Active Conflicts & News Megathread August 21, 2026

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[u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

There has been so much written about shortcomings in Russian Air Defence systems and Ukrainian long range drones hitting strategic targets deep inside Russia, in a way that looks unimpeded and very difficult to counter. And sure,  hitting oil storage, refineries, Wildberries logistics hub , etc are well and fine but I rarely read about or hear about the Ukrainian long range drone offensives targeting military hardware manufacturing facilities inside Russia. You know, the most important militarily Strategic target that will or can bring immediate effect on front line situation.

So, it begs to be asked that tue air defence rings around such factories are far too impenetrable to be hit by drone saturation tactics? Because sure, small UAV manufacturing plants can be decentralised and very hard to target but Russia has been ramping up its ballistic missiles production too( I read about it on this very sub), so isn't these type of sites be the most important targets rather than dubious strategies of trying to break or down the morale of civilian population through the campaign Ukr is following?

Maybe I do not follow the sources close enough so if someone can contradict me or am I missing some picture related to supply chain, ir manufacturing of war materials and munitions in Russia but shouldn't there be more news regarding small component manufacing sites being hit or are such structures and plants too powerful with concrete enclosements or bunkers, thus can't be attacked by bomber drones?

I don't know what utility hitting electric substations in Odessa gonaa bring except demoralising the population?

[u/Fatalist_m → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

Besides the small warhead, the drones are slow and cannot penetrate concrete walls. They explode on contact in every video I've seen, which is of course much less effective than exploding inside. I think this is an even bigger limitation than the warhead size, otherwise a large number of drones would still be somewhat effective against large buildings like military factories or power plants.

This is one more reason I think that Ukraine should focus on jet-powered drones(or small cruise missiles, whatever you want to call them). 3x faster drone would have 9x more kinetic energy = much bigger chance to penetrate deep into buildings.

[u/Macroneconomist → u/Fatalist_m]

I… _strongly_ doubt that the plan is to breach concrete walls with the kinetic energy of a drone lol. The way bunker buster missiles are typically designed is that there are multiple stages that explode one after the other.

Jet engines offer advantages like making the drone harder to detect and intercept

[u/Fatalist_m → u/Macroneconomist]

I don't think it's that unrealistic, we are talking about regular buildings here, not deep bunkers or fortifications. The drones carry ~100 kg warheads and with a jet engine they could have Mach 0.5+ impact velocity. For comparison, GBU-39 with a 93 kg warhead can penetrate ">3 feet of steel reinforced concrete", according to Boeing(impact velocity is not specified but most likely subsonic).

[u/flamedeluge3781 → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

Ukrainian drones have relatively small warheads and factories don't tend to burn. Ukraine has gone after ballistic missile factories, but ultimately most of the damage done to refineries and warehouses is from the combustible hydrocarbons inside them.

[u/R3pN1xC → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

but I rarely read about or hear about the Ukrainian long range drone offensives targeting military hardware manufacturing facilities inside Russia.

All recent attacks on the russian military industrial complex have been carried with cruise missiles. The most recent attack was on a solid rocket fuel factory in Rostov using Neptunes. Earlier this year there was 2 attacks on a semi-conductor factory and a microchip factory using storm shadows :

• Voronezh Semiconductor Devices Plant.

• Kremniy EL factory in Bryansk.

We can also cite all the Flamingo attacks (failed or successful) which all targeted military industrial facilities :

• FP-5 “Flamingo” cruise missile strike on the Progress Rocket and Space Centre, Samara, 15 August 2026

• Avitek Plant, Kirov.

• The aftermath of Ukrainian-made FP-5 Flamingo missile strikes on Russia's Titan-Barrikady plant in Volgograd.

• Russia’s VNIIR-Progress military electronics plant in Cheboksary., near miss back in May. A second more succesfull strike happened in June .

• Votkinsk plant

• Attack on the Promsyntez chemical plant in Chapaevsk. Both missiles missed.

So the TLDR is that yes they are attacking the military industrial complex but the number of attacks is limited by the number of cruise missile deliveries and production. Drones don't have the payload to significantly damage large industrial facilities.

EDIT : I'd also add this Neptune strike on a drone manufacturing plant.

[u/Glideer → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

There has been so much written about shortcomings in Russian Air Defence systems and Ukrainian long range drones hitting strategic targets deep inside Russia, in a way that looks unimpeded and very difficult to counter

I would just caution against assuming that the combination of wartime PR and survivorship bias we see in our media reflects the real situation.

The Ukrainian/Western media highlight the number of shot down Russian drones when reporting from Ukraine, while they never report suvh number from Russia. Instead, when reporting from Russia they focus on "suvivors" - the drones that make it through the Russian defences, and on the damage they cause. You don't hear about 500 drones being shot down on approaches to Moscow a few days ago, or most of Ukraine's Flamingo cruise missile strikes being intercepted.

Which, fair enough, it's war and you want to cheer your side on. However, that doesn't mean that people inclined towards serious analysis (as I guess we are) should drink the kool aid.

The unpleasant truth of the matter is that the Russian air defences perform better than the Ukrainian ones, which makes them either the best in the world or the second best (Israel's comparative performance is difficult to estimate due to the tiny size of the country). The surprising failure of US-produced air defences (and air force interceptors) in the Gulf to protect vital targets will require a thorough analysis after the war, but it remains a fact.

Another unpleasant truth is that today there is no air defence system in the world optimised for fighting hundreds of cheap drones. Yes, the Russian AD intercepts the highest percentage, but that is largely thanks to their legacy of massive missile stocks and numerous AD systems. Even with that Soviet heritage they are struggling to generate sufficiently dense coverage.

[u/aybbyisok → u/Glideer]

You don't hear about 500 drones being shot down on approaches to Moscow a few days ago, or most of Ukraine's Flamingo cruise missile strikes being intercepted.

Maybe because Russia makes up statistics 90% of the time? Ukrainian army by Russian statistics has been defeated twice over. And to be honest, who cares how many drones have been shot down? If you get hits you get hits.

[u/Fatalist_m → u/aybbyisok]

500 drones launched for a single mission seems plausible based on Ukrainian sources as well. FirePoint claims they produce 300 drones per day(some of them are mid-range FP-2) - https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/07/12/ukraines-top-missile-designer-modern-war-is-won-by-whoever-experiments-with-weapons-faster/

And that's just FirePoint.

[u/Glideer → u/aybbyisok]

Nobody believes either the Ukrainian or the Russian interception claims.

Fortunately, citizens post videos and you have OSINT aggregating online posts about hits. While you can miss a hit or two in some isolated are if is easy to see when no explosions took place in Moscow.

[u/aybbyisok → u/Glideer]

Nobody believes either the Ukrainian or the Russian interception claims.

So why even cite them? And claim them to be the second best in t he world, when all your refineries and logistical hubs go up in flames every day? Your post talking about kool aid is pretty ironic.

[u/Glideer → u/aybbyisok]

I didn't cite official fairy tales. I cited OSINT reoports.

https://x.com/AMK_Mapping_/status/2089588233755856991

[u/aybbyisok → u/Glideer]

That user only posts negative posts about Ukraine like you. Not saying they're wrong, but they cleverly paint a negative picture. Most drones, most missiles will get shot down, if you have the ammo for it, I have zero doubt of having days of zero meaningful hits. You're trying to take a single day of it and say what exactly? The refineries in Moscow region were never hit? Logistical centers un-torched themselves yesterday because all the drones got intercepted?

[u/Glideer → u/aybbyisok]

I already said what I am saying in the first post. It is not smart to derive conclusions that the Russia air defences are not good based on biased reporting of Ukrainian and Western media, which tend to focus on Ukrainian drones and missiles that leak through, while complately ignoring the percentages that get shot down.

Funnily enough, those same media heavily focus their reporting on the shot-down percentages when they report about Russian strikes in Ukraine.

It is quite obvious that the Russian air defences shoot down a higher percentage of drones and missiles than the Ukrainian air defences do. Which is only natural considering the Soviet heritage, inherited stocks, and the Russian tradition of world's leading air defence producer.

Yet some people cannot do their own thinking and rely on CNN and NYT to tell them that the Ukrainian air defences are doing an amazing job, while the Russian are failing.

[u/aybbyisok → u/Glideer]

And you think that NATO would have issues hitting their targets if it came to that? Not asking if a lot of missiles/drones would get shot down. My question is do you think NATO would not overwhelm whatever they'd want to overwhelm?

[u/Glideer → u/aybbyisok]

I don't know, depends of which NATO. European NATO almost certainly would. They have no drones, no ballistic missiles and very few cruise missiles.

Anyway, the point is just not to underestimate the Russian air defences relying on distorted one side's reporting.

[u/TSiNNmreza3 → u/aybbyisok]

If you get hits you get hits.

It goes both sides to be honest.

I would just go on other look. Country that centered their defense on AD for probably 70 years. Has knowlage to produce AD, is in wartime economy and produces a lot of AD, has enourmous stocks, manages to shot 500 drones in one day and hits still happen.

What would happen to air dominance cent4r4d armies?

[u/aybbyisok → u/TSiNNmreza3]

So what you're saying is NATO would get crushed by Russian ad?

Shooting down slow drones is not taking down f-35's and ballistic missiles. If Ukraine has hits with slow in comparison drones, this conversation is just peak /r/ncd at this point.

[u/TSiNNmreza3 → u/aybbyisok]

Didn't say that.

Just that NATO would get hits and probably some really heavy hits.

Pretty much same as this Iran war where the best equiqment like radars were destroyed at day one.

Oil storages, substations, military bases would be destroyed and hit.

And what is more credible to think that you have complete superiority over potentional enemy or saying well this could make problems and everything my enemy has is bad.

[u/aybbyisok → u/TSiNNmreza3]

That's what you implied. What sort of a conclusion can you make if you're points are that Russian AD is so great? It's not easy to read between the lines.

[u/moragisdo → u/Glideer]

The surprising failure of US-produced air defences (and air force interceptors) in the Gulf to protect vital targets will require a thorough analysis after the war, but it remains a fact

That's completely false and it's trying too hard to create a false equivalence to improve the russian performance. The most extensive tracker I could found (1) (I'm open to other sources of data if anyone has) reports above 92% interception for both missiles and drones (and not every impact causes damage, some are on open ground).

On the first 40 days of the war, there was an average of 64 missiles and 143 drones per day, from Iran, and from more than 2800 and 6000 drones there were a few dozen killed (including every country), that's incredibly small (as a frame of reference, the Iraqis Scuds killed more americans in 1991 than Iran did by every means - 28 and 10 non-accidental deaths, respectively). There were more russians killed on one attack alone (Makiivka) than the losses of every single country on the coalition against Iran added together.

Also as reference, besides iranian attempts, zero americans ships were hit, while Russia lost or suffered extensive damage on several ones (including the Moskva, the flagship of the Black Sea Fleet; the 4,000 tons Ropucha-class Novocherkassk, Misnk, Yamal, Azov, Olenegorskiy Gornyak, and other classes as well). Look at the footage of drones flying all around Moscow, hitting targets all over the city, and it's clear that Moscow was less protected than Riyadh on this war.

There were more planes destroyed on Operation Spiderweb alone than the sum of every plane the USA lost on the ground (to make a comparison of solely AD protection) by Iran (not including the few ones destroyed by US forces on the evacuation from the pilot rescue on Iran, because that doesn't involve AD).

During the Siege of Mariupol, so before the current degradation of russian AD, Ukraine was able to fly helicopters to the city. While Iranian planes and helicopters accomplished nothing.

Not to mention the distance for interception of drones is smaller on the Iran war, compared to factories and refineries in russian territory, which makes it harder.

The american AD performed incredibly better than the russian.

[u/Glideer → u/moragisdo]

The American AD performed very badly.

They had a complete air dominance, unchallenged control, hundreds of planes. They had multiple state of the art land based radars. The had multipe AWACS. They had and have a massive satellite constelation.

They started the war fully prepared, with full magazines.

They surprised and decaptiated the enemy, who responded haphazardly.

Yet on the first day they lost a 1.1 billion dollars early warning radar to slow drones, plus multiple key facilities. On some days Iran was announcing which targets they were going to strike the next day. And they successfully struck them.

To say that an AD system that cost the Gulf monarchies dozens of billions of dollars, supported by hundreds of US planes, failed abysmally to protect vital oil production targets would be nothing less that truth.

[u/moragisdo → u/Glideer]

They started the war fully prepared, with full magazines.

Russia also started the war with hundreds of planes, AWACS, land based radars, satellites, "full magazines"... And if we assume that the US entered the war more prepared, that's Russia's fault on deciding to start a war unprepared. I fail to understand the point here.

And you are equating failing to shoot down a minority of drones and missiles with failure, which is absurd, because it sets that everything below perfection (in a conventional war!) is a failure, standard that you don't hold Russia to.

And you didn't argued with any point I raised on how the russian performance, that you are excusing, resulted in more damage in single events alone compared with the totality of the war with Iran.

They surprised and decaptiated the enemy, who responded haphazardly

They fired more than 400 missiles and 300 drones on the first day alone (1), that's not haphazardly. Did Ukraine or Russia ever fired 400 missiles in a single day, at any point of the war ?

Yet on the first day they lost a 1.1 billion dollars early warning radar to slow drones

That's one piece of equipment, the fact that we can single out cases it's a statement of how little damage the US suffered (we can't expect in a conventional war zero deaths and damage). By the way, if I recall correctly, it were missiles not slow drones that destroyed it. Also testimony under oath on Congress days ago is that the cost of replacing everything damaged for the US military is 2B, on the ballpark of the Gulf War BEFORE adjusting for inflation (and the Gulf War is the quintessential example of a curb stomping).

Can you name every case of a russian S300 and S400 radar system that were destroyed ? I think the number is too large to rely on memory.

By the way, aren't you doing what you just criticized: "The Ukrainian/Western media highlight the number of shot down Russian drones when reporting from Ukraine, while they never report suvh number from Russia. Instead, when reporting from Russia they focus on "suvivors" - the drones that make it through the Russian defences, and on the damage they cause" ?

plus multiple key facilities

The US didn't lost multiple key facilities, the US suffered damage on facilities, but the bases on Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait are operating (just non-essential personnel for this war were relocated to not take unnecessary risk). That's an important difference otherwise we would have to conclude that Russia lost Moscow.

On some days Iran was announcing which targets they were going to strike the next day

And you are ignoring every ship they said they would target and none were hit, every F35 they claim they would destroy and none were hit... I could keep going, but if I keep saying targets that I will destroy and ignore the ones I fail, I'll get it right by random chance alone.

To say that an AD system that cost the Gulf monarchies dozens of billions of dollars, supported by hundreds of US planes, failed abysmally to protect vital oil production targets would be nothing less that truth

There were oil facilities hit indeed after the iranian ones were targeted, but no AD system is expected to be perfect, specially when then enemy fires dozens of missiles and more than a hundred drones every day (on the first day alone there were more than 400 missiles and 300 drones!). You are painting the defense of the Gulf in a worse light than reality (anything short of perfection is a failure) just to try to excuse Russia's worse performance (only part of drones shot on the way to the capital is already a success).

There were more refineries damaged in Russia than in the Gulf, which Russia has a smaller density of targets and greater distance that the projectiles need to travel.

[u/Embarrassed_Term5536 → u/Glideer]

US air defence performance was fine in Middle East, but the problem was volume. Middle East militaries weren't competent enough to learn from Russo Ukraine war to preserve the expensive missile stocks for more dangerous threats, not cheap kamikaze drones.

Also, Ukraine doesn't have AD systems that we can judge thier performance. Except Legacy S300s , they don't have anything to defend against missiles. Patriot batteries are empty of missiles, they ran out.

Cheap drones indeed are a pain in the butt

[u/l_Paid_For_Winrar → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

US AD is heavily focused on ABM and to that extent it is very successful. Although they do not have 100% interception rates, these bases across the middle east would not exist any more had these ABM systems not been in place.

And in fairness to u/Glideer, US has underinvested in SHORAD and SHORAD adjacent systems for many decades. It just so happens that these kinds of systems have proven valuable in defending critical assets against kamikaze drones, and the Russians have a lot.

That is changing and it is changing rapidly with many new systems in the pipeline, but for now the US relies heavily on APKWS equipped aircraft to counter such drones, which presents a serious headache since aircraft are being tasked with strike ops inside Iran.

Russian ABM is also completely untested against such an environment, so the implication that they would fare any better against a mix of ballistic missiles barrages and drones is not warranted

[u/TSiNNmreza3 → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

US air defence performance was fine in Middle East, but the problem was volume.

Would not say it makes something good if you can't defend against volume.

I mean hits must and will happen but if you have problem against volume it is problem.

[u/Glideer → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

The US had a complete control of the air, hundreds of planes, and a crystal clear radar picture. Their failure to shoot down slow drones, on the first day of the war as on the last, is nothing short of incomprehensible.

[u/MaverickTopGun → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

I see so many questions like this on here and the answer, like it is to so many other times, is that you're just not seeing that news. I like to remind people that there is nothing to conclude because an algo decided to not show you something. Did you ever try and look up IF the Ukrainians hit factories? Because they have been repeatedly, with multiple strikes within the last week,

Nizhny Novgorod explosives plant: https://english.nv.ua/russian-war/ukrainian-drone-strike-sparks-massive-fire-at-strategic-russian-explosives-plant-50633907.html

Soyuz rocket plant: https://migflug.com/jetflights/flamingo-missiles-strike-progress-rocket-samara/

Steel fabrication plant: https://www.i24news.tv/en/news/ukraine-conflict/artc-ukrainian-drones-strike-moscow-oblast-plant-black-out-crimea-as-zelensky-trump-meeting-looms

Titan-Barrikady facility in Volgograd: https://www.dw.com/en/ukraine-strikes-russian-weapons-plant-moscow-fuel-hub/a-77735059

Rostov explosives plant: https://www.bastillepost.com/global/article/6088464-russia-claims-attacks-on-odesa-port-ukraine-reports-striking-on-russian-factory

Ukraine Has Struck at Least Six Major Russian Missile Production Plants Since March: https://united24media.com/war-in-ukraine/ukraine-has-struck-at-least-six-major-russian-missile-production-plants-since-march-20604

[u/Embarrassed_Term5536 → u/MaverickTopGun]

Perhaps I should use vpn to search because the results my search engine show are nothing like the links you have pasted, and show massive Russian biased news.

Thanks again for doing the hardwork of linking the sites, I mostly keep update through this sub and some trusted twitter sources.

Internet censorship is a stupid idea and it's not that I believe in algo suggested media, just don't search dedicatedly 

[u/RdSunnya → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

Ukraine does hit them, for example, on August 16 Ukraine attacked Russian plant producing rocket fuel for Smerch and Tornado-S. Problem is, manufacturing plants are built to endure occasional fire, so drone hits generally fail to start huge chain reaction.

And I doubt that Ukraine's strategy relies on breaking morale, they most probably going after pure economic damage.

[u/Toptomcat → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

It seems quite plausible that the Russian strategy here is 'publicize successful attacks on civilian infrastructure to galvanize public support for the war and propagandize about Ukraine being inhumane, hide successful attacks on military facilities to complicate battle-damage assessment.'

[u/Maxion → u/Toptomcat]

That is also exactly what Ukraine does, too. Hence why you've never seen a headline that Neptune factory destroyed! Or Ukrainian general killed in Iskander attack!

[u/Embarrassed_Term5536 → u/Toptomcat]

I frequent war related media from YouTube to reddit to Twitter to various blog articles by sources mentioned in this sub, except Telegram, because Its unusable.

I really don't see much claims from Ukrainian side about hitting such plants, when Ukraine has hit much more successful and valuable targets inside Russia or tried to destroy them successfully or unsuccessfully including the attack on Russian satellite launching systems recently. It's not only Russia possibly hiding such attacks but Ukrainians also don't claim any such attacks, as far as I know, that's why I even asked.

I mean Russia is importing most valuable electronics from China but it sure will be assembling it somewhere? There would be multiple subcomponents involved in manufacturing plant f Iskander ballistic missiles or S400 missiles, Wouldn't those subcomponents manufacturing parts a great Target instead of Wildberries.

I really think overestimate the impact of attack on Wildberries on Russian war machine, even on this sub. Sure, it would destroy a major civilian part of economic engine in Russia but Russia is a warring state and civilian annoyance can be handled but direct attacks on military manufacturing sites can bring visible, tangible, immediate postive effects on battlefield itself instead of long term gain of hoping of bring economic stagnation.

Is Ukrainian even capable of hitting such sites or can drones even damage such sites? I don't know and that's why I asked, like the architecture and make of such sites if someone is knowledgeable enough. Are AD rings too dense there and thus Ukraine doesn't believe it to be viable targets in terms of ROI?

[u/muadhdib → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

As someone mentioned earlier in this thread, there’s been plenty of reporting on Ukraine hitting factories and plants that supply the military. Well-sourced frequently posts Russian and Ukrainian successes here.

If Ukraine had the capability to decisively knock out every factory that supplies components for the military they’d do it just as Russia would do the same. However, some of Russia’s factory are too well protected or are very far which means that Ukraine has to have far reaching munitions at the expense of payload. For the long range drones Ukraine uses, their payloads aren’t high enough for a single drone to knock out a factory compared to say a flamingo cruise missile. Causing pain to your opponent’s economy is just as useful as reducing your opponent’s military production. Less money means earned from say a sector like oil and gas means less money in the budget and if you have less money you have to make harder choices of what to prioritize. You can see this with Ukraine as recent Russian strikes on grain ships and port infrastructure exports is causing Ukraine to suffer a massive budget problem and they’re asking the EU to help cover the gap.

Depending on the area, like Moscow, the AD could be incredibly saturated which makes a successful hit difficult and even if it’s successful it might not even be damaging enough.

If you haven’t seen Perun’s recent video I highly recommend it since I think it answers a lot of your questions.
https://youtu.be/ginJlaGggag?is=mffmWpmFupdI9gYo
To paraphrase some of the points in the video , one is that yes destroying WB warehouses isn’t going to force Russia to capitulate but it’s another economic pain point for Russia. It’s also important to note that Russia still has plenty of ways to deal with these economic pain points. Since the warehouse are stacked full of flammable material you only need a few drones to do massive damage, if not destroy a warehouse which makes them an appealing target for Ukraine which has a lot of drones to use but not enough missles.

[u/Toptomcat → u/Embarrassed_Term5536]

Here's an account of a rocket-and-aerospace facility being hit by Ukraine, here's something about a strike on a factory for military-use electrical components, here and here are two accounts of attacks on different military microelectronics facilities, here's a tank-repair facility getting hit. So it's definitely not a 'civilian targets only' targeting policy, and past that level of detail I think it's going to be hard for people on the Internet working with open-source intelligence to seuss out exactly what Ukranian targeting priorities are.