategic depth, that was always an added value, is diminishing, and that war is coming increasingly closer to Russian economic base, which is oil and gas sector. Ukraine's president says there will be more attacks like this on Russia. Russia is saying that its response will be systematic. Which countries should be more concerned? I think both countries should be concerned because Ukraine increasingly is developing capabilities not only in drones, but also in missiles. Ukraine is testing and trying to put into action also longer-range missiles, which can cause much bigger impact and damage than just drones. But I think as long as Russia starts being seriously concerned, that may compel Russian leadership to rethink the war. And as the war, some military experts estimate, in six to seven months may reach this infliction point, that can only be the powerful argument for Russia's leadership to negotiate the ending of the war in genuine effort, not actually using negotiations to get some leverage over United States and divide Europe over Ukraine's support. What do you think was more the goal for an attack like this? Was it more to damage Russian infrastructure? We saw the oil complex there with smoke billowing from that. Or do you think it's more to erode Russian morale? I think it's actually both of these reasons you've mentioned, to erode Russia's morale at home, to kind of show that Russians are not invincible, that Putin is pursuing the course that is threatening Russian people, that is threatening Russian economy. And suddenly, because it comes to Putin's own hometown, St. Petersburg, which is always viewed as super protected, like Moscow, it sends a very strong signal to other Russian cities that they are really exposed now to the consequences of war. And the last reason is also to show to all those nations outside of democratic West that are relying on some relationship with Russia in Asia, in Africa, in the Middle East, that it's actually a quite toxic partnership, that Russia's power is also eroding, and that Russia is vulnerable. And it's to a degree a paper tiger, because it cannot defend such strategic city during such important time as St. Petersburg. Give us a sense, if you can, of how people in Russia think about the war now, more than four years after it started. You talked about morale. Are people in Russia still behind Putin on this war? To start with, it's important to underscore that Russia is quite a repressive, autocratic, personalized regime. And that means that free thinking and free flow of information is not available, really, and that there are severe repressions for disagreeing with the regime. And I think there's no unified population inside Russia. There are a lot of people who are indifferent to this war. They want to close their eyes to it and forget that it exists. There are some who fervently support it from patriotic reasons. They share imperialist ideology. They do not want Russia to lose. They believe Russia is entitled to control of Ukraine and, for the same matter, other parts of Eastern Europe. And some that actually oppose it. But that's a very small segment that would dare even to say it publicly. Arisa, thank you very much for your analysis. That was Arisa Lutsevich. She's deputy director of the Russia and Eurasia program at Chatham House.