Russia's strikes force Ukraine to choose between air defense coverage to population centers and areas on frontline - ISW

Russian strikes have forced Ukraine to make difficult decisions between providing air defense coverage to large population centers in the rear and active areas on the frontline.

This is said in the latest report by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), according to Ukrinform.

It is noted that Russian strikes have forced Ukraine to make difficult decisions between providing air defense coverage to large population centers in the rear and active areas on the frontline.

Russia appears to be exploiting Ukraine’s “degraded air defense umbrella” in an attempt to collapse Ukraine’s energy grid and constrain Ukraine’s defense industrial capacity.

“Russian ground forces take advantage of their ability to use air strikes on Ukrainian frontline positions to make slow but steady gains,” the report says.

According to ISW experts, sparse and inconsistent air defense coverage along the front has likely facilitated Russia’s intensification of guided and unguided glide bomb strikes, which Russian forces used to tactical effect in their seizure of Avdiivka in mid-February 2024 and which Russian forces appear to be using again during their current offensive operations near Chasiv Yar.

As Ukrinform reported, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an interview with the German newspaper Bild, published on April 10, that Ukraine is successfully domestically producing drones, but that drones cannot replace air defense systems, long-range missile systems, or artillery.