Movement on the front lines in Ukraine has largely stalled in a bloody stalemate. The Trump administration’s peace talks haven’t budged since Russia turned down a cease-fire in August. But Ukrainian officials argue that they still have a strategy to end the war: Strike deep inside Russia with missiles and drones.
Refineries, factories, ports and railroad lines have already been blown up. Ukraine now has an arsenal capable of hitting much of western Russia, where much of the country’s oil processing industry is concentrated. Kyiv has also announced a new weapon, called the Flamingo, that it says could reach Russia’s industrial heartland in the Ural Mountains.
With long-range strikes, Ukraine aims to batter the country’s oil industry and bring the pain of the war home to Russians. The question is whether the strategy will be enough to sway the Kremlin to negotiate in earnest.
What is Ukraine’s thinking?
The ramping up of the deep-strike campaign is Ukraine’s latest reinvention of its war effort.
Ukraine pushed back Russia’s initial invasion with the patriotic fervor of volunteer soldiers. Later, President Volodymyr Zelensky lobbied relentlessly for Western heavy weapons to hold the trench lines.
Now, long-range strikes aim to force Russia into a settlement by inflicting damage on its already strained economy and by spurring a largely pacified Russian public to begin to agitate against the war.
Mr. Zelensky calls the campaign “long-range sanctions” or “drone sanctions,” casting it as a ratcheting up of economic pressure.
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