Russia has spent decades building up its presence in the Baltic Sea.
It has to.
That sea is a crucial lifeline for Russia, as it helps the country to keep its oil flowing out.
Ukraine just took aim and fired.
Over and over again, it has been hitting Russia’s Baltic Sea oil lifeline, taking out what Putin can never replace in the process.
This has been three nights of chaos for Russia.
The Baltic black heart has been ripped out, and Putin’s oil empire is bleeding.
To give you just a little taste of what Ukraine has been doing in the Baltic region, we head to the Kirishi oil refinery, which is located in Russia’s Leningrad oblast.
During the early hours of March 26, Ukraine unleashed a devastating wave of drones at that refinery, which is responsible for converting Russian crude oil into usable products, such as fuel and lubricants.
That strike came as global oil prices have risen to above $100 per barrel several times since the U.S.
launched Operation Epic Fury in Iran.
It, along with the other strikes we’ll be covering, has been designed to send a clear message to Putin that his desire to capitalize on these higher oil prices is going to be quashed by Ukraine every single step of the way.
Robert Brovdi, who is the notorious commander of the Madyar Birds and now the head of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, took to Telegram to explain what Ukraine’s flying sanctions achieved in Kirishi.
“Siberian oil, which politely enters the KINEF oil refinery (Kirishi refinery), and then with diesel fuel or crude oil through the ports of Transneft-Primorsk and Ust-Luga, was “tanked” and fed with the bloody oil surpluses of the bunker grandfather, during the last three days…with the assistance of the freedom-loving Ukrainian Ptah with his pyrotechnic shows, got a little spoiled,” Brovdi declared mockingly when announcing Ukraine’s attack.
He went on to joke how Ukraine has created a “clot” in one of Russia’s most important Baltic oil refineries, and it would take days for Russia to put out the fires and figure out how to clean up the mess that Ukraine’s drones have caused.
We think that might be something of an understatement.
Euromaidan Press offers some more concrete details, noting that the latest strike against Putin’s Baltic Sea oil network took out some of the Kirishi refinery’s primary oil processing units, which alone forces the refining of crude oil to stop in its tracks.
You can’t make gasoline and diesel when your processing units are burning.
For Putin, that means Russia can no longer make the oil-based products here, that he is sending to soldiers along the front lines in Ukraine, and that Russia is selling to its customers to keep the Ukraine invasion going.
In addition to the processing units, Ukraine’s drones also hit a pair of storage tanks at the refinery, so oil being prepared for processing or refined products ready for shipping are also burning in Kirishi.
There may yet be more.
The true scale of the damage is being assessed.
We’re seeing no signs of the typical Russian claims of Ukrainian drone debris being the cause of all of this, which tells us that the authorities in Leningrad are a little too busy putting out fires all over the Kirishi plant.
This is the last thing that Putin wanted to see at Kirishi because this particular refinery is far more important to Russia than its president wants people to think.
Kirishi is more than just another oil refinery.
Ukraine has been hitting Russia’s refineries for months to limit Putin’s ability to profit from Russia’s oil.
Kirishi is different because it is a key cog in the Baltic Sea oil machinery that Russia has been building up for decades.
Bloomberg makes that clear in its report on Ukraine’s strike, as it notes that the Kirishi facility is designed to process over 400,000 barrels of oil a day, and that it focuses on the production of diesel, gasoline, and light fuel oils, the latter of which are made so that Russia can export them to its customers.
Euromaidan Press has more, as it points out that the KINEF refinery at Kirishi is one of the three largest processing plants in the Russian Federation.
All told, it deals with between 20 and 21 million tons of crude oil every year.
And beyond its vitality as a refinery that makes products for export, Kirishi also accounts for 6% of Russia’s total refining capacity, and it makes fuels used by Russia’s armed forces and its people.
Ukraine just hit the right refinery at the wrong time for Putin.
As oil prices skyrocket due to Operation Epic Fury, Putin was hoping that the Kirishi refinery would help bring billions of dollars into Russia that it wouldn’t otherwise have.
Now, it’s burning.
And while that would be bad enough for Russia’s dictatorial leader, the major problems at Kirishi are just the newest to emerge for Russia.
Because behind this, there’s an even bigger issue: Ukraine is striking all over the Baltic region.
What happened at Kirishi is just the latest in a series of strikes that have lasted for days, all of which are being carried out to dismantle Russia’s Baltic Sea oil operation.
For three straight days between March 23 and March 26, Ukrainian drones have been flying, sometimes for over 1,000 kilometers, or over 620 miles, to hit critical targets in the Baltic region again and again.
In addition to refineries, Ukraine has been hitting export hubs, terminals, and almost anything that it knows Russia relies upon to get its liquid gold out of the country and into the greedy hands of its buyers.
Several key Russian ports along the Baltic Sea have been hit during these three days, including Primorsk and Ust-Luga.
Combined, these two ports were responsible for the exporting of 49.7 million tons of petroleum products in 2025 alone, United24 Media reports.
That sheer volume is enough to show you that billions of dollars of Russia’s dirty oil money flows through these two ports alone.
And right now, neither one of them is operating as it should because Ukraine’s drones have hit as hard as the ones that took out the Kirishi oil refinery.
Primorsk was the first of the three targets to be hit.
On March 23, Ukraine’s drones streamed into the port, which is located near St.
Petersburg, during the early hours of the morning.
By 4 am, the regional governor, Alexander Drozdenko, was forced to humiliate himself by confirming that Ukraine’s drones had damaged a fuel storage tank.
But Drozdenko was hiding the full extent of the damage.
By March 26, The Insider was reporting that five or six of Primorsk’s storage tanks had been taken out by Ukraine’s drones, leading to a massive smoke plume that stretched about 200 kilometers, or over 120 miles, into Russia.
Even those who couldn’t see the port itself burning would have seen the smoke wafting through the air and known that Ukraine’s drones had been on the hunt again.
Two days later, Ukraine was at it again.
March 25 brought with it the news that Ukraine’s drones had made the port of Ust-Luga their target.
Those drones had traveled around 1,000 kilometers from Ukraine’s borders during the evening of March 24 and into March 25, eventually striking with such force on Ust-Luga that they are reported to have caused at least 10 explosions while also leaving a massive glow emanating in the sky that could be seen by residents from miles around.
Drozdenko was again the man to report on the attack for Russia, and he called this one a “minor ignition” while also claiming that air defenses had shot down 56 of Ukraine’s drones.
It’s different from the drone debris claim, we’ll give that much to Drozdenko.
But reports from the scene and satellite photos tell a very different story.
Flames from this “minor ignition” climbed over 100 meters, or over 320 feet high, The Telegraph reports.
The same outlet also points out that Ukraine has hit Ust-Luga four times over five consecutive nights, as of March 28.
Ust-Luga’s oil loading pier has been destroyed, and there is also damage seen on technical trestles and storage tanks that indicate this strike by Ukraine was the furthest thing away from being “minor.” Ukraine has been battering Ust-Luga.
In fact, it’s been destroying everything that Russia has built up for its oil industry in the Baltic Sea region.
The repetition here is major, and it amounts to an escalation that has caught Putin completely off-guard.
Completing three strikes in as many days against key components of Russia’s Baltic Sea oil infrastructure would be bad enough.
That’s already an attack that is of such size and scale that it would have required a combination of brilliant planning by Ukraine and utterly inadequate air defenses from Russia.
But Ust-Luga has been hit four times in less than a week.
Primorsk has taken three heavy shots in five days, too, Euromaidan Press reports.
What we’re seeing here is a concerted campaign that energy analyst Boris Aronshtein claims amounts to “…the most serious threat to exports of Russian oil and oil products since the war began.” The same expert adds, “The thoughtfulness, the scale and direction of the attacks, as well as the timing of their execution — all of this together produced an effect that I personally cannot recall in the four-plus years of the war.
Ukraine may be aiming to do what it achieved at the Feodosia port in Crimea in 2025.
Following a pair of strikes by Ukraine in September and October of last year, the Institute for the Study of War has assessed that Russia may never be able to get that port operational again, at least not for as long as it’s fighting against Ukraine.
The Feodosia attacks struck a blow against Putin’s ability to control the illegally annexed Crimean Peninsula.
These attacks in the Baltic Sea region are even more of a threat against Putin’s ability to wage war.
We’re going to tell you exactly why in just a moment.
But while we’re on this, if this is the kind of insight you want to see more of, subscribe to The Military Show so you never miss one of our videos.
So, Putin has spent the last week watching as Ukraine shatters two of Russia’s key Baltic Sea oil ports, and now he can do nothing as yet another oil refinery burns.
That refinery supplies those two ports.
Or it would be, if those ports weren’t on fire as well.
As Putin cowers in whatever hidey-hole he has found for himself, Russia’s entire Baltic Sea oil operation is going up in smoke.
Literally.
The ports that Ukraine has hit with its repeated volleys of strikes are responsible for loading and shipping out about a million barrels of oil every day.
Right now, The Telegraph reports, Russia is making about $760 million per day from its oil, again with rising prices that have resulted from Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz being the key reason why.
United24 Media reports that it may take more than two weeks for Russia to repair its two Baltic Sea ports, based on similar work that had to take place in Novorossiysk following drone attacks there earlier in March.
It wasn’t until the end of the month that tankers started sailing back into that port.
And this repair timeline assumes that Ukraine isn’t going to just keep hitting these ports and refineries over and over again until there’s nothing left of them.
Ukraine knows it can do it.
It has carried out repeated successful strikes against Russia’s Baltic Sea oil infrastructure in about a week, which tells us that Russia’s air defenses are either compromised, insufficient, or simply non-existent at Primorsk, Ust-Luga, and Kirishi.
Let’s take a moment to look at the true scale of the damage that Ukraine has done with this week of devastating strikes.
United24 Media reports that there were 18 tankers in the ports of Primorsk and Ust-Luga on March 22, which is the day before Ukraine began its strikes.
For context, that is almost half of the capacity of all of Russia’s oil ports combined, the outlet says, which highlights just how vital these Baltic Sea lifelines are to Putin.
Both Ust-Luga and Primorsk being shut down for several weeks cuts deep into Russia’s entire oil operation.
March 22 has already reportedly seen zero tankers arrive in Novorossiysk, which is Russia’s main Black Sea oil port.
All that Russia has left now are a couple of ports in the Arctic region, along with several in the Pacific region that aren’t exactly ideal for pushing out oil when so much of that oil flows through the Baltic.
Russia’s oil producers are already scrambling as hard as they can to move their products away from the stricken Baltic Sea ports.
Oilprice.com reports that the loss of Ust-Luga and Primorsk has instantly knocked out about 40% of Russia’s entire oil export capacity.
That has led to pipeline operator Transneft trying to redirect its oil away from those ports, though it’s not like it has too many other options.
That oil either has to go to the Arctic and Pacific ports we’ve already mentioned, which are hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away from Russia’s Baltic Sea ports.
Or, it has to go into storage, where it will be stationary and easy prey for yet more of Ukraine’s drone strikes.
There are also some options in the Black Sea for Russia, the same outlet reports.
But with Novorossiysk only just starting to come back to life, those options are limited.
And even with that port opening back up, infrastructure isn’t up to what Russia needs to maintain its export pace.
Plus, it’s Novorossiysk.
In the Black Sea.
That’s even more of a target for Ukraine than the Baltic Sea ports, so sending oil and tankers there is basically the same as sending an invitation to Ukraine’s drones, telling them that it’s time to hit Novorossiysk again.
At this point, Ukraine basically has Russia’s oil yo-yoing through the country, which means it’s not getting sold.
And if oil isn’t getting sold, it’s not making money for Russia.
Think back to what we told you earlier.
Russia has been making about $760 million per day from exporting its oil since the beginning of Operation Epic Fury in Iran.
That figure falls by $304 million for as long as Ust-Luga and Primorsk are down, assuming the 40% of exports figure we mentioned earlier is accurate.
It might even be more than that.
Oilprice.com has also claimed that the two broken Baltic ports are responsible for 60% of Russia’s maritime oil trade.
That would mean over $450 million wiped off the $760 million per day for as long as those two ports are closed down.
Whichever figure is correct, Putin now has to deal with a hole in the Russian oil industry that is several hundred million dollars wide, and Russia simply can’t allow that to happen.
Why? The Baltic Sea is a lifeline for Russia and for Putin’s Ukraine invasion.
It’s not just the volume of oil that moves through this waterway that makes it so important for Russia.
Ukraine’s strategy has been genius in that respect.
First, and repeatedly, it has targeted the Baltic Sea ports, destroying terminals and taking out storage in the process.
With the Kirishi strike, Ukraine’s drones have moved further inland and are now taking out facilities that keep those ports supplied.
The odds are we will see follow-up attacks against Kirishi, along with other strikes in Russia’s west, and perhaps even more attacks against Primorsk and Ust-Luga.
It’s a layered approach, and the reason it is so brilliant is that the Baltic Sea isn’t just where Russia makes most of its oil money.
It’s the sea that Russia needs to dominate because it provides the most efficient route for the country’s oil to the countries that are buying it.
The U.S.
Naval Institute has been saying as much as far back as September 1958, and nothing has changed for Russia since the height of the Cold War era.
The Baltic Sea is everything to Russia.
It is a lifeline that has been slowly getting choked off, first by NATO amassing members that surround the waterway, leading to some calling it a NATO lake, and now by Ukraine unleashing its flying sanctions against Russia’s oil ports in the region.
In January 2026, Sanctions Russia pointed out that the Baltic has become even more of a lifeline for Russia in the wake of Western sanctions against the country.
It has become Russia’s safest oil export route, at least inside Europe, because it wasn’t in range of Ukraine’s long-range drones.
Black Sea ports were, and we’ve seen the slow degradation of Russia’s naval facilities in that sea ever since the beginning of the war.
But the Baltic Sea was safe.
It was sacred to Russia.
An efficient route out for its sanctioned oil that became a critical export corridor.
But now…everything has changed.
With a week of constant attacks against Baltic Sea ports and oil refineries, Ukraine has let Russia know that the lifeline that it once believed to be so safe is now within Ukraine’s range.
Ukraine doesn’t even have to try to target the shadow fleet ships that are sailing through the Baltic Sea.
If it takes out the ports and refineries, which is what it is doing, it can make it pointless for the shadow fleet to even be in the Baltic Sea in the first place.
This isn’t just about oil and money for Ukraine, though both are vitally important.
It’s about sending a message to Putin.
A message that tells Russia’s leader, with crystal clarity, that the Ukraine of 2026 is a far cry from the Ukraine of 2022 that had already stopped his supposed “special military operation.” Over the last four years, Ukraine has developed into a military force to be reckoned with.
Long-range drones crashing into Ust-Luga, Primorsk, and now Kirishi are just the latest examples.
Ukraine’s deep-strike campaign is getting deeper.
Its drones are becoming more powerful.
And now, the Baltic Sea lifeline that Putin has relied on since he launched his war, and had become especially profitable during March, is being torn apart.
It took decades for Russia to build up this lifeline.
Ukraine has shattered it in about a week.
And it all started with Primorsk.
When Ukraine unleashed its attack on that port, it was easy to assume that the strike would be a one-time thing and that Ukraine would move on to other targets.
But what that strike really told us was that Ukraine has a powerful new weapon that has made what we’re now seeing in the Baltic region possible.
Find out what that weapon is, and more about why Primorsk matters so much to Moscow, in our video.
And if you enjoyed this video, remember to subscribe to The Military Show to see more of our coverage of Ukraine’s latest deep strikes.
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