Zelenskyy Vows To Increase Use Of Drones As Ukraine Fights To Regain Initiative
By RFE RL
(RFE/RL) — The Ukrainian military will continue using long-range drones to “degrade” Russian infrastructure, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on June 4, praising Ukrainian forces for using both first-person view (FPV) drones and long-range drones in combat.
“In this war, it has been proven — and especially by our warriors — that drones can give the advantage and help regain the initiative,” Zelenskiy said in his nightly address.
The use of the long-range drones had “proven Ukraine’s ability to degrade the internal strength of a terrorist state,” he said, adding that their use “must continue” and vowing to increase the production and procurement of drones.
A long-range Ukrainian drone targeted a Russian Voronezh-M early warning radar station, a Ukrainian military intelligence official told RFE/RL on May 27, in one of Kyiv’s deepest attacks inside Russian territory since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion.
The drone covered a distance of 1,800 kilometers to hit a radar station in the city of Orsk near the Russian-Kazakh border. Ukraine said that set a record for distance traveled by a drone in an attack inside Russia.
In early May, Ukraine said one of its drones traveled a distance of 1,500 kilometers and struck an oil refinery in Russia’s Republic of Bashkortostan.
The use of FPV drones in late winter and early spring — while Ukraine waited for fresh supplies of artillery and other military equipment from its partners — “practically saved the front line,” Zelenskiy said.
He also thanked Ukrainian soldiers for helping to stabilize the area around Kharkiv, which has had to fend off a Russian offensive that began in early May.
Zelenskiy also said that the majority of the battles and the heaviest attacks currently taking place are in the Donetsk region.
In a meeting earlier on June 4 with Ukraine’s military leadership, the situation in Kharkiv as well as in the south and in the border areas of the Sumy and Chernihiv regions was addressed, he said.
The Ukrainian military is now “doing everything necessary to make Russia see that we have the means to respond to any attempt to expand the war and increase pressure on Ukraine,” the Ukrainian president said without referring to a change in policy announced last week by the United States allowing weapons it has supplied to be used to strike targets inside Russia in defense of Kharkiv.
Zelenskiy also noted that it is only the beginning of June, “but these are already the weeks that will determine the whole summer and, in many ways, this year.”
Earlier on June 4, Russia launched a missile attack on Ukraine’s southeastern city of Dnipro, regional Governor Serhiy Lysak said on Telegram, adding that several civilians were injured.
Ukraine’s air defenses shot down two missiles, but falling debris ignited a fire, Lysak said.
“As a result, residents were injured, including children. A 1-month-old baby boy is in satisfactory condition…. A 17-year-old boy is in hospital in moderate condition. A 68-year-old man and three women — 32, 36, and 56 years old — were also injured,” Lysak added
