Tech • AI • Robotics • Game
How Ukraine blinded Russia’s drones: Operation Vivaldi explained | The Economist
6/10TL;DR
Operation Valdi reflected a wider Ukrainian shift from direct assaults to systematically blinding, starving and then striking Russian battlefield and rear-area systems dominated by drones, artillery and deep logistics.
KEY POINTS
A battlefield emptied by surveillance and firepower
Front lines in eastern and southern Ukraine have become largely barren, with a contested zone roughly 20 to 40 kilometers wide where movement above ground is often fatal. Constant drone observation and artillery fire have forced troops to burrow in, creating a landscape compared to World War I trench warfare viewed from the air. The result is a battlefield where survival depends on concealment and brief, tightly controlled movement.
Why massed infantry attacks fail
Russian tactics have relied on sending small groups of infantry forward to infiltrate gaps and then calling larger numbers in behind them. In current conditions, that second wave is often exposed and struck quickly by drones and artillery before it can consolidate gains. Ukrainian planning concluded that seizing terrain first required dismantling the enemy’s ability to detect concentrations of troops.
Operation Valdi’s first phase targeted Russian drone networks
The key Ukrainian innovation was to treat Russian battlefield awareness as the main obstacle. Over several months, Ukrainian forces built an intelligence picture of where Russian drone operators, headquarters and resupply nodes were located in the relevant sector. The opening phase of Operation Valdi then focused on hitting those supply points and command elements to blind the local Russian system and create a temporary opening for ground action.
Mid-range strikes extended the same logic deeper behind the front
Ukrainian planners increasingly distinguish between front-line attacks and mid-range strikes, generally reaching 200 to 400 kilometers behind Russian lines. These missions target the warehouses, transport links and support nodes that keep the front supplied, rather than only the final delivery point. In practice, they have been carried out mainly by larger unmanned systems guided at distance through Starlink-enabled control links.
Crimea became a choke point
A major objective of these mid-range operations was to put a stranglehold on Crimea, a critical hub for Russian military sustainment. The campaign resembled classic air interdiction: hitting supply nodes, transport infrastructure and shipping routes to squeeze the peninsula’s role in supporting Russian operations. In effect, drones were carrying out tasks that a conventional tactical air force would normally perform.
Long-range strikes reached far into Russia
Beyond roughly 250 kilometers, Ukraine has expanded attacks with very long-range drones, including the Liutyi as a key workhorse. A sharp rise in such strikes reflected improved availability rather than a sudden policy change. While refinery fires drew the most public attention, the main military priority lay elsewhere: degrading production and support systems feeding the war.
The main targets were military production, not just oil
Ukrainian deep strikes have focused heavily on facilities linked to glide bombs, missile production, explosives, propellants, aircraft maintenance and broader military supply chains. Glide bombs in particular have become a major Russian weapon, allowing aircraft to release munitions from safer distances of up to 80 to 100 kilometers. Cutting the industrial and maintenance base behind those attacks is intended to reduce pressure on Ukrainian cities and front-line positions.
Oil refining was hit with measurable economic effect
Refineries were a smaller share of Ukrainian strikes but still had significant impact. Russian diesel exports reportedly fell from around 800,000 barrels a day to about 140,000 barrels a day after repeated attacks on refining capacity. That made refinery strikes attractive as a way to impose concentrated economic pain with relatively few successful hits.
Russia’s retaliation has been far larger
Russian deep strikes on Ukraine have occurred at far greater volume, described as up to five times larger in successful impacts. Part of the recent spike stems from a major expansion in production of Shahed-derived drones, with annual output now estimated near 28,000, up from only the low thousands in earlier years. Interception has also grown harder because newer variants are jet-powered, reducing Ukrainian success rates from roughly 80 to 90 percent down to about 30 to 40 percent.
Strikes at sea created political and economic risks
Ukraine’s pressure on Russian-controlled shipping and export facilities in the Sea of Azov and the eastern Black Sea also carried wider consequences. Ukrainian accounts cited damage to 116 merchant ships in the Sea of Azov, while war-risk insurance in parts of the Black Sea reportedly spiked to as much as 20 percent of a vessel’s value for calls at Novorossiysk. That raised the danger that wider trade and food markets would feel the effects, allowing Moscow to shift blame for disruption beyond the battlefield.
CONCLUSION
Operation Valdi illustrated how the war is increasingly decided by reconnaissance, drones, logistics and industrial depth rather than simple front-line assaults. Ukraine’s strategy has become one of opening narrow windows on the battlefield while trying to exhaust the much larger Russian system behind it.
Ask a question