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, and 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 while russian ground forces take advantage of their ability to use air strikes on Ukrainian frontline positions to make slow but steady gains.
ISW continues to assess that 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.
Read more: Ukraine’s Air Force Representative Explained How Many Patriot SAM Systems Are Needed to Protect the Country
Read more: Ukraine's New Buntar 1 Drone: Reconnoitering Air Defenses Beyond Their Range
