Ukraine has once more brought the war to Russia’s capital, launching its biggest drone strike against Moscow since the start of the conflict, causing what may be extensive damage to the city’s main oil refinery and sparking fears of fuel shortages.

Nearly 200 drones struck targets across the city, demonstrating Ukraine’s growing drone capability, in terms of scale, frequency and range of attacks. According to Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, almost as many drones were shot down — but enough still got through to damage critical infrastructure, disrupt airports and remind Muscovites that the war is no longer confined to Russia’s border regions.

The attack on Gazprom Neft’s 240,000 barrel per day (bpd) refinery in Moscow’s southeast Kapotnya district was the most strategically significant strike. The plant supplies 40% of the capital’s fuel supply, including jet fuel to the city’s four airports.

The extent of damage is unclear, but video footage shows multiple fires sending large plumes of black smoke into the sky. According to Reuters, a 140,000-bpd crude distillation train was damaged, along with a catalytic reformer and a diesel hydrotreatment unit. Some secondary units, piping and auxiliary equipment were also affected, and storage tanks caught fire.

It was the second strike against the refinery this week – on June 16 a drone also damaged and set alight one of the plant’s crude distillation units. 

Ukraine has shifted the focus of its drone campaign over the past two months, from targeting terminals and other oil export infrastructure to the country’s refineries. Rather than causing further disruptions to global fuel supply, the aim now it seems is to intensify pressure on Russia’s domestic fuel demand, not only depriving the Russian military of critical diesel but also making average motorists aware of the toll that Moscow’s war is taking on their daily lives.

The Moscow refinery was one of a number of processing plants nationwide to be targeted over the past month – a coordinated attack aimed at inflicting maximum damage to fuel supply all at once. The consensus among analysts is that over 2mn barrels per day of refining capacity — a third of the national total – has been struck by drones since late April. How much of this capacity is still offline is unclear, however. 

But the recent strikes on the Moscow plant set a precedent. While previous attacks have mostly affected only fuel supply in Russia’s regions, Kyiv’s drone campaign now risks causing shortages in the Russian capital. 

For now, Moscow is not facing an obvious city-wide fuel panic. There is no evidence of long queues emerging at filling stations, and fuel prices set by Russia’s integrated oil companies such as Rosneft and Gazprom Neft have seen relatively little change, as they are best positioned to absorb supply pressure for longer. But there have been sharp increases in prices charged by some independent retailers. On June 18, Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service asked Neftmagistral, an independent chain with around 100 filling stations in Moscow and the surrounding region, to explain why it raised the price of AI-95 gasoline by 19% in a week.

While the city may not be facing widespread panic-buying, several motorists who spoke with IntelliNews confirmed that they had stocked up on extra fuel in the wake of the June 18 attack, anticipating that prices would rise over the coming days. Authorities have taken steps to reassure the public – the mayor’s office issued a statement on the same day as the attack that fuel supply to Moscow was “proceeding as normal.”

The government has already mostly maintained a ban on gasoline exports over the past two years because of refinery disruptions. According to Reuters, the country has even begun importing fuel following the latest strikes. The government has also eased regulations regarding fuel quality – some refineries can now sell gasoline and diesel on the domestic market that falls short of the Euro-5 standard for sulphur and other emissions. While the move will enable refiners to maximise output, lower standards could cause damage to some modern vehicles. 

The main question is whether Ukraine can sustain the frequency of its attacks. While today’s refineries in Russia often have similar designs as those built during the Cold War – built to withstand major aerial bombardments, the facilities will be rendered inoperable if Kyiv can continue striking them often enough that repairs simply cannot take place.

Ukraine’s prowess in drone technology continues to grow. The US has even sought access to the country’s homegrown drone technology, which is all the more proficient as it has been tested and refined in battlefield conditions rather than merely in laboratories. Russia’s aerial defence systems – and its own drone capabilities – have simply failed to keep up. 

While Russia’s fuel supply situation for now appears manageable, risks are growing. A single damaged refinery can be worked around, but repeated strikes on core processing units, storage tanks and logistics infrastructure are harder to absorb. Ukraine does not need to collapse Russia’s entire refining system to bring the war home to Muscovites. It only needs to show that the capital’s fuel supply is vulnerable, and that the costs of the war are no longer confined to the border regions or the federal budget. 

In Moscow, car ownership is high, commutes can be long and driving remains central to daily life for many of the city’s citizens. Fuel shortages or sharp price rises would therefore be felt quickly and personally, creating exactly the kind of visible, everyday grievances that can fuel civil unrest and greater war fatigue.