Russia Unleashes 345-Asset Drone–Missile Barrage Two Days Before Invasion’s Fourth Anniversary

Mass saturation attacks on civilian infrastructure recall Germany’s late-WWII V-1/V-2 ‘Baedeker raids’ (1944-45) aimed at sapping morale when battlefield fortunes stalled. In today’s theatre, cheap Iranian-derived Shahed drones and cruise missiles let Russia force Ukraine to expend scarce, expensive interceptors—a pattern visible since the first large swarm on 31 Dec 2022 and mirrored in Iran’s June 2025 missile salvos that briefly overwhelmed Israeli-US defenses. The strategic trend is clear: mass-produced, semi-accurate drones are redefining air power, shifting cost-exchange ratios and turning energy grids into frontline targets. Whether historians in 2126 view this night as decisive will hinge less on the immediate damage than on how states adapt—through layered air defenses, hardened grids, or new norms limiting strikes on civilian power—choices that will shape the next century of warfare far beyond Ukraine.