KYIV, July 13 — Against this backdrop of grinding attrition, Ukraine has pursued a sustained campaign of strikes against Russian oil depots and fuel storage facilities since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022. The strategy is clear. These attacks are designed to disrupt the logistics of the Russian military, which relies heavily on petroleum products for vehicles, aircraft, and artillery.
By hitting fuel supplies deep inside Russian territory, Ukraine aims to degrade the war-fighting capability of its adversary.
A Campaign of Deep Strikes
The pattern of these operations has been consistent over the course of the conflict. In April 2022, a drone attack struck an oil depot in Bryansk Oblast. The following year, in April 2023, Ukrainian forces hit a fuel depot in Belgorod.
By May 2024, the campaign had extended further south, with a successful strike on an oil terminal in Krasnodar Krai. The most recent major operation in this ongoing effort occurred on March 19, 2025, when a strike targeted fuel infrastructure in Stavropol Krai.
Each of these locations represents a node in Russia’s military fuel network, and each successful hit complicates Moscow’s ability to sustain operations. Ukraine has relied on domestically produced drones for these long-range missions. The UJ-22 Airborne, a Ukrainian-designed unmanned aerial vehicle with a range up to 800 kilometers, has been a key platform for reaching targets deep within Russian territory.
The Wider Picture
What is at stake in this campaign is not merely tactical advantage. The strikes on fuel depots mirror, in method and intent, Russia’s own attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure. Moscow began targeting Ukraine’s power grids and fuel depots in October 2022, a campaign that has caused widespread blackouts.
Both sides understand that modern warfare runs on fuel. Disrupting the enemy’s supply of it is a direct way to constrain battlefield options and reduce the economic resources available to continue the fight.
For Ukraine, the calculus is straightforward. Every ton of fuel destroyed before it reaches a Russian tank or aircraft is a ton that cannot be used to sustain the invasion. The drone campaign against oil depots, while not a war-winning measure in itself, forms a critical component of Kyiv’s broader effort to degrade Russia’s war-fighting capability and to defend its own territory by striking at the logistical foundation of the enemy’s war machine.
