Ukraine drone strikes test Putin’s resolve and raise escalation fears
Russian President Vladimir Putin visits the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier next to the Kremlin wall in Moscow on June 22, 2026, on the Day of Remembrance and Sorrow, during World War II of Nazi Germany. He attended the wreath-laying ceremony held on the occasion of the 85th anniversary of the invasion of the Soviet Union in World War II.
Pavel Bednyakov | Afp | Getty Images
A series of Ukrainian political victories and profound coup successes revived hopes that the war might turn in Kiev’s favor; But analysts warn that efforts to increase the cost of the conflict to Russia risk triggering further tensions.
More than four years after Russia’s full-scale invasion, Ukraine launched an unprecedented drone strike on Gazprom’s Moscow Refinery, triggering a massive explosion and sending clouds of black smoke into the skies over the Russian capital.
The attack, which lifted the lid of a storage tank into the air, showcased Kiev’s advanced medium- and long-range drone capabilities and expanded the scope of a series of attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure.
Ukraine has also increased its attacks on Crimea, which Russia captured by force in 2014, as part of its strategy to isolate the peninsula, and has benefited from the political fluctuations in recent weeks.
US President Donald Trump signaled the potential for America to renew support for Kiev, the election of Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar removed a major obstacle to Ukraine’s integration into the European Union, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was praised for turning the diplomatic tables against Russian President Vladimir Putin. open letter He suggested meeting face to face.
The end game is approaching and therefore we are now at risk of escalation.
Christopher Granville
General Manager at TS Lombard
An interim US-Iran peace deal also appears to have pushed the Russia-Ukraine war up the geopolitical agenda, while falling oil prices are likely to reduce Moscow’s recent windfall.
But analysts told CNBC that Ukraine’s depleted air defenses pose a major obstacle to its success on the battlefield, and the potential for Russia to further escalate the situation remains a danger.
Grégoire Roos, director of Chatham House’s Europe, Russia and Eurasia programs, called Ukraine’s drone attack on the Moscow oil refinery “the most interesting development in the last year.”
Black smoke rises from the site of Russian oil producer Gazprom Neft’s Moscow oil refinery on the southeastern outskirts of Moscow on June 18, 2026.
– | Afp | Getty Images
Roos said the incident underscores Ukraine’s growing military confidence and an understanding that Kiev must continue to hit Russia “where it hurts most” by cutting off Russian energy revenues.
“It’s a bad time for Russia. The number of bankruptcies [small and medium-sized enterprises] Roos told CNBC in a phone interview.
Officially Russia’s inflation rate came in It was 5.6% on an annual basis as of mid-June, lower than a month ago, according to the Central Bank of Russia. However, Swedish intelligence recently manipulate economic data and that the real inflation rate could be much higher, perhaps as high as 15%. Roos said such a figure was “quite significant.”
“Even when oil prices skyrocketed and skyrocketed at the height of the war in the Middle East, Russia did not increase its production. So yes, it benefited from a windfall, but production did not increase, so the effects were quite limited,” Roos said. he said.
Roos said it was difficult to see how Putin could withdraw from the war without losing credibility and thus potentially power. “It’s like hiking at high altitude. Once you choose the path, there’s no turning back. And that’s what makes it dangerous for Europe, because the risk of escalation is always there,” he added.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Tuesday that Moscow was observing “signs of a changeAccording to the Russian state news agency Tass, the Trump administration’s stance on the agreement reached at the summit in Alaska last August.
The comments appeared to reflect growing frustration in Moscow, although Ryabkov said talks with the United States would continue.
Why is Crimea under pressure?
Natia Seskuria, senior researcher on Russian and Eurasian security at London-based defense think tank RUSI, said Ukraine’s medium- and long-range drone campaign against Russia was “really important.”
“Ukraine is basically showing the Russians that the cost of this war is only increasing. Not just for the Putin regime, but for ordinary Russians as well,” Seskuria told CNBC via video call.
“Putin has been signaling to his people for a very long time that Crimea is safe and that war will not come close to their home, and now we see that they are facing the worst fuel crisis in a very long time.”
A line of vehicles waits to refuel at a gas station in Moscow, Russia, on June 21, 2026. St. While strict fuel and diesel sales limits ranging from 20 to 100 liters per vehicle are implemented at many gas stations in St. Petersburg, a routine traffic flow and normal activity continues to be observed at stations across the capital Moscow.
Anatolia | Anatolia | Getty Images
Seskuria said it was too early to reach a conclusion about the extent to which Ukraine could completely cut off Crimea, but continued attacks on the peninsula could make Russia’s summer offensive “much more complicated.”
Russian authorities, which already impose fuel restrictions in Crimea, recently suspended fuel distribution to the public in the occupied territory while Ukrainian attacks continue.
Analysts warn of escalating tensions
“The end game is approaching and so we are now at risk of escalation,” TS Lombard chief executive Christopher Granville told CNBC by phone.
“Russia’s regional agenda is now limited to the northwestern corner of the Donetsk region, the last part of Donbas,” Granville said.
He added that Russia “could take six months to capture one or at most two such places” and that two places in Donbas, the cities of Kostyantynivka and Lyman, “are about to fall.”
Granville said the two major cities in the region, Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, would still fall to Russian forces.
Firefighters try to extinguish a fire in a residential building after an air strike on Zaporizhia, June 16, 2026, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Darya Nazarova | Afp | Getty Images
“So you’re potentially looking at 12 months to get to that point, so in other words you can see the end point.”
But Granville made clear that the same 12-month timeline could also be applied to the alternative possibility of continued Ukrainian pressure on Russian logistics and society, which “could result in Russia agreeing to a ceasefire on front lines that fall short of its current territorial objective.”
