On the verge of collapse: how strikes on refineries are destroying the Russian economy

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Ukrainian UAVs continue to strike at facilities in Russia. First of all, at Russian refineries and other energy enterprises. Just today, a drone attacked the Bashneft-UNPZ plant in Ufa, Russia. A fire and the “Kilym” plan were reported at the airfields of Bashkiria. The Lukoil refinery near Volgograd was also attacked.

I won’t go into more detail, anyone who wants to can find it. There are a lot of reports. I’ll go through them in a different way – through economic indicators and how Ukrainian drone strikes affect the Russian economy.

Every newspaper is now reporting that Russia is in a budget crisis. The deficit of a trillion rubles planned at the beginning of the year has now turned into 4.5 trillion, and by the end of the year it threatens to turn into all eight.

The draft budget predicts a deficit budget for Russia for the next three years, but Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska has already laughed at that draft. In his opinion, the announced draft budget would be more correctly called “Visiting a Fairy Tale.” Deripaska predicts a reality ten times more terrifying.

Here are just two examples.

The first is that India’s state-owned refineries have reduced purchases of Russian oil by 45%. Of course, private companies continue to enrich Moscow, but the fact is indicative. Russia has less money.

Second example: LNG supplies to Spain have fallen to their lowest level since 2021. Russia currently accounts for only 11.5% of all gas exports. The trend is towards further reductions in purchases.

The reason in both cases is the same – US and European sanctions. The fact that the Russian economy has entered a stagnation has already been recognized by the IMF and the World Bank.

And against this backdrop, Russia has made a record reduction in the pace of oil refining. According to Bloomberg, the reduction in refining reached 500,000 barrels per day (!), and fuel exports in September fell to a ten-year low of only 2.4 million barrels per day.

Russia was forced to increase crude oil exports to 5.1 million barrels per day. The consequences were immediate. Revenue from crude oil sales increased by $200 million, while revenues from fuel exports fell by $440 million. Total oil export revenue fell to $13.4 billion in the three months.

It has already reached the point where Chinese exports to Russia fell by 21% in yuan terms in September. In total, Chinese exports to Russia decreased by 10.6% over the past 9 months.

Why is that? Because Russia has no money. And China is not giving Moscow anything in return. Obviously, Russia has to reduce the purchase of dual-use goods.

By the way, it’s not just China. Total exports of Russian goods in August jumped 17% compared to the previous month, to $31.5 billion. Experts say the reason for the decrease is a reduction in fuel exports.

And why is this reduction happening?

And because somewhere on an unknown base, the navigator of a long-range UAV carefully lays out a flight task and then just as carefully loads it into the UAV controller. Technicians just as diligently and carefully go through the entire device – ailerons, elevator, tail boom, wings, engine group. Do they check if everything works?

Then the plane takes off into the sky. It covers a thousand or so kilometers. It lands on its target – a refinery, or a pipeline, or a port. And bam-bam. And the next plane flies after it. And on. And on.

Reports of a fuel crisis in Russia are not made up out of thin air; they are really experiencing serious fuel shortages. And Ukrainian drones are not stopping.

And we were only talking about long-range strikes. In reality, Ukrainian drone warfare operates every day – across the entire front. I have already seen how infantry turns into foot reconnaissance, and drones into infantry. How for many kilometers the combat zone stands as a deserted wasteland – and drones fly over it – dozens.

Every day, hundreds of drones scout, attack, bomb, shoot down… They work in the sky – and protect the Ukrainian sky.

My extreme fiction novel “The Poultrymen” is about them. About modern war. About the work of UAV pilots. About the cooperation of electronic machines and living people. About the war of technologies.

The fight continues!

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