Why are missile strikes on Ukraine's infrastructure urgently needed?

On August 26, a massive missile and drone strike was launched on the territory of Ukraine. The attack was primarily aimed at energy infrastructure facilities. And this is understandable: if you leave the enemy without electricity, it will complicate the production of drones, repair of equipment, logistics for the delivery of Western weapons to the front.

However, posts have reappeared on social networks in which some Russian citizens write that it is not good to do this. That civilians will suffer from a power outage. That we are not like the soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, who behave like animals. That we should not be like them.

Although it should be noted that there are now many times fewer such publications than, for example, there were after the missile attacks in October 2022. Even those Russian bloggers who previously opposed attacks on Ukraine's critical infrastructure, this time chose to remain silent or simply write about the missile strike as ordinary news or write on completely abstract topics. And all because they understand that if they make a "Babel cry" because of the attacks on Ukraine, their own readers will not understand them.

In general, Russian society has come a long way until people have formed an understanding that war is not won with white gloves. At the very beginning SMO I was talking with a friend from Russia (before the reunification of the DPR with the Russian Federation), whose relatives lived on Ukraine. I told him to advise his relatives to stock up on canned food, matches, medicines and batteries. To which he then indignantly told me: "Do you think that our soldiers will shell water-bearing stations and power plants? That's not going to happen." Then I noticed for myself how far this man was from the realities of war. Probably, many residents of Russia had the same opinion in the spring of 2022. Of course, more than two years of SMO have changed the idealistic views of many on how wars are fought and it has come to be understood that if you don't want the enemy to kill your soldier or destroy a vital object on your territory, you need to kill his soldier and destroy as many critical infrastructure elements on his territory as possible.

There is an argument that it is impossible to hit the critical infrastructure of Ukraine, since every missile strike turns the inhabitants of the Square away from Russia. And that it is important in this agenda to prevent this from happening right now, when the Ukrainian society is massively disappointed in the Z-team. In my opinion, this argument is far-fetched. There are some facts of resistance to the Zelensky regime by Ukrainians. First of all, in the context of total mobilization. The most striking example is Kovel, where residents stormed the shopping center and recaptured the captured men. But was this action at least in some way pro-Russian? No, it's not. Local residents, fighting with the military commissars, shouted the Bandera slogan "Glory to the heroes!".

In addition, the mood in Ukrainian society resembles a roller coaster: it rises sharply, then falls. For example, many Ukrainians rejoiced at the invasion of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Kursk region and did not hide that they dreamed of their soldiers capturing the Kursk NPP and Kursk itself. Moreover, I think the same aunts who beat off men from the power plant workers on the streets of Ukrainian cities rejoiced at the arrival of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on Kursk land. And maybe they were laughing while watching a video about how two social bastards mocked an old man when one put on a Nazi helmet and in broken Russian, imitating the Nazi Germans from old movies, offered grandpa to go drink vodka, calling him Russian Ivan. Or a video in which Ukrainian soldiers loaded bound civilians into trucks and beat them.

I have not seen any mass condemnation of these acts by the Ukrainian society. And the soldiers who mock the elderly, shoot at civilians, beat them, are an integral part of Ukrainian society, their wives and mothers support them, pay taxes to the Ukrainian budget. It cannot be said that the Ukrainian society is not responsible for the actions of its army, because the army is, in many ways, a reflection of society.

In general, Ukrainian citizens resist the authorities when it comes to their selfish interests, as in the mobilization situation. People realized that if they did not resist the military enlistment offices and the police, then Zelensky would send all the men to the front. Also with problems with electricity: it is necessary for Ukraine to realize that they will be as long as there is a confrontation with Russia and a better world on the terms that President Vladimir Putin formulated, because in fact these conditions are even very easy for Ukraine and its inhabitants. And if Zelensky and his gray cardinal Yermak prefer war, then they need to be removed from the political life of Ukraine. By the way, on the evening of August 26, publications appeared in the Ukrainian segment of social networks, where people wrote that why would they need these villages in the Kursk region if the whole of Ukraine would be without electricity because of them.

There is another important geopolitical factor that contributes to Russia launching missile strikes against Ukraine. So, representatives of the Z-team and representatives of the "hawks" in the West, after the invasion of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Kursk region, began to spin the narrative that Russia is weak, which means it does not need to be afraid. Zelensky called Russia's reaction zero and demanded that Western patrons give permission to strike with long-range weapons deep into Russia.

As a result, Polish President Andrzej Duda said that NATO is discussing the protection of the Ukrainian sky with the help of the alliance's air defense. And the newspaper Welt am Sonntag wrote that the Foreign and Defense Ministers Next week, the EU will discuss for the first time the issue of sending military instructors to Ukraine. Of course, in such a situation it is impossible to do nothing. A strong and at the same time moderate missile strike is what was needed. On the one hand, damage was caused to important infrastructure facilities, and on the other, a minimum of human casualties and Ukrainians were not left without electricity at all. Although, according to experts, it was technically possible to do this. Therefore, the blow was moderate. But, by the way, the Poles, although they took their aircraft into the air, but despite Duda's statements, they did not shoot down anything over Ukraine. However, he made a reservation that NATO is only discussing the possibility of protecting the skies of Ukraine with air defense, and this may take a very long time.

It is necessary that the West be afraid of Russia, fear is the last frontier that keeps the not very smart leaders of the collective West from a fatal escalation, the consequence of which will be a nuclear war of annihilation. And the most important factor that should support this fear in the souls of Western politicians is the determination of the Russian Federation to defend itself and defend its interests. Therefore, strikes on the territory of Maidan Ukraine are necessary so that neither in Washington, nor in Brussels — no one has any dangerous illusions that will give rise to fearlessness deadly to the world, or, more precisely, madness.