Inside a Ukrainian Long Range Drone Unit

Today on State of the World, we meet a Ukrainian drone team hitting targets deep inside Russia . You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening. It's Thursday, june eighteenth. I'm Greg Dixon. Ukraine launched a massive wave of long range drones deep into Russia early Thursday morning with the majority targeting Moscow. It was one of the largest attacks on that city since Russia's full scale invasion of Ukraine began . This attack illustrates a paradigm shift in the conflict, one that we've covered before on this podcast. Ukraine is seizing the advantage in the war, even though its forces are far outnumbered by the Russian military . And they're doing it largely with drones, like the ones used to attack Moscow. In a few minutes, we'll me et one of the Ukrainian military units that conducts those kinds of drone strikes. First, for details on what was hit in the Moscow attack, we'll hear from NPR's correspondent in Moscow, Charles Maines. He spoke to Ste venskeep. Charles, you're okay? I'm just fine, Steve, thanks. Good, good, glad to hear it. When we say this is one of the largest attacks, how large was it? Well, Moscow Mayor, Sergei Sabanin said nearly two hundred Ukrainian drones were basically shot down on approach to the capital overnight and into the morning , but acknowledged that several had managed to hit the city's main oil refinery. Videos circulating on social media showed drones repeatedly striking this facility, sending these large fireballs skyward and explosives tumbling out of many of Russian mouth . In one instance, an explosion sent the lid of a round oil container rocketing skyward. It really looked like something from a CGI effect in a movie. Wow I should add that Russian intercepts also appear to have played a role in some of the damage we've seen . For example, one drone crashed into a megamall here, another slammed into a high rise apartment, presumably those drones were intended elsewhere. But even hours after the attack, you saw thick plumes of black smoke masked along the Moscow skyline. All four of the city's airports have suspended operations. So all in all a real are jolt to the city and we're still waiting to hear about injuries. So how does this attack on Moscow's main oil refinery fit in with the recent attack on another big city St. Petersburg? Yeah, I was in St. Petersburg for that attack and it was similarly we sa,w big plumes of black smoke over the city . In recent months, Ukraine has upped these attacks on Russian energy infrastructure in a bid to both dent the Kremlin's war chest, and also I think to bring the war that has ravaged Ukraine home to Russians as well . In a statement after these latest attacks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy justified them as response to intense Russian bombing of Ukrainian cities. He also painted them essentially as a mess age. It was time for Russia to end the war and enter into some form of diplomatic negotiations. Any chance of that ? Well, probably not. You know, we haven't heard from Vladimir Putin, Russian President Vladimir Putin, he's actually in the city of Khazan today in Tatstan, hosting a regional Asia conference. He made some comments early on in the morning that seemed to pretend as if this had never happened . But Russia certainly has been attuned to comments recently from President Trump that he wants to re engage on the Ukraine issue now that at least it seems for now the war with Iran has quieted down . In fact, a Kremlin aid said they're expecting White House envoys Steve Witcoff and Jared Kushner in Moscow in the near soon , although we don't have an exact date for that . But the aid put it said it was really to explain the real picture from the Russian view of what's happening in this war suggesting that somehow Trump was getting bad information from Europeans and this idea that somehow Ukra ine had the upper hand. But meanwhile, we also heard from Russian nationalists who once again have said these brazen attacks that we saw today mean that Russia should punch harder, should use more powerful missiles to bring Ukraine to heal , whether that takes cold with Vladimir Putin, we just have to wait and see. Charles, thanks so much. Thank you. And PR's Joanna Kissis recently spent some time with one of the Ukrainian units that launches long range drone strikes. She takes us to one nighttime lunch in eastern Ukraine . We're driving on a dirt road deep into a vast field that's somewhere in eastern Ukraine . We stop in the middle of that road and see soldiers in body armor . They are carrying something that looks like a jet that's about the size of a small car. This is how our beautiful join Beautiful drone. We've just arrived here with the long range strike team. We are dressed like we should be on the front line and the sun is setting and we're just waiting . The team is part of Ukraine's unmanned systems forces . The unit's commander uses the military call sign Charlie. NPR is identifying the soldiers in this report by call sign at the request of Ukraine's military, which cites security reasons. Commander Charlie started running this unit three years ago when Ukrainian drone technology was in its early stages. Now he says these drone systems are very effective. Our defense forces do lack cruise and ballistic missiles, but our drones have really influenced the course of combat operations and they have hit our enemy hard . Ukraine's long range drones can travel eight hundred miles and have repeatedly targeted the lifeblood of Russia's economy, oil. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Ukraine knocked out nearly forty percent of Russia's primary oil refining capacity in May. The Kremlin, however, has dismissed claims that these drone strikes have hurt Russia's economy. In the farm field , soldiers are hammering in temporary launch pads for the drones. A soldier with a laptop checks the flight plan and other logistics. It's getting darker and darker. There sever'als drones in a row here . One, two, three, I count at least three. Another soldier, he uses the call sign push , tells me he's launching drones every night . Every day we can see our work as a result of this work and it's really motivated us every day , the best work in the world . Why? Because you know, we are doing a lot of damage for our enemies and it's everything we need right now . Further down the dirt road, soldiers are placing drones on launchers. Commander Charlie says this used to take half a day. Now everything happens so much faster, he says. I compare it to a pit stop in a Formula One race . It's now totally dark out. A team wearing headlamps and infrared goggles starts up a motorcycle engine connected to the launcher by a cable. A soldier whose call sign is Yuki explains the setup. drone. We need to create a high takeoff speed for the drone to fly, he says . And this is how we do that. The soldiers rev up the engine and then comes a flash of fire. The drone flies up into the night sky joint number three. One after another, more drones are launched. Number five, Zelensky has often called these long range drone strikes Ukrainian sanctions. So you have now seen our sanctions in motion. Let's hope we will finally force the Kremlin into a peace that is fair to Ukraine. The Ukrainian military won't say where these drones are going, only that the targets are hundreds of miles away in Russia or Russian occupied Ukraine. Russia intercepts most of these drones, but some do get through. Commander Charlie confirms his team worked on drone strikes that hit an oil refinery outside Mosc last month. A strike, Charlie says, felt like justice. Because he says, the residents of Russia's capital experienced firsthand what happens in our cities every day . The drone launches take about two hours and the soldiers depart right after they're finished. The team leaves no trace of their work in this farm field . Only the scent of burnt fuel which lingers in the warm night . Joanna Achissis NPR News reporting from Eastern Ukraine That's the State of the World from NPR . Thanks for listening