Ukraine is systematically striking the electrical substations that feed Russian forces across the occupied territories, hitting 38 sites in less than two weeks, even as Russian troops keep up relentless infiltration attempts near Dobropillya in Donetsk Oblast.
A grid campaign behind the lines
According to the commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, Major Robert "Magyar" Brovdi, Ukrainian forces have struck 14 electrical substations in occupied Donetsk Oblast since September 24. The sites lie between roughly 20 and 70 kilometres behind the front line, and at least one has been hit more than once.
The campaign extends well beyond Donetsk. Brovdi reported six more substations struck in occupied Zaporizhia Oblast, at distances of 38 to 87 kilometres from the front, along with 17 in occupied Crimea and one in occupied Kherson Oblast. Together, the strikes point to a deliberate effort to degrade the power supply that Russian logistics, command posts and drone operations depend on.
In the same period, Ukraine's General Staff said its forces damaged a Russian Buk-M3 surface-to-air missile system near occupied Kuroshany in Zaporizhia Oblast — the kind of high-value air defence asset that protects the very infrastructure Ukraine is trying to reach.
Seventy infiltration attempts a day
While Ukraine works the rear areas, Russia is throwing manpower at the front. A Ukrainian brigade holding the Pokrovsk direction, southwest of Dobropillya, reported that Russian forces try to infiltrate into urban areas in its sector between 70 and 80 times per day.
Analysts at the Institute for the Study of War noted that Russian troops are also using Geran drones — weapons normally reserved for long-range strikes on cities — against frontline Ukrainian positions around Dobropillya. Because those drones are comparatively expensive for tactical use, their appearance there signals how much priority Moscow's command is giving the sector. Russian forces continued intensified operations around Dobropillya on October 3 and 4 without advancing, as they pursue a wide envelopment of Ukraine's Fortress Belt from the southwest.
Pressure on both sides of the line
The pattern now runs in both directions: Russia grinds forward with infiltration teams and drones in the east, while Ukraine reaches deep into occupied territory to switch off the power behind them. Each substation knocked out complicates Russian resupply and repair work; each infiltration attempt, meanwhile, has to be found and stopped by Ukrainian infantry already stretched along the front.
With winter approaching, control of the grid — on both sides of the line — is becoming as much a battlefield as the trenches themselves.
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