Vladimir Putin has got a new headache to contend with as Ukraine launches a campaign to shut down Russia’s commercial airspace.
The 73-year-old dictator is getting a taste of his own medicine in his war on Ukraine, which he started when he rolled his tanks over the border four-and-a-half years ago.
Ukraine is now causing havoc in his country, devastating Russia’s oil and gas and logistics hubs in a bid to cause as much disruption as possible, cripple its economy, and break its people’s support for the war.
Next on Kyiv’s infrastructure hit list is Russia’s commercial aviation industry, which it has now said is in danger as drones fly across the border with wild abandon.
On Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky issued a simple, chilling warning to the Kremlin: Russian airspace “is becoming completely unsafe.”
Russia has already been forced regularly to close airspace around its airports because of the presence of drones, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The Ukrainian military said that it plans for the sheer number of drones crossing eastwards over the border to be so huge that Russia will have no choice but to ground flights in its airspace. In other words, they want what is known as Operation Carpet to turn temporary closures into a complete shutdown.
Ukraine started buzzing Russia’s airports in 2023, and now plans to scale it up to the point that they cannot operate.
Data from Osprey Flight Solutions, cited by the Journal, shows nearly 1,000 closures in August, up from fewer than 200 during the same period the year before. The latest data amounts to around 32 airports being closed per day, the newspaper reports.
“This is no longer simply a repetition of isolated, sporadic emergency alerts,” Ukrainian Armed Forces’ Southern Command spokesperson Serhiy Bratchuk told the Journal. “It is a transition to constant pressure aimed at paralyzing civilian air traffic in the European part of the Russian Federation.”
On Friday, the Kyiv Post reported that all four of Moscow’s airports—Sheremetyevo, Vnukovo, Domodedovo and Zhukovsky—had suffered disruption in the last three days, as had other key hubs such as Sochi, Saratov, Penza, Yaroslavl, Nizhny Novgorod.
Kyiv has said it won’t target commercial planes or civilians. Its own airspace has been closed since the war began.
“Ukraine does not threaten civilian aviation as such—not a single civilian aircraft,” Zelensky said Tuesday. “There will simply be drones in Russia’s skies on a scale that has to be taken into account.”
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said that on Wednesday and Thursday alone, 548 had flown towards Russia, with 143 intercepted near the capital, the Post reported.
Putin was unimpressed, telling reporters in response to Zelensky’s comments that it amounted to a“declaration of terrorism.”
“If they follow through, we’ll see how best to answer. We’ll find the right tools,” he said.
Ukraine’s ability to terrorize Russia with its drone armada has taken off this summer, with tens of thousands of unmanned weapons striking targets around the sprawling country.
The more drones that come across, the more that need to be shot down, a process that—among other things—uses GPS-confusing tactics that can collaterally affect commercial air traffic.
Many countries around the world have maintained their air bridges with Russia, despite Western countries severing theirs. Now some of the surviving links are at least temporarily in jeopardy.
Some airlines have already come to their own conclusions.
Air Tanzania on Friday said it was suspending routes between Russia and the East African country after carrying out a risk assessment.
“The decision is made following a routine risk assessment of the operational conditions on the route,” its press department said in a statement, cited by Russian state-affiliated newspaper Kommersant.
It wasn’t the only one, with Turkish budget airline Pegasus saying it was pausing operations in Russia for “technical and operational reasons.” Meanwhile, Emirati carrier Flydubai said in a statement to Gulf News that, “We continue to closely monitor the evolving situation in the region and adjust our flight schedules and routings as necessary. As the situation remains dynamic, our teams are continuously assessing operational requirements.”
“We are constantly improving flight safety and airport security requirements, and we have solutions for all of this,” said Andrei Nikitin, Russia’s minister for transport, according to the Interfax news agency. “We will not allow any significant disruption to civil aviation.”
