The Russians have failed to generate any operational momentum with their spring offensive as Ukraine’s long-range strikes against Russia reached new geographic and strategic depths this week. On 28 March, Kyiv's Flamingo cruise missiles struck an explosives plant in Samara Oblast. With a 3,000 km range, a 1,150 kg warhead, it is bringing all of Russia’s western industrial defense complex in reach. The strikes, with precision drones targeting energy, chemical, and defence industries, accelerated and are penetrating over 1,000 kilometres into Russian territory on nightly. 40% of Russia’s oil shipping has been disrupted, contributing to a Kremlin ban of gas exports from 1 April to 30 September. Gas stations across Russia have run dry. (And) Ukraine is conducting Mediterranean 'drone line' campaign from bases in Libya. One operation killed a senior Russian intelligence general.
Ukraine’s Impressive Long-Range Strikes. Ukraine’s long-range strike campaign against Russian territory reached new geographic and strategic depths during the week. The established pattern for these strikes, with precision drones targeting energy, chemical, and defence industrial nodes, continued to accelerate. Strikes are penetrating over 1,000 kilometres into Russian territory on a near-nightly basis.
The week saw attacks on consecutive nights on Leningrad Oblast’s energy corridor. Ukraine had already struck the Novatek terminal at Ust-Luga and the Kinef refinery at Kirishi, which is one of Russia’s three largest refineries by output at 355,000 barrels per day, in late March. Ust-Luga was struck a second time on 29 March, causing renewed fires at storage and loading infrastructure.
The cumulative effect on Russia’s Baltic export capacity is significant. By late March, Reuters estimated that at least 40% of Russia’s oil shipping capacity had been disrupted, contributing to a Russian government decision to ban gasoline exports from 1 April to 30 September this year, citing reduced refinery output. Gas stations across multiple Russian regions have already run dry.
The Ukrainian strike campaign then shifted south and east. On 2 April, a major fire broke out at the Bashneft-Novoil refinery in Ufa, Bashkortostan, which is approximately 1,400 kilometres from the Ukrainian border, according to Kyiv Post. This was followed on the night of 3-4 April by a multi-drone strike on Tolyatti in Samara Oblast, targeting two major chemical sites: Tolyattikauchuk and KuibyshevAzot. Militarnyi.com reported this was the second strike on these facilities within a month, with the previous attack occurring on 11 March. KuibyshevAzot is a major producer of nitrogen fertilizers and chemical raw materials. Ukrainian drones also struck the seaport of Taganrog and mounted simultaneous attacks on Shahed launch bases in Kursk and Bryansk regions and on a fuel train in occupied Luhansk.
Images: @TopLeadEU Ukraine’s FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile also featured in some attacks. On 28 March, Flamingo missiles struck an explosives plant in Chapaevsk, Samara Oblast. The Flamingo, with a 3,000 km range, a 1,150 kg warhead, is bringing all of Russia’s European industrial and defence complex within reach. Its operational use is accelerating; from the Votkinsk missile plant in February to the Samara explosives cluster in March.
President Zelensky noted on March 30 that some allied partners had requested a scaling back of energy strikes due to rising global oil prices driven by the Iran war. He offered a reciprocal deal; Ukraine would halt energy strikes if Russia stopped striking Ukrainian energy infrastructure. Moscow neither acknowledged nor accepted the offer.
Ukraine’s Mediterranean strike operations. The most interesting intelligence story of the week was published on 3 April by French broadcaster RFI. It published an investigation that confirmed Ukraine is conducting a Mediterranean maritime campaign from bases in Libya. One of those operations may have killed a senior Russian intelligence general.
The RFI investigation, confirmed by Euronews, found that over 200 Ukrainian officers and technical specialists are stationed at three sites in western Libya, operating in coordination with the Tripoli government. The primary infrastructure includes a drone launch facility near the Mellitah Oil and Gas Complex in Zawiya, with direct sea access, and a presence at the Air Force Academy in Misrata. A third site at the headquarters of Libya’s 111th Brigade facilitates coordination between Ukrainian and Libyan military officials. This infrastructure has given Ukraine a drone corridor covering the central and western Mediterranean.
It might be described as Ukraine’s Mediterranean drone line!
The 3 March strike that sank the Russian LNG carrier Arctic Metagaz, a sanctioned vessel carrying 62,000 tonnes of LNG to Egypt, was confirmed as a Ukrainian operation using a Magura V5 naval drone. The vessel caught fire and sank in international waters southeast of Malta.
RFI also reported that the December 2025 strike on the shadow fleet tanker Qendil, the first-ever Ukrainian drone attack on a Mediterranean vessel, may also have killed GRU General Andrey Averyanov. Averyanov is widely linked by Western investigators to the Vrbětice ammunition depot explosions in Czechia, as well as other assassination and sabotage operations across Europe. Reporting cited by Nashaniva indicates that around ten senior Russian intelligence officers were aboard the Qendil, travelling disguised as crew. The strike resulted in two deaths and seven injuries. Moscow has not commented officially.
The strategic dimension of Ukraine’s Mediterranean campaign extends well beyond attacking Russian ships. Russia’s shadow fleet, which is estimated at over 3,000 vessels, is the primary mechanism for Moscow to circumvent Western energy sanctions and keep oil revenues flowing to finance its war against Ukraine. While this strike campaign occurs, Ukraine has concurrently been developing next-generation open-ocean naval drones under an agreement with the United Kingdom, encompassing joint production, R&D, and an AI Centre of Excellence in Kyiv. The trajectory of the Mediterranean strike campaign appears to be taking the lessons of Ukraine’s Black Sea naval drone campaign and transforming it into a wider, potentially globe-spanning, maritime interdiction capability.
Russian Strikes Against Ukraine. Russia’s aerial bombardment campaign continued this week. AFP analysis of Ukrainian Air Force data confirmed that Russia fired at least 6,462 long-range drones against Ukraine in March 2026. This is the highest monthly total since the full-scale invasion began, up 28% over February 2026. Ukraine’s air force achieved a near-90% interception rate across the month, the highest since February 2025. The Shahed Tracker feed on X also issued its latest graphs which supports this analysis.
Source: @ShahedTracker The biggest strike of the week took place on the night of 2-3 April. According to Ukrainian Air Force figures, Russia launched 579 aerial attack assets in a combined strike: 10 Iskander-M ballistic missiles, 25 Kh-101 cruise missiles, 2 Iskander-K cruise missiles, and 542 strike drones from multiple launch sites. Ukrainian air defences destroyed 541 of the 579 targets launched - a 93% interception rate. Eleven missiles and 27 drones got through, striking 20 locations. The attack killed at least four people and injured over 30, damaged residential buildings, a shopping mall in Sumy city centre, a veterinary clinic in Fastiv, and high-rise apartment buildings in Kyiv Oblast. Kharkiv also suffered 37 strikes across two days. Zelensky told Ukrainians that this barrage was Russia’s answer to his Easter ceasefire proposal.
ISW’s 3 April assessment flagged a significant future threat: Russian forces will likely shift their long-range strike campaign toward Ukrainian water supply and logistics targets in Spring and Summer 2026. This represents a new form of strategic coercion, targeting the infrastructure that sustains civilian life and military supply chains simultaneously. The Russian shift to daytime attacks, first documented in the 24 March mass barrage of 948 weapons, has also continued. Russia’s method, exhausting Ukrainian air defences overnight then following with daytime swarms, exploits the finite capacity of any layered air defence system. On 4 April, Russia launched a further 286 drones overnight, sustaining pressure with barely a pause.
The Ground War: Ukraine Holding Firm. Thus far, the Russians have failed to generate any operational momentum with their spring offensive
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