Russia's cheap Gerbera drones are getting a little more expensive—and a lot more capable. And that's bad news for Ukrainian forces as both sides in Russia's 53-month wider war on Ukraine escalate their attacks on the enemy's logistics.

The upgrade is AI-assisted targeting, and it gives the $10,000 Gerbera the same machine vision Russia put on its far pricier Geran strike drones. In the same way Ukrainian drone units are relentlessly bombarding Russian supply lines with their AI-assisted "middle strike" drones, Russian drone units can now bombard Ukrainian supply lines, potentially weakening Ukrainian units before Russian units even make contact with them.

In recent days, the first Gerberas have appeared with AI-assisted targeting. It's the same "Seeker" modification the Russians recently added to their long-range Geran attack drones—Russia's licensed copy of the Iranian Shahed-136: forward-looking cameras feeding a Raspberry Pi microcomputer that runs machine vision software.

On the Gerans, the operator picks out a target—a truck, a locomotive—from around a kilometer away and locks the drone onto it. From there the machine vision flies the rest of the run, holding the lock through the Ukrainian jamming that would otherwise break the operator's radio link in the final seconds. Russia has standardized the guidance, communications and navigation components across the Gerbera Seeker and the Geran Seeker, the Hudson Institute reported on 29 July, so the 18-kg Gerbera should finish its attacks the same way. The Gerbera Seeker also picks up an inertial navigation unit and a jam-resistant Kometa-M satellite antenna carried over from the Geran-2.

Greater autonomy via the Seeker mod helps the propeller-driven, plywood-and-foam Gerberas strike more widely within their range of up to 600 km—less when they're carrying a warhead. As it happens, 600 km is just enough to hold at risk all the main supply lines for Ukraine's front-line brigades and regiments. Russian crews have already been hunting Ukrainian trains with cruder versions of the same idea.

Ukraine's Defense Intelligence says Russian robotic-warfare formations have been tasked with striking fuel stations and civilian vehicles—trucks, buses and passenger cars—in front-line and border areas, with the Gerbera Seeker among the systems earmarked for the job, according to the same Hudson assessment.

Decoys, scouts and relays

The Gerbera wasn't always an AI attack drone. The Chinese-designed, Russian-manufactured drone—Ukraine's Defense Intelligence names the developer as the Chinese model-aircraft maker Skywalker Technology Co., Ltd., which ships kits and Chinese components to the Alabuga plant for assembly—started out as a decoy for bigger, pricier drones. Where a Geran might cost between $50,000 and $100,000 depending on the exact model and its features, a Gerbera is priced to move at just $10,000 or so.

Before launching Gerans, the Russians would send in Gerberas in order to distract Ukrainian air defenses and force them to expend their limited supply of ammunition. Gerberas can function as simple reconnaissance systems, relaying video back to their operators. It's likely the Gerans also serve as relays in mesh radio networks, passing radio signals back and forth on behalf of a wider wave of drones.

Transforming a basic Gerbera into a Seeker Gerbera adds cost and weight. At tens of dollars per unit, a Raspberry Pi isn't exactly expensive. It's unclear how much the warhead and software cost, however. In any event, a Seeker Gerbera is still much cheaper than a Seeker Geran is. Adding Seeker Gerberas could allow the Russians to focus their Seeker Gerans at the toughest and most distant targets: ships and port infrastructure, for example.

Low cost is a prerequisite for saturation middle strikes across the logistical zone. The targets—trucks, trains, warehouses and depots—are numerous, after all. Ukrainian drone units launch hundreds of middle strike drones every day, many of them with AI targeting. The defense ministry in Kyiv hopes to expand the strikes by procuring 100,000 middle strike drones for 2027.

The Seeker Gerbera could help Russia begin to catch up.

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For first time, Russia merged two separate drone types onto one Mesh network. Ukraine already has answer

If the Russians do indeed scale up Seeker Gerbera raids, the Ukrainians may have to counter the drones the same way the Russians counter Ukraine's own middle strike drones. The Russians spread their supply vehicles along more secondary roads and also attach air defense gun teams to more convoys. The same tactics could blunt Seeker Gerbera attacks.

Exclusives

Europe deepens trade with India while Western parts keep reaching Russia’s weapons. Brussels is drafting its largest-ever corporate blacklist over the war—and expanding trade with the country those parts pass through.

Russia can rebuild Wildberries warehouses more easily than it can replace warehouse workers. The warehouses are replaceable—but at a record 2.1% unemployment, the spooked workers who staff them are not.

Precision missiles hit the coordinates. Investigators ask who was still standing there. A new framework names the pattern in four Russian strikes—and aims at Russia’s standard legal defense.

Europe wants Ukraine’s railway split. The war wants it whole. Ukraine has two years to split its railway on the EU model—and no intention of giving up the wartime control that model is built to remove.

Greece blocked a gas ban, France and Italy softened an entry ban—now Brussels tries 1,600 companies helping Russia’s war. Bloomberg sources says the proposed list covers firms feeding Russia's military industry, and the work stayed out of public view.

Military

Ukraine orders nationwide bomb shelter inspection as more head underground amid rising ballistic missile threat. Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyi ordered authorities to inspect every civilian shelter and ensure people can enter as soon as a ballistic missile threat is known.

"There is no sky that is 100% safe": Poland to consider sending more Patriot missiles to Ukraine after Russian missile crashes on its territory. The pledge comes after a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile flew nearly 100 kilometers into Poland during Moscow's latest mass attack on Ukraine, prompting Warsaw to review additional military support.

Warsaw confirms a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile overshot Ukraine and hit a field in Poland. The Kh-101 flew across Ukraine and traveled about 95 km inside a NATO member before it fell.

Russia builds sea drones to hunt Ukraine, Ukraine just torched the base where they sit in occupied Crimea. Operators struck the hangars of a Russian naval uncrewed-boat base at Snizhne, near Yevpatoriia, setting off a large blast. Other targets: radars, a launcher, a Shahed base.

Russia parked a 5,000-kilometer jamming station in Crimea, Ukraine parked a drone on top of it. The hit came near Cape Fiolent overnight, another Russian high-value asset lost on a peninsula Ukraine keeps working to cut off.

Ukraine preparing "asymmetric" response to Russia's ballistic missile campaign, Zelenskyy says. Zelenskyy says Ukraine has approved technological and asymmetric measures to counter Russia's growing use of ballistic missiles, while seeking more air defense interceptors from European partners.

Intelligence and technology

This Ukrainian 344-kg armored capsule keeps wounded soldier in constant contact with operator, with emergency exit he controls himself. Ukraine's Robotized Complexes unveiled the Murakha CaseEvak, a ground robot with an armored medical capsule that remotely evacuates wounded soldiers from zones where enemy drones hunt rescuers.

Ukraine loses another F-16 to onboard emergency. Ukraine lost an F-16 on 29 July during a mission to intercept Russian air targets.

Ukraine's interceptors shot down Russian spy drone at 6,400 meters. It's thousand meters above Everest's base camp. Ukrainian National Guard pilots intercepted a Russian ZALA Z-20 reconnaissance drone at one of the highest altitudes at which Ukraine has downed an enemy drone.

Ukraine's Defense Forces sent FP-1 drones to Ryazan, a refinery and a warehouse burned. Open-source analysts worked through eyewitness frames to place the blaze at the complex the marketplace calls Ryazan: Tyushevskaya. Later in the morning, the drones reached a Perm refinery 1,500 km from Ukraine.

International

EU releases another €3.47 billion for Ukraine's "urgent needs", drones, missiles, air defense, and Gripen jets. The latest EU defense tranche will fund drones, missiles, air defense, and Gripen fighter jets, with Brussels pledging additional military support for Ukraine in the coming weeks.

The Belarusian tunnel to the EU was almost done. Then Lithuania drilled a hole in exactly the wrong place, for the diggers. Polish tunnel-detection equipment narrowed down the location, and a single bore confirmed a passage running from Belarusian soil.

US Senate took first step toward Graham sanctions bill on Russia. It gives Trump power to impose 500% tariffs on Russian oil. The US Senate voted 86-12 to advance the Russia sanctions bill renamed for the late Senator Lindsey Graham, hours after his funeral.

Ukraine hits 201 Russian shadow fleet ships in three weeks. Commander says Crimea's supply route is now blocked indefinitely. The campaign has run alongside strikes on Crimea's power grid and air defenses, part of a broader effort to make holding the peninsula costlier by the week.

Humanitarian and social impact

Russia likely used North Korean missile in strike that killed Ukrainian family. Reuters and President Zelenskyy say preliminary evidence points to a North Korean ballistic missile in the strike that killed five members of the Voronov family during Russia's latest mass attack.

Two children pulled from the rubble alive, three did not survive, one village near Kryvyi Rih after Russian missile attack. Last night, Russian missiles killed eight Ukrainians and injured dozens.

Ukrainian drones destroyed nearly 15.4% of Russian retail giant's storage space in July. Ukrainian drones destroyed eight Wildberries warehouses in July, which is about 860,000 square meters.

Russian soldiers raped Ukrainian woman and shot her in back when she tried to escape in Bucha. Ukraine has now put their names on record. Ukrainian police charged two Russian soldiers from the 76th Air Assault Division.

This Ukrainian border town has served as Russia's testing ground for new weapons of terror since 2023. Then, it turns them on rest of Ukraine.

Russia is bombing Kostiantynivka to rubble while pushing its infantry into it on foot. Artillery and guided glide bombs hit the city as small Russian groups try to dig into whatever buildings they can reach.

Political and legal developments

62 of the 140 foreign parts in this Russian missile were American. Ukraine wants that gap closed. An Iskander missile Russia fired at Kyiv Oblast on 10 July held more than 140 foreign components, Ukraine's sanctions chief says, most made recently.

Investigators descend on Ukraine's recruitment offices in a coordinated nationwide operation. The operation, run with the army's General Staff, reached most regions on 30 July and is expected to produce named suspects.

Ukraine's army has some brigades starved of soldiers and others overstaffed. New commander is now auditing why. Ukraine's General Staff has launched a check on how its brigades, regiments, and corps are manned.

Read our previous daily review here.

Ukraine has ordered an urgent nationwide inspection of all civilian bomb shelters following Russia's latest deadly ballistic missile attack, with Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyi instructing authorities to ensure shelters are properly maintained and accessible whenever a ballistic missile threat emerges.

The move comes after Russia's overnight missile and drone barrage killed civilians across Ukraine and as more Ukrainians increasingly rely on bomb shelters amid a growing wave of Russian ballistic missile attacks.

Ballistic missiles leave civilians with little warning

Koretskyi's order follows reports circulating on social media that some people were unable to access shelters before the overnight attack because an official air raid alert had not yet been issued. 

Kyiv authorities denied claims that access to metro stations – the capital's largest public shelters – was restricted after the alert was announced, saying all stations were opened immediately once the warning was declared.

However, Russia's increasing use of ballistic missiles has sharply reduced warning times, often to minutes or less. In some recent attacks, air raid alerts have been issued only after missiles were already approaching or reaching their targets.

Government orders inspection of every shelter

Koretskyi said relevant ministries, government agencies, regional military administrations, including the Kyiv City Military Administration, and local authorities had been instructed to immediately inspect every civilian shelter within their areas of responsibility.

"All of them – without exception," he said.

The inspections will assess both the condition of shelters and whether people can access them without obstruction.

Shelters should open before air raid alerts

Koretskyi said shelters should be accessible when authorities already know a ballistic missile threat exists, even if an official air raid alert has not yet been issued.

"Access to shelters must be available even when the danger is already known but the alarm has not yet been announced," he said.

"Given the constant threat of ballistic missiles, regional authorities and city administrations must act more quickly and based on the real need to protect people."

He said it was unacceptable that, more than four years into Russia's full-scale invasion, Ukrainians could still face problems accessing bomb shelters.

"People must always be able to reach shelters in advance and without obstruction, especially when there is a ballistic missile threat. This is the personal responsibility of every official," Koretskyi said.

Ballistic threat drives more people underground

The order comes as Russia increasingly relies on ballistic missiles, which can reach their targets within minutes and leave civilians with little time to seek shelter.

The growing threat has led more Ukrainians to use bomb shelters during air raids. During the latest overnight attack, more than 56,000 people took refuge in Kyiv's metro stations alone, according to the Kyiv City State Administration.

The renewed focus on shelter access also comes as Ukraine continues to press partners for additional Patriot interceptor missiles, which are among the few systems capable of shooting down Russian ballistic missiles. Russia's latest overnight attack included ballistic missiles that struck multiple regions across the country, killing at least nine civilians and injuring dozens more.

Poland will consider providing Ukraine with additional Patriot interceptor missiles after a Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace during Moscow's latest mass attack on Ukraine, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on 30 July.

Speaking at the site where a suspected Russian Kh-101 cruise missile crashed in Poland's Lublin Voivodeship, Tusk said Warsaw would review further military assistance to Ukraine following the incident, according to Ukrinform.

Poland weighs additional Patriot missiles

"After this incident, together with the defense minister, we will consider as soon as possible the issue of further assistance to Ukraine, including the transfer of additional missiles for Patriot systems, should such a need arise," Tusk said.

The announcement follows Russia's overnight missile and drone barrage against Ukraine, during which a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile flew roughly 95 kilometers into Polish territory before crashing in a field. Polish authorities said they scrambled an F-16 fighter jet and were prepared to shoot the missile down had it continued deeper into the country.

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Warsaw confirms a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile overshot Ukraine and hit a field in Poland

Patriot interceptor missiles are currently Ukraine's most effective defense against Russian ballistic missiles. Ukraine has repeatedly warned it is running short of interceptor missiles, while Russia has intensified its use of ballistic weapons that can only be shot down by a limited number of advanced air defense systems.

Tusk added that no country has completely secure airspace.

"There is no sky – not in the United States, not in Israel, not in Ukraine, and not in Russia – that is 100% safe," the Polish prime minister said.

Tusk: Next 100 days could decide the war

Tusk said he discussed the battlefield situation and prospects for ending the war during talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday.

"After my conversation with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, one thing is quite clear: the next 100 days could determine the outcome of this war. It's fifty-fifty," Tusk said, according to Ukrinform.

Investigation into missile incursion continues

Tusk said there was currently no evidence that Poland itself had been the intended target of the missile.

He added that the United States, European Union member states, and Norway had offered assistance with the investigation. Ukraine has also proposed helping examine the incident, and Polish authorities plan to use the expertise of Ukrainian specialists.

The missile incursion occurred during one of Russia's largest aerial attacks in recent months, which killed at least eight civilians across Ukraine and injured more than 50 others. Officials have said the object that crashed in Lublin Voivodeship was most likely a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile.

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Two children pulled from the rubble alive, three did not survive—one village near Kryvyi Rih after the Russian missile attack

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said preliminary evidence indicates Russia used a North Korean ballistic missile to destroy a family home near Kryvyi Rih, killing five people during Moscow's latest mass attack on Ukraine.

The strike flattened the home of the Voronov family in the village of Radushne. Parents Olena and Artem Voronov were killed along with three of their children – Mark, Azarii Ilai, and Emilia. 

The fate of Zakharii, Dominika, Federika, Viorika, and 18-month-old Artem, the family's grandson, remained unclear as rescuers searched the rubble and forensic experts examined recovered remains to determine which family members had been found.

Preliminary evidence points to North Korean missile

"Russia used a North Korean missile in Radushne for the first time in a long while – these are the preliminary findings," Zelenskyy said in his evening address.

"Of course, there will still be expert examinations and everything will be verified, but as of now, it appears to have been North Korean ballistic weaponry."

He condemned what he called the alliance between Moscow and Pyongyang, saying Russia relies on North Korean missiles and troops "to kill our Ukrainian children."

Reuters, citing two sources familiar with the matter, also reported that Russia likely used a North Korean KN-23 or KN-24 short-range ballistic missile in the attack. One military source told the news agency that Ukrainian radar detected flight paths characteristic of the missiles, though investigators must still examine recovered fragments before reaching a definitive conclusion.

According to Reuters, it would be the first confirmed use of a North Korean missile against Ukraine in nearly a year and could indicate Russia has received a new shipment of such weapons.

Zelenskyy urges partners to send more interceptors

Zelenskyy said international condemnation of the attack and concern over a Russian cruise missile that crossed into Poland during the same overnight barrage were not enough.

"The most important thing is not just condolences and not just condemnation, but air defense missiles and the kind of pressure on Russia that can stop this senseless Russian war, its strikes, and its terror," he said.

He called air defense interceptors, particularly for Patriot systems, Ukraine's highest priority, while also requesting additional missiles for NASAMS, IRIS-T, HAWK, and other Western-supplied systems.

"I very much hope that all our partners, especially our American partners and our friends in Europe, understand that real human lives depend on whether they help us – whether they help Ukraine," Zelenskyy said.

Russia expands ballistic missile campaign

The strike on the Voronov family came during one of Russia's largest recent aerial assaults, in which Moscow launched 74 missiles and 265 drones across Ukraine. The barrage killed at least nine civilians and injured dozens more.

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Two children pulled from the rubble alive, three did not survive—one village near Kryvyi Rih after the Russian missile attack

Russia has increasingly relied on ballistic missiles, which are far more difficult to intercept than cruise missiles and can currently be shot down only by US-made Patriot systems.

During the same overnight attack, a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile flew roughly 95 kilometers into Poland before crashing in a field, prompting Warsaw to scramble an F-16 fighter jet and renewing concerns about the risk posed to NATO territory.

The European Commission has disbursed an additional €3.47 billion to Ukraine under the defense component of its €90 billion Ukraine Support Loan, providing funding for drones, missiles, air defense systems, and Gripen fighter jets.

The latest tranche comes as Ukraine faces intensified Russian missile and drone attacks and seeks to bolster its defense capabilities.

Funding to strengthen Ukraine's defense

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the new funding would help Ukraine defend its skies while deepening defense industrial cooperation between Kyiv and the European Union.

"Today, we are investing an additional €3.47 billion to help protect Ukraine's skies," von der Leyen said.

"With this new disbursement under our €90 billion loan package, we are helping Ukraine defend its people. We are also bringing our defense industries closer together, combining Europe's industrial scale with Ukraine's unmatched innovation. This is our new Drone Deal taking shape."

According to the Commission, the package includes another tranche under its drone procurement program and additional funding for drones, including long-range jet-powered drones, missiles, and Gripen fighter jets to help Ukraine rapidly acquire critical military equipment.

“The funding is provided in response to Ukraine's urgent military needs, as it continues to require capability support to defend itself against Russia's war of aggression,” the statement reads.

The Commission said further funding for drones, ammunition, air defense, and missiles would be approved and disbursed in the coming weeks.

Part of broader Ukraine Support Loan

The Ukraine Support Loan consists of €60 billion dedicated to strengthening Ukraine's defense capabilities and industrial capacity, alongside €30 billion in budget support to help keep the Ukrainian state functioning.

The latest payment follows previous disbursements of €3.2 billion under the EU's Macro-Financial Assistance program on 25 June, €3.9 billion under the defense window on 30 June, and €1.1 billion on 15 July.

The Commission said a total of €28.3 billion is expected to be allocated to Ukraine's defense industrial capacity during 2026, with the remaining funding scheduled for disbursement before the end of the year.

Ukraine welcomes latest tranche

Ukrainian Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyi confirmed that Ukraine had received the €3.47 billion payment, saying the funds would strengthen the country's defenses and help finance its most urgent needs.

"These funds will strengthen our defense and help finance Ukraine's most urgent needs," Koretskyi wrote on X.

He said Ukraine has secured €11.6 billion under the Ukraine Support Loan so far this year, including €3.2 billion in budget support and €8.4 billion for defense, out of the €45 billion available under the mechanism in 2026.

"I am sincerely grateful to the European Commission and all EU Member States for their consistent and unwavering support," Koretskyi said. "Every euro invested in Ukraine strengthens our resilience, protects our people, and brings us closer to a just and lasting peace."

Since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022, the European Union and its member states have provided more than €220 billion in support to Ukraine, including assistance financed through proceeds from immobilized Russian sovereign assets.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine is preparing a series of "asymmetric measures" and technological solutions to strengthen its defenses against Russia's escalating ballistic missile attacks, following a high-level security meeting on 30 July.

The announcement comes hours after Russia launched a large-scale overnight missile and drone attack across Ukraine in which ballistic missiles once again proved the hardest to intercept. Ukrainian officials have repeatedly warned that dwindling stocks of anti-ballistic interceptors leave cities increasingly exposed.

Ukraine preparing asymmetric response

Zelenskyy said he had received reports from Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Mykhailo Drapatyi, Chief of the General Staff Ihor Skybiuk, Defense Minister Yevhen Khmara, and Deputy Head of the Presidential Office Pavlo Palisa.

"We discussed in detail the challenges created by Russia's tactics of ballistic missile strikes and our ability to counter them at both the military and diplomatic levels," Zelenskyy said. "We identified decisions, technological steps, and asymmetric measures that can provide Ukraine with greater protection."

The president did not disclose what those measures would involve.

More air defense missiles sought from Europe

Zelenskyy said he had instructed Commander-in-Chief Mykhailo Drapatyi to strengthen coordination and information-sharing with military leadership in neighboring countries.

He also said teams from Ukraine's Defense Ministry and the Presidential Office would work with European partners that could help supply additional air defense missiles, as Kyiv continues to press allies for more interceptors capable of defeating ballistic threats.

Ballistic missile threat growing

The renewed focus on ballistic missile defense follows one of Russia's biggest recent air attacks. Overnight into 30 July, Russia launched 358 aerial weapons against Ukraine, including nine ballistic missiles. Ukraine's Air Force intercepted only one of them, underscoring the growing challenge posed by Moscow's reliance on ballistic weapons.

The latest strike highlighted the limits of Ukraine's current air defenses against ballistic missiles, reinforcing Kyiv's calls for more Patriot interceptors and other systems from its partners.

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Two children pulled from the rubble alive, three did not survive—one village near Kryvyi Rih after the Russian missile attack

Frontline and long-range strike updates

Beyond air defense, Zelenskyy said the meeting reviewed the battlefield situation, particularly around the Sloviansk and Kostiantynivka sectors in Donetsk Oblast, as well as the operation of Ukraine's Black Sea export corridor.

The president also highlighted Ukraine's ongoing long-range strike campaign against Russian military targets in occupied territories, including Crimea, saying priority targets had been updated.

"Our operation of mid-strikes against Russian forces and positions in the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine, particularly in our Crimea, continues," Zelenskyy said.

General Staff preparing reforms

Separately, Zelenskyy said the General Staff is preparing a package of systemic reforms aimed at improving frontline situational awareness, accelerating operational decision-making, and giving brigades greater flexibility to respond to Russian assault operations.

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Investigators descend on Ukraine’s recruitment offices in a coordinated nationwide operation

He thanked Ukrainian troops defending the front line and preventing Russian forces from achieving the objectives set by the Kremlin.

An Iskander missile that Russia fired at Kyiv Oblast on 10 July was built from more than 140 foreign parts, 62 of them American, and at least 20 were made in 2025—components that cleared every Western control and reached a Russian assembly line within about a year, Euromaidan Press reported.

Without those parts, Ukraine’s presidential sanctions commissioner Vladyslav Vlasiuk said, Russia could not build the weapon.

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62 of the 140 foreign parts in this Russian missile were American. Ukraine wants that gap closed

A paradox runs through Europe’s answer to that problem. The EU is preparing to blacklist more than 1,600 companies for helping Russia’s war industry, its largest single batch of corporate designations, Bloomberg reported, while at the same time deepening trade with India, a country the same Western parts move through on their way to Russia.

And closing that gap will matter even after the war ends: a new study of Russia’s arms makers finds they will keep producing weapons at wartime speed—and keep needing imported parts to do it—whether or not the fighting stops.

Ukraine has been pulling the same finding out of downed Russian drones and missiles for two years—Indian electronics in Shahed drones among them.

The India route grew before the trade deals arrived

A 29 July report by the strategic intelligence company Strider put a number on the wider channel: more than 50,000 sensitive goods, or goods with potential dual-use applications, reached Russian defense companies through Indian supply chains after the full-scale invasion.

The security intelligence firm compared totals from 2019 to 2021 with those from 2022 through the first quarter of 2025. Since the invasion, sensitive exports from India to Russia have multiplied several times over—and the sharpest jumps come from the countries deepening their own trade with India.

Swedish-origin goods rose almost sixfold. British, Swiss, and French exports of the same kind roughly doubled or more. The pattern extends beyond Europe: American-origin goods more than five times over, Australian goods even faster. German trade was the exception, falling by more than a third—though Germany still ships more of these goods through India than anyone.

Without those parts, Ukraine’s presidential sanctions commissioner Vladyslav Vlasiuk said, Russia could not build the weapon.

French carbon fiber—used in aircraft, drones, and missiles—reached Polymer Company LLC in Russia through India in 2025, according to Strider. The Russian government has designated the firm part of its military-industrial complex, and it supplies several restricted entities.

None of this shows that a part in the 10 July Iskander passed through India. It shows Western goods moving through the country where Britain’s trade deal took effect on 15 July and where the EU is targeting entry into force in 2027. Those deals expand legitimate commerce, not evasion.

Strider’s warning concerns what happens after Western goods enter long, opaque supply chains, and the report urged end-use monitoring to be written into the agreements themselves.

Brussels is preparing 1,600 more names

The blacklist Brussels is drafting would target companies rather than whole industries, reaching corners of Russia’s military supply chain that earlier rounds missed.

The firms have a combined annual turnover of more than $20 billion and employ more than a quarter of a million people. If members approve it, the number of EU-sanctioned entities would jump by half. Foreign ministers are expected to take it up in October.

The bloc’s 21st package, adopted on 23 July, had already tightened dual-use export curbs on dozens of firms, some outside the EU. Six days later, the firm published the scale of one route around exactly those curbs.

Russia plans to keep producing

That is why the flow of parts outlasts the war. A 14 July study of five major Russian defense manufacturers found them still dependent on imported components despite sanctions, corruption, labor shortages, and inflated costs—and likely to hold high output in select weapons while slowly rebuilding reserves.

Its sharpest warning is about time: Russia’s arms industry will probably stay on a wartime footing even if the shooting in Ukraine stops, while Western industry is unlikely to mobilize on that scale until a major war is already underway.

The Iskander compresses that long problem into a single year. At least 20 of its foreign parts were made in 2025, fitted into the missile, and fired at Kyiv Oblast on 10 July 2026.

A Russian cruise missile crossed deep into Poland and crashed in a field during Russia's mass overnight strike on Ukraine, Polish and Ukrainian officials said. Warsaw says it scrambled a fighter jet and was ready to shoot the missile down had it flown on. The same barrage killed civilians across Ukraine and sent hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles at its cities.

A Kh-101 crossed nearly 100 km into Poland

In the early hours of 30 July, a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile flew into Poland and came down about 95 km from the Ukrainian border, the Ukrainian defense outlet Militarnyi reported. 

Poland's Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz called it an extremely difficult night for the country's air defense and said an unidentified object had fallen in a field.

The missile in Poland was one of 74 missiles and 265 drones that Russia fired at Ukraine overnight — 61 Kh-101 and Kalibr cruise missiles, four Zircon and Onyx, and nine ballistic Iskander-M, S-400, and KN-23. 

Ukraine's acting Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha noted that the Kh-101 missile crossed into Poland, called it a violation of NATO airspace, and said Kyiv is informing partners and international organizations about the attack.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk later said everything indicated it was a Kh-101, and that Polish forces were ready to shoot it down had it continued deeper.

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Two children pulled from the rubble alive, three did not survive—one village near Kryvyi Rih after the Russian missile attack

Poland scrambled a jet and tracked the missile

During the attack, Poland's Operational Command set out the sequence. 

• Around 03:29 Polish time, one object came within about 5 km of the border, then turned away. 
• At 3:40, radar caught an unidentified object moving west over Polish territory, and an F-16 went up to identify and intercept it. At 3:46, it vanished from the screens before it could be identified. 
• Sirens sounded for Lublin and much of the voivodeship only around 3:50. 
• A helicopter crew later located the probable crash site in open ground near Tarnawa-Kolonia, in Lublin Voivodeship. 

Ukrainian monitoring channels eRadar and Strategic Aviation placed a cruise missile over Poland at 04:40 Kyiv time, equal to 03:40 in Warsaw. The monitoring channel Strategic Aviation tracked it over Lublin Voivodeship, which borders Ukraine's Volyn Oblast.

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The Belarusian tunnel to the EU was almost done. Then Lithuania drilled a hole in exactly the wrong place—for the diggers

At least eight civilians killed in Ukraine during the same attack

In Ukraine, one of the Russian missiles killed a family — parents and three children — in a direct hit on their home near Kryvyi Rih, while rescuers pulled two more children from the rubble alive. In Lviv, western Ukraine, another missile destroyed apartments, injured dozens including children, and damaged two kindergartens and a school. Russia's strike killed at least eight people across Ukraine and injured dozens, with civilian casualties in Kyiv, Poltava, Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Sumy, Vinnytsia, and Cherkasy.

Not the first Russian missile over Poland

This was not the first Russian cruise missile to cross into Poland. In 2023, a Kh-55 flew several hundred kilometers over Polish territory before it fell near Bydgoszcz. Earlier in July, the Polish outlet Onet, citing intelligence and diplomatic sources, warned that Poland could become a target of Russian provocations meant to test NATO's resolve, with strikes on critical infrastructure among the scenarios named.

Another Wildberries warehouse burned overnight, this time in Penza, over 600 kilometers southeast of Moscow—the latest in Ukraine’s two-week drone campaign against Russia’s biggest online retailer. The buildings, it turns out, are the least of it.

The strikes work not by destroying warehouses, which can be replaced, but by breaking what a business this size cannot run without: workers willing to staff it, and sellers willing to stock it.

That campaign has already killed. Whether it can spread into the wider Russian economy is the harder question—and for now, the answer looks like no.

Burning a warehouse barely dents Wildberries

The Penza hub—90,000 square meters, a main sorting node for Russia’s Volga region and only the first stage of a complex built to reach double that—was only the newest. Regional governor Oleg Melnichenko confirmed the fire, and staff had been evacuated before dawn, with the company shifting orders to other warehouses.

The same morning, drones struck a second Wildberries hub in Sarapul, in Udmurtia, where staff were evacuated ahead of the fire and no casualties were reported. Both were part of a campaign that opened in mid-July and has rolled across the country since.

Any single warehouse is close to disposable. Ukraine has knocked out more than a tenth of Wildberries’ storage network, and the network keeps absorbing the losses. Hubs like these run largely independent of one another: merchants ship goods straight to a given warehouse, where the stock waits until a local order pulls it out.

Burn one, and the next does not fall with it. No domino effect. The reading that the strikes therefore break Wildberries’ business model rather than its buildings comes from a Lines on Maps video analysis of the campaign.

On the physical damage alone, Wildberries can take the loss and carry on.

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“When karma works”: Ukraine torched 188,000-square-meter warehouse of Russia’s biggest online retailer after years of strikes on leading logistics company

The real target is who staffs them

So the strikes are aimed at something harder to replace than a building. The campaign has killed at least eight people and injured more than 80, most of them night-shift workers caught in the first strikes. A warehouse job was never a prize, and it now carries a real chance of not surviving a shift.

Russia’s labor market makes the rest easy. Unemployment has reached a record 2.1%, the lowest figure Rosstat has ever logged, as mobilization and emigration drain the workforce, with the state forecasting a shortfall of some 3.1 million workers by 2030.

A worker who no longer wants to gamble on the next wave of drones does not have to. The staff who cleared out of the Penza hub before dawn can be hired somewhere safer by week’s end, and no one is paying them to stand under the flight path.

Sellers who cannot afford to stay

The other half is the sellers. Wildberries had rewritten its seller terms just weeks before the strikes, reclassifying drone attacks as force majeure and shedding its liability for goods lost in them. So a trader whose stock sat inside a burning hub swallows the loss.

For Anastasia, a clothing-store owner, that meant watching a business vanish between one day and the next. “Just yesterday I was an entrepreneur, and today I am bankrupt. My entire clothing collection has burned down,” she wrote in an Instagram post.

And the sellers cannot easily flee the platform. The whole model runs on scale. Wildberries cannot simply put up smaller, less tempting warehouses without wrecking the economics that make it work, and nobody revives brick-and-mortar retail overnight. The smallest sellers needed the scale. The scale is what is burning.

How much of Russia’s economy is at stake

The sums are large enough to explain why Ukraine bothered. Goods sold through Wildberries in 2025 came to about 3% of Russia’s GDP, and the strikes have caused up to $2 billion in direct damage, Estonian military intelligence estimates—turnover moving across the platform, not Wildberries’ own revenue, which is a fraction of it. Much of the coverage has treated the two as the same.

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Ukrainian drones destroyed nearly 15.4% of Russian retail giant’s storage space in July

Russia’s business climate index fell to its lowest reading since the middle of 2022 in July, on the Central Bank’s own numbers. Even so, the hit is easy to overstate: that 3% does not vanish with a warehouse, because a share of it reroutes, slower and costlier, through whatever the vendors improvise.

Wildberries is not a purely civilian target: the platform moves military kit—body armor, uniforms, drone parts—bought through it by Russian units, Estonian military intelligence says.

Why the fire probably won’t spread

Which leaves the biggest question, and the one it is easiest to overstate: could the fires reach the wider Russian economy?

Probably not. The company is heavily indebted and has already breached the terms of its bank loans—the sort of covenant breach that lets creditors call in everything at once. They have not. The Russian government has signaled it may prop the retailer up if it comes to that, with state-controlled VTB, Russia’s second-largest bank, cast in the central role.

On prediction markets, where the calls are backed by money rather than clicks, a bankruptcy this year is priced as unlikely. The damage that lasts is not on any balance sheet—the warehouse worker who will not clock in tomorrow, the trader who will not restock a shelf they have already watched burn once.

Ukraine's drone forces struck a string of Russian targets across occupied Crimea, Russia's Rostov Oblast, and the occupied south, Robert "Madyar" Brovdi, the commander of the Unmanned Systems Forces, said. The hits ran from a naval drone base and radar shelters on the peninsula to air-defense systems and a site Russia uses to launch attack drones. They feed a widening campaign to cut occupied Crimea off from what keeps it supplied.

A naval drone base and radar shelters struck in occupied Crimea

On 30 July, the Unmanned Systems Forces (SBS) reported strikes on a Russian base of naval uncrewed boats at Snizhne, near Yevpatoriia in occupied Crimea. Footage showed the hangars catching and a large blast rolling up from the site. The same night, drone crews hit the radio-transparent shelters of a radar station at Okhotnyche, on Ai-Petri above Yalta — the dome-shaped covers, or radomes, that shield a radar from the weather.

Both targets fell to fighters of the 9th battalion "Kairos" of the 414th "Madyar's Birds" Separate Brigade, Brovdi added.

A Buk caught on a trailer, radars from Crimea to Rostov

Further east, drone pilots struck a Russian Buk-M3 air-defense system near Snizhne in Donetsk Oblast while it was moving on a low-loader. That strike and a hit on a site at Donetsk airport, where Russia stores and launches Shahed attack drones, were the work of the "Phoenix" unmanned-aviation grouping within the Luhansk Border Detachment.

The radars came in a run. Crews struck a P-18 station at Ivanivka in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, a target of the 412th Brigade "Nemesis." Deeper in, they struck a Nebo-SVU radar at Russkiy Kolodets and a Sopka-2 complex at Fedorovka, both in Russia's Rostov Oblast. In all, the commander counted five air-defense elements hit that day, part of 30 downed by his units through July.

The sea blockade climbs, and the power squeeze goes on

The maritime side kept moving too. Ukraine's sea-drone campaign, codenamed MoLoChKa — short for "Moscow will fall through Crimea" — has now struck 205 vessels since it opened on 6 July, 130 in the Azov Sea and 75 in the Black Sea, Brovdi said. The fuel tankers that carry gasoline to the peninsula are a standing target of that hunt, and the effort to shred Russia's air cover over Crimea runs alongside it.

Across the whole grouping, SBS said its units struck or destroyed 1,758 enemy targets in a single day, and 50,109 since 1 July, according to its running statistics.

Ukraine's military intelligence has destroyed one of Russia's electronic-warfare stations in temporarily occupied Crimea, the country's Defense Intelligence agency (HUR) said. Fighters caught the coastal complex on the peninsula and published video of the strike, the latest in a run of intelligence operations stripping Russia's sensors off Crimea. The station was built to listen in on and jam communications across a wide area, and none of that reach kept it alive.

A jamming station that could not save itself

In the night of 26 to 27 July 2026, fighters from HUR's Department of Unmanned Systems found and destroyed the Russian Murmansk-BN electronic-warfare station near Cape Fiolent in occupied Crimea, HUR reported on Telegram, sharing footage of the hit.

The Murmansk-BN is a coastal complex that Russian forces use for radio reconnaissance, intercepting signals, and jamming shortwave communications, HUR said. Its range can reach up to 5,000 kilometers. A station meant to jam and silence an enemy's communications across that distance did nothing to detect the drone closing on it.

What the Murmansk-BN does

The Murmansk-BN is a strategic, long-range electronic-warfare system. Made by the Russian concern KRET, it entered service in 2014 and was first fielded in occupied Crimea, south of Sevastopol. It works in the high-frequency band, the shortwave range armies use for long-distance radio when other links fail.

Western analysts have documented the same system type suppressing high-frequency traffic over great distances. That is what makes each one Ukraine removes a hole in Russia's electronic cover rather than a small loss.

Days after an S-400, another Crimea kill

The jammer is the second high-value Russian system this unit has taken off the peninsula in days. Days ago, HUR's drone operators burned an S-400 Triumf launcher and its 96L6 radar in occupied Crimea, the long-range battery Russia leans on to shoot down aircraft and missiles.

Both hits fit a wider pattern. Ukraine's drone crews have struck close to 200 Russian air-defense assets in the first half of 2026, and over the unit's life have struck 76 radars and 31 electronic-warfare systems among a larger tally, thinning the cover Russia depends on over occupied territory.

Ukrainian investigators launched a coordinated sweep of the country's draft offices in a single morning, the State Bureau of Investigation announced. The operation goes after two things at once: money paid to escape mobilization, and the mistreatment of the men those offices process. Ukraine's military command has publicly backed the raids.

More than 100 draft offices, searched in one morning

On the morning of 30 July, the State Bureau of Investigation began searches at more than 100 "territorial recruitment and social support centers" — the draft offices Ukrainians call TCKs — across most regions, the bureau set out. It runs the operation, codenamed "Honest Draft," together with the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

"For many at the TCKs, a 'Clean Thursday' has truly come today," the Bureau wrote, invoking the pre-Easter day of ritual cleaning.

The Bureau named two targets. First, schemes that let men liable for service buy their way out of mobilization. Second, draft-office staff exceeding their powers, including the beating and torture of those liable for service. Officials stressed that the operation is systematic cleanup work across the whole system, and not a reaction to one high-profile case. Detentions and notices of suspicion are expected across various regions.

The army says it is backing the raids

The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said it is giving full assistance to law enforcement in investigations aimed at exposing corruption and abuses, including at the recruitment centers. If wrongdoing is confirmed, those responsible must answer under Ukrainian law, it added.

"The Armed Forces of Ukraine maintain a policy of zero tolerance for corruption and ensure a comprehensive, objective and impartial investigation of every report of a possible offense," the General Staff wrote. 

At the same time, it cautioned that isolated cases should not devalue the service of recruitment-center staff who do their jobs properly and keep mobilization running.

The sweep arrives as Ukraine reorders its whole defense apparatus. The army's new leadership is running a force-wide manning audit to find soldiers kept away from the fight. That drive followed the ousted defense minister's public fight over arms procurement and the audit that exposed billions in overspending. 

Russia struck cities across Ukraine with a mass wave of missiles and drones overnight into 30 July 2026, killing civilians, including children, and injuring dozens, according to Ukraine's Air Force, State Emergency Service, and local authorities. Rescuers dug through collapsed homes in Lviv, in the capital, and in a village near Kryvyi Rih, and one Russian cruise missile crossed the border into Poland. It was the first mass strike on Ukraine's western oblasts since March.

The scale of the attack

Ukraine's Air Force tracked 358 incoming weapons — 74 missiles and 284 drones of various types. Air defenses shot down or suppressed 320 of them, 55 missiles and 265 drones. The missiles included Tsirkon and Oniks anti-ship missiles, Iskander-M, S-400, and North Korea's KN-23 ballistics, and Kh-101 and Kalibr cruise missiles, alongside Shahed, Gerbera, Italmas, and decoy drones launched from four Russian regions.

The ballistic missiles remain the biggest problem for Ukraine. Of the nine Russia fired, air defenses stopped only one. Impacts landed at 20 locations, with debris falling on 13 more.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy put the current nationwide toll at eight dead and dozens wounded in the capital and across ten oblasts. He tied the losses directly to the missing air defenses. 

"Protection from the Russian missile threat is the most important task for saving our people's lives," he wrote. "Untimely help, delays in supplying anti-ballistic missiles — that is exactly this destruction, exactly these casualties that, unfortunately, we have today."

A family of six killed near Kryvyi Rih

The heaviest loss of life came in Radushne, a village in Kryvyi Rih district of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. An Iskander-M ballistic missile hit a house where a large family lived. Six people died, three of them children, and eight were wounded, the head of the Kryvyi Rih Defense Council, Oleksandr Vilkul, reported.

The head of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Oleksandr Hanzha, named the children killed as a six-year-old girl and boys of 11 and 17. An 84-year-old woman was hospitalized in serious condition, and a 49-year-old woman and boys of 6 and 15 were taken to hospital in moderate condition. Two houses were destroyed and five damaged. Rescuers pulled two children from the rubble alive.

Lviv: homes, a school, two kindergartens

Lviv neighborhoods took some of the worst damage. The number of wounded recently rose to 26, with 15 hospitalized, children among them, the head of Lviv Oblast, Maksym Kozytskyi, reported. One child was in the hospital.

Two residential buildings on Patona and Vyhovskoho streets were hit, and more than 20 apartment buildings were damaged, along with lyceum school No. 15 — where 140 windows and four doors were blown out — and two kindergartens. Mayor Andrii Sadovyi described a direct hit and no military target anywhere near it. 

"Here on Patona we see a direct missile hit. The floors have essentially been sheared off," he said. "They simply attack residential buildings, kill people directly. There are no military targets here, nothing at all."

Rescuers freed a woman, a man, and his six-year-old son from a collapsed building, the Lviv Oblast prosecutor's office said. A crane was used to lift people from a damaged five-story block through a blocked stairwell.

One killed in Kyiv

In the capital, one person died and two were hurt, the Kyiv Military Administration and the Emergency Service reported. Fires broke out in two districts: market pavilions in Obolon and a garage cooperative in Sviatoshyn, where firefighters found a body while putting out the flames and hospitalized an injured man, the emergency service said.

In Skybyn, in Brovary district of Kyiv Oblast, a strike partly destroyed a two-story house and wounded five people, including a 16-year-old boy, the emergency service confirmed.

Poltava, Zhytomyr, Mykolaiv, and the coast

In Poltava district, warehouses caught fire from the strikes and one person died, the head of Poltava Oblast, Vitalii Diakivnych, said. A Nova Poshta parcel terminal was also hit, with no casualties there.

Mykolaiv Oblast came under a night of drone attacks that damaged port infrastructure, warehouses, homes, an ambulance, and an administrative building, but wounded no one, the oblast administration reported. 

In Kharkiv, a jet-powered Shahed hit an industrial zone, Mayor Ihor Terekhov reported. 

The Russian strikes injured three children and two adults in Zhytomyr Oblast, local authorities said.

Air defenses also worked over Kirovohrad Oblast, where a private yard was damaged in Svitlovodsk and no one was hurt, the oblast administration said.

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A cruise missile in Poland

One Russian cruise missile crossed into Poland during the attack and came down in Lublin voivodeship, near the village of Targowisko, where a blast woke residents and rescuers found a crater in a field, the outlet lublin112 reported. Polish forces had put military aircraft into the air hours earlier because of Russia's long-range strikes on Ukraine, the country's Operational Command said, with fighters and an early-warning plane airborne and ground air defenses at readiness.

It was not the first such incursion. In 2023 a Russian Kh-55 flew several hundred kilometers over Polish territory before it fell near the city of Bydgoszcz. Earlier in July, the Polish outlet Onet, citing intelligence and diplomatic sources, warned that Poland could become a target of Russian provocations meant to test NATO's resolve.