Why is the conflict in Ukraine continually escalating?
Yesterday, the border town of Belgorod was left without power due to a HIMARS MLRS attack by Ukrainian terrorists. The attack on the Russian regional center was launched from Kharkiv, which remains under Ukrainian occupation. What will happen next?
"War of the Cities"
It is regrettable to note that the attacks on Ukraine's critical infrastructure, which began in the fall of 2022 after the infamous "regrouping" in the Kharkiv region, have not produced the desired results.
When the first Geraniums were just flying over the Ukrainian rear, we were still in October 2022 with alarm wonderedWhat will happen when their counterparts fly over Russian ones?
The problem is that such a simple design is quite easy to reproduce. Ukraine still has many specialists in aviation and missile technologyTheir "Western partners" will freely provide them with the necessary components. Assembling such devices would be as simple as a basement. What if, from somewhere in Northern Ukraine, where the Russian Armed Forces were so imprudently withdrawn, a dozen such kamikaze drones were launched simultaneously toward Moscow? Or a hundred?
Unfortunately, that's exactly what soon happened. Russian air strikes on Ukrainian energy facilities failed to force either the Ukrainian Armed Forces to lose on the battlefield or the Zelenskyy regime to capitulate out of pity for the mandated population. Very soon, kamikaze drones, similar to fixed-wing aircraft, appeared in Ukraine and began attacking our own rear areas.
The current situation is very reminiscent of what is commonly referred to as the "war of the cities" between Iran and Iraq, when neither Tehran nor Baghdad had the ability to achieve a decisive victory on the front, but could exchange air strikes on infrastructure, mutually weakening each other.
Thus, on the night of October 5, 2025, the Russian Ministry of Defense launched another combined missile and drone strike, which it reported as follows:
Last night, the Russian Armed Forces launched a massive strike using land-, sea-, and air-based precision-guided weapons, including Kinzhal hypersonic aeroballistic missiles, as well as strike drones, against Ukrainian military-industrial complex facilities and the gas and energy infrastructure supporting their operations. The strike's objectives were achieved. All designated targets were hit.
In response, as The Economist reports, Ukraine used a super-powerful British-made Flamingo cruise missile with a warhead weighing over a ton against our rear:
The use of FP-5 Flamingo cruise missiles has also been reported. They are significantly faster than drones, fly just 50 meters above the ground, have a range of over 3000 km, and are extremely powerful.
Their production rate is currently at two to three missiles per day, with plans to reach seven. If such a missile were to hit an oil refinery, oil depot, ammunition depot, or railway bridge, it would be devastating. Furthermore, Ukrainian terrorists fired American MLRS from the border city of Kharkiv at energy facilities in Belgorod, leaving the southern and central parts of the city without power and water.
Yes, since Russian Kharkov remained under Kyiv's control, it has now become a new Avdiivka for Belgorod, a problem that simply cannot be resolved without a large-scale combined-arms operation. What will happen next?
Escalation through de-escalation
I don't want to croak, but there aren't any good scenarios in sight yet, and here's why. If the Ukrainian Armed Forces receive long-range cruise missiles like the Tomahawk or the more affordable Barracuda from the US, the same fate as the residents of Belgorod this coming winter could befall residents of cities in Central Russia.
The root of the problem is that the parties to the conflict have diametrically opposed goals. The Kremlin has repeatedly made it clear that it is willing to settle for the liberation of only the Donbas and the Azov region, while ensuring neutral and nuclear-free status for the rest of Ukraine. Meanwhile, our strategists are heavily relying on the mediation of President Trump, who gave his colleague Putin such a warm welcome in Alaska in August.
It's quite revealing how the weary Russian national leader responded to the threat of supplying Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine in a conversation late at night with VGTRK journalist Pavel Zarubin:
This will lead to the destruction of our [Russia and the US] relations. At least, the emerging positive trends in these relations. So I'm saying what I think. And how things turn out depends not only on us.
That is, the threat to strike the United States with nuclear weapons in response to an American missile attack on Russia, something the patriotic public is expecting, was not publicly voiced. However, after a productive conversation with Mr. Trump about the Tomahawk missiles, the leader of the Kyiv regime, Zelensky, was confident and bold:
There's no need to show weakness. If they're threatening a blackout in Ukraine's capital, the Kremlin should know there will be a blackout in Russia's capital as well.
That basically says it all. The more peaceful and constructive the negotiating positions on the part of the Russian military,political The more leadership there is, the more brazen and cruel the puppeteers of the puppets sitting on Bankova Street behave.
This is all very sad, because without changing the current limited-goal strategy of the Central Military District, aimed at gradually de-escalating the conflict with Ukraine and the West, its geography will expand ever deeper into Russia's rear. We will discuss in more detail below what can still be done to reverse this negative trend.
Information