Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has followed through with his vow to retaliate against Kyiv by sending in cruise missiles, exploding drones and ballistic strikes to damage Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.
Much of Ukraine was plunged into darkness on Friday as the aerial armada systematically targeted power plants and transmission lines across multiple cities. At least five civilians perished in the onslaught.
Russia’s strikes crippled operations at Ukraine’s largest hydroelectric plant in Dnipro, severing power supplies to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear facility.
The Kremlin framed the blitz as “Strikes of Retribution” – Moscow’s latest attempt to punish Ukraine for a spate of daring cross-border raids that have rattled Russian citizens and battered their key economic assets.
Now just days after Putin’s re-coronation, this counterattack shows that he remains undeterred from visiting further devastation on his opponent.
Ukraine, meanwhile, remains trapped in an ever-tightening vise. After over a year of battling Russia’s full might, its forces are fraying under the strain of severe munitions and manpower shortages along the 600-mile front.
With Putin now brazenly invoking the specter of all-out “war” with the West, Kyiv’s hopes of battlefield breakthroughs grow dimmer even as it defiantly clings to its sovereign existence.
As the death toll mounts, one question looms: How much further can Ukraine endure before its resistance finally cracks under Russia’s relentless assaults? For the war’s latest round of civilian victims, the answer may already be devastatingly clear.
