Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces struck five tankers, five dry cargo ships, and one tugboat belonging to Russia’s “shadow fleet” in the waters of the Sea of Azov overnight Tuesday, Commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ Unmanned Systems Forces Robert “Madyar” Brovdi reported.
“+11 overnight on July 14. In nine days, 116 vessels have been hunted down by the Birds of the Unmanned Systems Forces in the Sea of Azov as part of Operation ‘MoLoChKa’: five tankers, five dry cargo ships, and one tugboat. The shadow fleet is being starved, but it must disappear as a phenomenon,” Brovdi said in a Telegram post.
Brovdi explained the purpose of the operation aimed at destroying Russia’s feeder fleet in the Sea of Azov.
“The paralysis of Russia’s feeder fleet — the ‘courier’ small and medium-sized 140-meter flat-bottomed tankers with a deadweight capacity of 7,000 tonnes — as a significant component of Russia’s shadow fleet essentially makes it impossible to export ‘black gold’ from oil transshipment bases… through the Volga–Don Canal and the Sea of Azov to larger tankers that cannot enter oil terminals or ports due to their draft and are forced to be loaded offshore in the Black Sea from the tanks of these courier tankers, which transfer cargo from 12–15 such small vessels operating in the waters,” the commander said.
He added that strikes on small-tonnage tankers and the tugboats used to evacuate them after attacks are limiting the delivery of scarce gasoline supplies to Crimea through the shallow waters of the Sea of Azov. This leaves road and rail tanker transport as the main — and highly vulnerable — alternative, as these routes are also under the fire control of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces.
