Ukrainian drones on Thursday hit more Russian oil facilities and set two oil tankers ablaze in the Sea of Azov, while gasoline shortages and fuel rationing spread across multiple regions and drivers waited for hours to fill their tanks. The machinery of war keeps grinding, and ordinary people are the ones standing in line for the fuel, the delays, and the fallout.
Who Pays for the Oil War
The acting governor of Russia’s western Tver region, Vitaly Korolyov, said a Ukrainian drone strike triggered a fire at an oil depot in the city of Tver. In the southern region of Stavropol, Gov. Vladimir Vladimirov said oil reservoirs had been set ablaze by Ukrainian drones in Vyazniki. He said the authorities ordered the evacuation of residents of several apartment buildings near the facility as the fire expanded. That’s the hierarchy in plain view: decisions made far above, then residents pushed out of their homes when the flames spread.
In the Sea of Azov, Ukrainian drones set two oil tankers ablaze, according to Rostov Gov. Yuri Slusar, who said that one of the ships was still burning and the crews were evacuated. The attack was the latest in a series of strikes on oil tankers in the area in recent days, part of Ukraine’s efforts to cut fuel supplies to Russia-occupied Crimea. The fuel system becomes a battlefield, and the people who work it or live near it are left to absorb the blast radius.
What Kyiv Calls “Long-Range Sanctions”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that in addition to strikes on oil facilities in Stavropol and Tver, Ukrainian defense forces also hit a reserve fuel storage facility about 800 kilometers (500 miles) from the front line, and an oil-pumping station in Ufa nearly 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) from Ukraine’s border. He said they also struck an oil-loading terminal in the Rostov region about 200 kilometers (125 miles) from the front line, but it was not clear if that was the same strike described by Slusar.
Zelenskyy described the strikes as part of Kyiv’s campaign of “long-range sanctions” carried out in response to Russian attacks and Moscow’s refusal to end the war. “We have long proposed that Russia end this war, and every day of delay should bring the feeling of war to where it all began — to Russia,” Zelenskyy said. The language is polished, but the target remains the same: infrastructure, fuel, and the people caught between states that keep feeding the war machine.
The Air War Keeps Spinning
Russia’s Defense Ministry said that air defenses downed 73 Ukrainian drones from late Wednesday until early Thursday. Ukraine’s Air Force said that Russia fired 94 long-range strike drones and two ballistic missiles at Ukraine last night. While 72 drones were jammed or intercepted, 19 drones and both missiles inflicted damages at 13 locations, it said. The numbers read like a ledger of managed destruction, with both sides counting machines while civilians live under the consequences.
During Wednesday’s meeting with Zelenskyy on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Turkey, Trump said the U.S. will give Ukraine a license to make Patriot air defense systems to counter missile attacks from Russia in their more than four-year war, a huge coup for Kyiv which has long requested the technology. The deal runs through the same old channels of power: states, alliances, licenses, and weapons, all presented as security while the costs stay down below.
The tone of their meeting was markedly different from an earlier, acrimonious encounter at the White House in February 2025 when Trump berated Zelenskyy. On Wednesday, he praised the Ukrainian leader’s willingness to reach a deal to end the war, saying he has “done an amazing job” and “been very effective.” The praise lands neatly in the language of rulers talking to rulers, while the people dealing with shortages, evacuations, and burned fuel infrastructure get no such applause.