Ukraine’s drone strike deep inside Russian territory left Kremlin officials angry and alarmed over the sudden vulnerability of a nuclear-capable air fleet far from the battlefield, according to people close to senior officials in Moscow.

Sunday’s dramatic attack on Russian long-range bombers in air fields in Siberia helped to disrupt an arsenal that Moscow deploys to hit Ukraine with some of its most powerful missiles. It also demonstrated Ukraine’s ability to hit key assets thousands of miles from the front lines, which the Russian military had thought were safe.

While nobody is predicting that Sunday’s dramatic attack will change the course of Vladimir Putin’s war, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy celebrated the “brilliant” covert operation.

Planned over a year and a half and involving unmanned aerial vehicles popping out of trucks that had been driven across Russia’s vast expanse, it was the longest-range mission undertaken in the three-year war, he said.

The damage inflicted on the warplanes is likely to rattle decision makers around Putin rather than shake up Moscow’s military aims. Only a few such bombers are needed for attacks on Ukraine, meaning that the pace of missile and bombing strikes won’t slow, according to people close to the Kremlin who spoke on condition of anonymity.

But the deep-penetration raid was a direct hit on air assets, including targets on Tu-160, Tu-95 and Tu-22 M3 bombers that have long been considered less vulnerable to attack than land and naval forces, which have suffered bigger losses. Russia’s Defense Ministry confirmed attacks at five military airbases across the country on Sunday.

Russia acknowledged that several aircraft were damaged, compared with Kyiv’s claim that more than 40 planes were hit. A person close to the Kremlin put the tally at closer to 10. Pro-Moscow military blogger Rybar, which has about 1.3 million Telegram subscribers, estimated that 13 aircraft were damaged, most of them long-range bombers.

Even a dent in a fleet of Tupolev Tu-95 strategic bombers, which the Soviet Union began deploying in the 1950s, will put strain on remaining models modified to carry cruise missiles, according to Douglas Barrie, a senior fellow for military aerospace at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London.

That fleet was already the smallest component of Russia’s so-called nuclear triad — intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine launched missile and nuclear bombers, Barrie said. “It has now gotten yet smaller,” he added.

“The impact is quite sensitive and unpleasant,” said Dmitry Stefanovich, a research fellow at the Center for International Security at the Moscow-based Institute of World Economy and International Relations. While the bombers are deployed for non-nuclear missions, the attack will have a “weak effect” on nuclear forces, with ICBMs and submarines playing a bigger role, he said.

The operation won’t significantly reduce Russia’s nuclear capabilities, according to people close to the Kremlin and the Defense Ministry. London-based political analyst Vladimir Pastukhov said the attack will have little concrete military significance, with “minimal involvement” of Russia’s aviation forces in the war on Ukraine.

“The remaining equipment is more than enough to achieve the goals for which it is involved in this war,” Pastukhov said on his Telegram channel.

But the nature of the target cuts to the heart of Russia’s threat factor as a nuclear power, chipping away at Putin’s image of invulnerability. Thomas Withington, an associate fellow in electronic warfare and air defense at the U.K.’s Royal United Services Institute, noted a shift, with Kyiv now viewing Russia’s nuclear deterrent as a legitimate target.

“This recent attack underscores the inability of Russian air defenders to protect key strategic assets like bomber bases,” Withington said.

Export restrictions imposed on Russia by the U.S. and Europe will also make it difficult for Russia to source the parts and technologies needed to repair or rebuild the damaged hardware.

A Russian audit obtained by Bloomberg in 2022 showed that the bombers were reliant on critical Western components and that Russia had failed for years to replace those parts with domestic analogues or alternatives from friendly nations such as China. That task would be even harder today due to stringent trade sanctions.

Any degradation of Russia’s air assets will be good news for European governments, which have struggled to catch up with Putin’s war production when it comes to air defenses. The strategic bombers also pose a threat to NATO allies, according to Withington.

“By taking them out of the fight, Ukraine has helped to reduce the threat in this regard to NATO and its allies,” Withington said.

---------

—With assistance from Alberto Nardelli.

©2025 Bloomberg L.P. Visit bloomberg.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.