Blasts’ signs indicate major Ukraine strike

KYIV, Ukraine — A powerful attack on a Russian air base in occupied Crimea was the work of Ukrainian special forces, a Ukrainian government official told The Washington Post on Wednesday, suggesting an increasingly important role for covert forces operating deep behind enemy lines as the country expands efforts to expel Russian troops.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, did not disclose details of how Tuesday’s attack was carried out. The attack marks a significant escalation in the nearly 6-monthold war, demonstrating a new ability by Ukrainian forces to carry out attacks farther behind the front lines than had previously been thought possible.

At least three explosions rocked the Saki air base Tuesday, in a coastal area of the Crimean Peninsula, which was annexed by Moscow in 2014 and is a popular vacation destination for Russians.

Russia denied any aircraft were damaged in Tuesday’s

blasts — or that any attack took place. But satellite photos clearly showed at least seven fighter planes at the base had been blown up and others probably damaged.

Ukrainian officials stopped short of publicly claiming responsibility for the explosions, while mocking Russia’s explanation that a careless smoker might have caused ammunition at the Saki air base to catch fire and blow up. Analysts also said that explanation doesn’t make sense and that the Ukrainians could have used anti-ship missiles to strike the base.

If confirmed, the losses would be the biggest in a single day for the Russian air force since the start of the war, and could further curtail Russia’s capacity to carry out missile strikes against Ukrainian cities, at least in the short term. Russia’s air force has struggled to mount airborne operations throughout the war, and most of its strikes are launched from planes and ships comfortably out of reach of Ukrainian air defenses in Russia or Russian-occupied territory.

The attack could also have a profound impact on Russia’s long-term ability to maintain its control over southern Ukraine, and especially the nearby province of Kherson, where Ukrainian forces are hoping to launch a counteroffensive to reclaim territory. Crimea has emerged as a key logistics hub for Russian operations in the south, the main transit point for troops, equipment and ammunition reinforcing and supplying the Kherson area.

If Crimea is now in play and the peninsula is vulnerable to further attack, Russia will have to guard a part of Ukraine where it had assumed it could operate unimpeded. And that could hamper its ability to reinforce and supply its troops in the south, said Andriy Zagorodnyuk, a former Ukrainian defense minister who is now chairman of Ukraine’s Center for Defense Strategies, an independent think tank.

The attack has demonstrated to the Russians that “they are not invincible anywhere,” he said. “Most importantly, they cannot feel safe in Crimea. They thought they were safe in Crimea and they thought they were safe at long-range distance.”

The explosions, which killed one person and wounded 14, sent tourists fleeing in panic as plumes of smoke rose over the coastline nearby. Video showed shattered windows and holes in the brickwork of some buildings.

One tourist, Natalia Lipovaya, said that “the earth was gone from under my feet” after the powerful blasts. “I was so scared,” she said.

Sergey Milochinsky, a local resident, recalled hearing a roar and seeing a mushroom cloud from his window. “Everything began to fall around, collapse,” he said.

Crimea’s regional leader, Sergei Aksyonov, said some 250 residents were moved to temporary housing after dozens of apartment buildings were damaged.

But Russian authorities sought to downplay the explosions on Wednesday, saying all hotels and beaches were unaffected on the peninsula.

Officially, Kyiv has refused to confirm or deny that Ukrainians were involved. But on Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy focused his nightly address on Crimea, promising to win back the territory. “Crimea is Ukrainian, and we will never give it up,” he said, without mentioning the air base or the attack.

Exactly what caused the explosions at the base remains a source of speculation and Ukraine, if it were responsible, might never officially disclose its methods. Russian officials have said the first known strike in Crimea a little less than two weeks ago, against the Russian naval base at Sevastopol, was carried out by a drone. Some military experts suspect Tuesday’s attack may also have been carried out by some form of drone, perhaps operated by covert forces hidden nearby.

Another possibility is that explosives were planted by saboteurs at key points in the facility, experts say. A missile could have caused the damage, but there has been no evidence of any missile impact and Ukraine is not known to have ready access to missiles with that kind of range.

Hints from Ukrainian officials that special operations forces may have been involved have put a spotlight on the activities of what is officially known as the National Resistance, and which many Ukrainians refer to as “partisans.”

Led by Ukraine’s special operations forces and under the overall command of the Ukrainian army, the shadowy force made up of trained infiltrators and local sympathizers has been stepping up activities aimed at disrupting Russia’s logistics, administration, and command and control, according to Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council.

The force is secret and details of its operations can’t be disclosed, he said in an interview.

“If you ask me if there are partisans, I will answer: There are. They are everywhere. We prepared in advance and we have them,” he said. “What they are doing is another matter. It depends on what tasks and when they will be received. And there is and will be resistance.”

The resistance fighters could play an important role in complementing the conventional capabilities of Ukraine’s armed forces, which remain heavily outgunned on the battlefield despite the arrival of Western weapons systems, Zagorodnyuk said.

“They are supposed to be nonpublic, but we know this movement exists and is very active,” he said. “They can supplement Ukrainian conventional capabilities.”

Guerrilla activity has been especially prevalent in the southern Kherson region, just north of Crimea. In June, a Russian-installed official in Kherson was killed in a mysterious bomb blast on his way to work, one of a number of assassinations attributed to the resistance. Posters around the city made by Ukrainian resistance groups have warned those working with the Russians that partisans would come for them too, according to images posted on social media.

One flier read, “If a HIMARS can’t reach, a partisan will help,” a reference to the U.S.-supplied High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems that have given the Ukrainians the ability to strike up to 50 miles behind Russian lines.

The Saki air base is located over 140 miles from the nearest front line and U.S. officials have told The Post that no U.S. weapons were used in the attack, ruling out the possibility that HIMARS were responsible for Tuesday’s strike. But resistance operatives have played a role in helping locate key targets such as ammunition depots and command and control posts and providing coordinates for HIMARS teams to target, Ukrainian officials said.

The Washington Post could not independently verify claims from either side.

RUSSIAN SHELLING CONTINUES

In other developments, Russian forces shelled areas across Ukraine on Tuesday night into Wednesday, including the central region of Dnipropetrovsk, where 13 people were killed, according to the region’s governor, Valentyn Reznichenko.

Reznichenko said the Russians fired at the city of Marganets and a nearby village. Dozens of residential buildings, two schools and several administrative buildings were damaged.

“It was a terrible night,” Reznichenko said. “It’s very hard to take bodies from under debris. We are facing a cruel enemy who engages in daily terror against our cities and villages.”

In Ukraine’s east, where fighting has raged for eight years, a Russian attack on the center of the city of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region killed seven, wounded six and damaged stores, homes and apartment buildings, setting off fires, Ukraine’s prosecutor general said on Telegram. Bakhmut is a key target for Russian forces as they advance on regional hubs.

Two residents of the village of Staryi Saltiv in the Kharkiv region in the northeast were killed Wednesday in Russian shelling, police reported.

RUSSIAN OIL FLOW RESUMES

Oil shipments from Russia through a critical pipeline to several European countries resumed after a problem over payments for transit was resolved, Slovakia’s Economy Minister Richard Sulik said on Wednesday.

“Oil is already on Slovakia territory,” Sulik said on Facebook. He gave no further details.

But no oil has reached the neighboring Czech Republic yet, the country’s Mero pipeline operator said, and Hungary also was still to receive deliveries by Wednesday evening.

Russian state pipeline operator Transneft said Tuesday it halted shipments through the southern branch of the Druzhba, or Friendship, pipeline, which runs through Ukraine to the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. The northern leg of the Druzhba pipeline, which runs through Belarus to Poland and Germany, was unaffected, Transneft said.

Transneft cited complications due to European Union sanctions for its action on Aug. 4, saying its payment to the company’s Ukrainian counterpart was refused.

Earlier Wednesday, Sulik said the payments would be made by Slovak refiner Slovnaft after both the Russian and Ukrainian sides agreed to the solution. Slovnaft is owned by Hungary’s MOL energy group.

MOL confirmed the money has been transferred. But Slovnaft spokesman Anton Molnar said the deal covered only shipments to Slovakia and Hungary and not to the Czech Republic.

Czech Industry and Trade Minister Jozef Sikela said his country has joined forces with Polish authorities to look for options to resume oil shipments to the Czech Republic. Two Czech oil refiners, including the one in Litvinov that processes Russian oil, are owned by Poland’s oil and energy giant PKN Orlen.

Sikela didn’t provide more details.

Slovakia receives practically all its oil through the Druzhba pipeline. Sulik said the payment is worth up to $10.2 million.

He said his country would work on a long-term solution to the problem which he said was caused by the refusal of an unnamed bank in Western Europe to transfer the money due to the sanctions imposed by the EU on Russia for its war against Ukraine.

“I wouldn’t look for a political context behind it, there’s none,” Sulik said.

However, Simone Tagliapietra, an energy expert at the Bruegel think tank in Brussels, said Russia has weaponized natural gas heading to Europe by claiming technical issues, and “this opens questions on whether it might now do the same with oil.”

Russia has blamed equipment repairs for its decision to slash flows through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany, whose government has called it a political move to sow uncertainty and push up prices amid the war in Ukraine.

EU leaders agreed in May to embargo most Russian oil imports by the end of the year as part of the bloc’s sanctions over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

The embargo covers Russian oil brought in by sea, but allowed temporary Druzhba pipeline shipments to Hungary and certain other landlocked countries in central Europe, such as Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

Information for this article was contributed by Isabelle Khurshudyan, Liz Sly, Adela Suliman, David L. Stern and Serhiy Morgunov of The Washington Post along with Susie Blann, Ellen Knickmeyer, Michael Biesecker, Karel Janicek, Courtney Bonnell and Bela Szandelszky of The Associated Press.