Russia has found the "weak point" of the Ukrainian Army on the front line.
Russia determined that cutting off the logistical supplies to the Ukrainian army in the field would hasten its collapse more than attacking; and this is their way.
Báo Khoa học và Đời sống•25/11/2025
Recently, the Russian Armed Forces (RFAF) has intensified attacks on enemy supply lines and locomotives? Specifically, on October 5, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced: "tactical aviation, attack UAVs, missile forces and artillery... destroyed... train cars used to transport weapons and ammunition by rail to war zones in Donbass". The Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) also issued a statement, saying that Russia had broken its own record that day: 700 UAV attacks and 52 missiles were used. Ukraine's industrial, logistics and energy facilities suffered the most damage.
But the main difference between these airstrikes and previous ones is the choice of targets – namely, the railway infrastructure of the Poltava and Sumy regions has been destroyed in many places. According to Mr. Kuleba, Minister of Development of Communities and Territories Oleksiy, trains from Kharkiv to Lviv and from Kramatorsk to Lviv are being delayed due to severe damage to the railway infrastructure. Attempts to block the supply lines to the AFU have been made by the RFAF before. Since the fall of 2022, Russia has been actively targeting Ukrainian energy facilities, including substations supplying railways. Russia’s goal is clear: most of Ukraine’s railways are electrified. Without electricity, electric locomotives cannot operate. And Ukraine lacks diesel locomotives. But the Kiev government has found a solution. "The power substations were quickly restored, or even simply replaced with equipment supplied from Europe. And the bunkers protecting these substations were built of solid concrete, which can withstand attacks by Geran-2 UAVs and some missiles," Russian military expert Vladimir Prokhvatilov told Vzglyad. Yuriy Knutov, a military historian of the RFAF air defense forces, added that Ukraine had been supplied with diesel locomotives by its Eastern European partners. Then Russia changed tactics and began attacking locomotives directly. Ukrainian Telegram channels claim that as early as this summer, the RFAF began a major attack on railway logistics, particularly in Dobropillia, an important AFU logistics center north of Pokrovsk, in the western part of Donetsk Oblast.
“Even with a conventional Geran-2 UAV, knowing the location of the locomotives, it is still possible to destroy them, since most railway facilities are poorly protected by air defense,” Vladimir Prokhvatilov explained. According to this expert, most of the weapons from the West came to Ukraine by rail. Then they were loaded onto trucks to be transported to the front. This tactic of dispersing supplies was developed by the Americans. Therefore, the railway was an important link in the logistics of the AFU. Thus, if even half of the locomotives were destroyed, the supply of Ukrainian troops, at least in key areas, would be threatened. According to Ukrainian sources, more than two hundred locomotives have been destroyed since the start of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. Russia's tactics to neutralize Ukraine's railways, first attacking them with Iskander missiles, then finishing them off with Geran attack UAVs; this is the information that expert Knutov used to describe Russia's methods of attacking Ukraine's supply lines and railway infrastructure. According to the expert, in October, for the first time in history, a Geran-3 UAV attacked a moving train. The Geran-3 UAV disabled the locomotive of a train in the Chernihiv region, forcing it to stop. Subsequent UAVs then attacked the train, including the fuel tank cars. The entire cargo caught fire.
The Geran-3 UAV is equipped with a night vision camera and a modern targeting system. They are capable of recognizing moving objects in real time. These devices maintain contact with the operator at a distance of several hundred kilometers. “This UAV is equipped with a jet engine, so it can fly at speeds of 400 to 600 km/h at altitudes of up to 5 km and can maneuver in flight,” Prokhvatilov explained. Geran-3 can detect radiation emitted by missile guidance stations and effectively avoid them. For conventional air defense systems, Geran-3 is a “very difficult” target. Military expert Vladislav Shurygin considers the destruction of locomotives to be an extremely important task. "It is extremely difficult for Ukraine to quickly replenish the shortage of diesel locomotives. Therefore, we need to create specialized UAV teams - locomotive hunters," the expert commented. Why did these massive attacks begin now? Military expert, political scientist and doctor of history Ivan Konovalov believes that Russia has begun to apply the tactics of "full suppression" of the enemy. At the same time, they are trying to disrupt the AFU's supply lines to the areas on the front where the RFAF is actively advancing.
At the same time, experts agreed that it was not advisable to completely cut off Pokrovsk, Kupyansk and Seversk by destroying the bridges. The enemy must be given the opportunity to retreat; after all, it is during a retreat, as happened at Avdiivka, for example, that the enemy suffers the most serious losses. Meanwhile, expert Vladimir Prokhvatilov believes that there are two other reasons for the large-scale attacks on Ukraine’s railway logistics: military and political. “By destroying what remains of Ukraine’s defense, energy and logistics complex, Russia is converting its military advantage into political advantage,” the expert concludes. (photo source Kyiv Independent, Ukrinform, Sputnik).
Báo Khoa học và Đời sống•25/11/2025
Comment (0)