Unable to break Ukraine’s defense, Russia embraces Islamist terrorist strategy

Unable to break through Ukrainian defensive lines, Russia is increasingly adopting the strategy of Islamist terrorists: blowing up Ukrainian civilians as they go about their daily lives. President Donald Trump is directly fueling this mayhem by buying diesel fuel from Russia.President Vladimir Putin’s problem is significant: since he began what was supposed to be a short “special military operation” in February 2022, Russia has lost approximately 500,000 soldiers, with many more seriously wounded. The Russian economy has been drained of skilled labor and productive investment. Today, it is forced to rely on a surging military-industrial complex to maintain some growth. Inflation is persistently high. Russian wallets are stretched thin. And Ukraine is striking deep inside Russia. Slowly but surely, Russians are growing frustrated with the war and the burdens it imposes on their lives. Putin knows it. He proved as much by banning Russia’s only anti-war party from standing in recent parliamentary elections.Yet, while Ukrainian attacks on energy and other key infrastructure targets are designed to undermine Putin and increase Russian popular frustration, Russian attacks on Ukraine have a far simpler purpose: to kill and thus terrorize. This contrast in strategies was laid bare late last week. Ukraine has conducted three attacks on data centers belonging to Russia’s Google-equivalent internet search engine company, Yandex. The attacks caused significant disruption to internet services, and Russia quickly announced that it was investigating them as terrorist attacks.Russian authorities are shameless. After all, just as Russia was decrying a data center strike that resulted in zero casualties, it was blowing up two buses in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk. Thirty people were killed and at least 18 others injured in an attack on Thursday. Kramatorsk sits on the front line, a priority target for Russian seizure as part of Putin’s effort to control the entire Donbas region. On Sunday, a Russian drone operator dropped explosives onto children, killing at least one boy.The Ukrainian victims of these attacks are ultimately victims of two things: first, the success of their armed forces in blocking Russian offensive action; second, Russia’s calculating brutality.Rather than adapt its strategy or offer compromises toward peace, Russia is attempting to terrorize Ukrainian civilians into abandoning their jobs and homes. ISIS, Hamas, and al Qaeda blow up buses in an effort to spread fear and misery, and Russia attacks buses for the very same reason. But just as Islamist terrorists claim to honor God with the blood of innocents, Russia’s attacks underline its sick lie that this war is about protecting Russian-speaking peoples.There is no question that this attack was deliberate. The glide bombs that Russia employed here are relatively accurate. They are loaded with high explosives that have a large blast radius. Russian commanders knew what they were doing when they ordered a strike on this key civilian transit location. As would have been the case had they launched these bombs at New York City’s Penn Station, they might not have known that buses would be destroyed, but they could be nearly certain that civilians would die.IN FOCUS: SIBERIAN PLAGUE LAB DEATH SHOWS WHY MOSCOW CAN’T BE TRUSTEDThis viciousness must not be viewed in a vacuum. It fits a pattern of Russia reveling in deliberately targeting innocent civilians in war. In 2024, Russia blew up a Ukrainian children’s hospital. In 2023, Russia attacked an apartment complex in Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s home city. In 2020, Russia launched repeated airstrikes on a hospital in a besieged Syrian city. In 2016, Russian aircraft deliberately targeted an international aid convoy in Syria. These incidents are just a drop in the ocean of Russian war crimes.Unable to defeat Ukraine militarily, Russia is seeking to defeat Ukraine through terrorism. Facing such injustice, Ukraine deserves Western support to strike back with discriminate but punitive effect.