Ukraine has turned the Sea of Azov into a shooting gallery. Over the past four days, its naval drones have hit at least 25 Russian ships near occupied Crimea, targeting the fuel tankers that keep the Russian war machine supplied.
Ukraine’s drone force commander, Robert Brovdi, call sign “Magyar”, put the number at 25 ships hit and set on fire. The Ukrainian military claims 36 vessels struck, most of them commercial oil tankers operating as part of Russia’s “shadow fleet.” Satellite data confirms fires burning off the Crimean coast since July 6, with one image showing a plume of smoke from a ship 4.2 kilometers offshore.
The targets read like a shipping manifest: the tankers Venera-3, Sanar-1, Sanar-17, Klimena, Thetis, Alexey Savrasov, Penelopa. A passenger ferry, the SKS One, was hit in Kerch port. The sanctioned tanker Blue was struck near Yalta, onboard footage shows a naval drone evading gunfire before reaching the hull. In the Rostov region’s Taganrog Bay, governor reports described two empty tankers attacked on Wednesday, still burning on Thursday.
This is the latest phase of Ukraine’s “logistics lockdown,” a campaign to choke off every route into and out of occupied Crimea. Land routes were already compromised after Ukrainian attacks on the Kerch port in June. Now the sea routes are burning.
The effect on Russia’s fuel supply is measurable. Putin estimated Crimea’s monthly fuel need at 70,000 tons in June; the struck tankers carried considerably more than that. Fuel rationing now affects more than 90 percent of Russian regions. Russia has banned diesel exports. Queues are forming at filling stations in Moscow and St Petersburg. In Crimea itself, Russian authorities are struggling with power supply and transport disruptions.
The Black Sea Fleet, once Moscow’s instrument of power projection in the region, is nowhere to be seen. The pro-war Russian Telegram channel “Military Informant” described the tankers as “a shooting gallery for Ukrainian drone operators, with no cover from a Black Sea Fleet, which could nowadays barely defend itself.” Mikhail Zvinchuk, who runs the Rybar Telegram channel, wrote that the fleet “has now shut itself in at Novorossiysk.”
Ukraine has also struck oil depots in the Tver and Stavropol regions, hundreds of kilometers from the front line, and an oil terminal in the Rostov region. The attacks on refineries, now stretching back months, have created a compounding fuel crisis that the military and civilian economy are competing for.
Zelensky’s message is blunt: “Russians must feel that it is their state that is waging war.” Trump, meeting him at the NATO summit, called the drone strategy “an escalation that can help lead to an end.”
Whether it leads to an end or a deeper spiral depends on whether Russia can adapt. So far, it has not. Its fleet is bottled up, its refineries are burning, and its tankers travel without protection. Ukraine has found a strategy that works, and it is pressing the advantage.