Impact of Ukrainian Drone Attack on Russia’s Oil Ports in Baltic Highlight Its Logistical Bottlenecks

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Mar. 30 – The successful Ukrainian drone attacks on the two largest Russian oil ports on the Baltic Sea, Ust-Luga and Primorsk, highlight not only the skills of Ukrainian forces but the logistical bottlenecks that Moscow has taken remarkably few steps to overcome and thus has left itself at risk of such attacks.

            Despite Russia’s enormous size, these two ports had been handling almost half of Russia’s oil exports, a reflection not just of the absence of other ports that might do so but of rail, road and pipeline connections from the point of extraction to the point of export (nakanune.ru/articles/124515/).

            Few other industrialized countries and none anywhere near as large as the Russian Federation have so many bottlenecks of this kind and thus, in time of war, are at such enormous risk of serious losses from attacks on a relatively small number of places both within the country and as far as its ports are concerned.

            So far, instead of considering how it might improve its logistical network, the Kremlin has focused on trying to improve its anti-drone systems. But until it creates a denser and more complete logistical network, something that will take enormous time and money, Russia will remain far more vulnerable to attacks with consequences far greater than they’d be elsewhere.