Extract from ABC News
Another Russian military vehicle is stopped in its tracks near Donetsk. (X: @99Dominik_)
Towering plumes of smoke and burnt-out vehicles are becoming an increasingly common sight on the highways of occupied Ukraine.
The Kremlin relies on these inter-city arteries, some of which are more than 100 kilometres behind the front lines, to get vital military and logistical supplies to its armed forces.
But lately, even Russia's famed war bloggers have conceded driving on these roads is now a dangerous "lottery".
Ukraine has developed AI-enabled drones capable of making precision strikes (like hitting a moving vehicle) from hundreds of kilometres away.
Now, military trucks and petrol tankers using this crucial land bridge between the Russian state and territory it occupies in southern Ukraine are being hit regularly.
The strikes have become so significant, some experts have declared the war that has been raging since Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022 has entered a new phase.
This Russian Ural military vehicle was struck by a drone around 100km behind the front lines. (X: @666_mancer)
The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a Washington DC-based non-partisan and not-for-profit organisation that tracks and assesses battlefield developments around the world, this week published a report that affirmed "Ukrainian forces are out-innovating Russian forces".
This ISW analysis asserted the war was now in "a new phase" defined by Ukraine's ability to disrupt Russian supply lines previously considered out of reach, among other things.
"Ukraine significantly intensified its intermediate-range strike campaign against dynamic targets in Spring 2026 in order to degrade Russian logistics at operational depths ahead of a planned Ukrainian manoeuvre," the report read.
It later noted: "Russian officials and milbloggers notably reported in mid-to-late May 2026 that Ukrainian drones were increasingly targeting Russian vehicles and logistics … at distances over 160km from the frontline."
The ISW has geolocated around three dozen attacks on vehicles on key highways behind the front lines, although anecdotal evidence suggests the number could be much higher.
The report concluded the war in Ukraine was "far from stalemated" — something at odds with the prevailing geo-political rhetoric that a Russian victory is inevitable or that neither country was capable of making a meaningful breakthrough.
Kateryna Stepanenko is the ISW's Russia team lead and co-authored the report.
She said Russia had once used the highways to rotate troops from the front lines, but that was becoming more difficult.
"It is a very significant accomplishment and technological advantage for Ukrainians as they're able to paralyse Russian forces before they're even able to reach the battlefield at distances of over 150 and 160 kilometres away," she told the ABC.
"It's no longer safe for Russian forces to operate in those areas."
The same arteries are also used to supply Crimea — a territory the Kremlin annexed in 2014 — with essentials from mainland Russia.
Ms Stepanenko said Ukraine's campaign had affected fuel supplies for civilians in Crimea, and that local occupation officials had alluded to the fact that petrol was in short supply on the peninsula.
Kateryna Stepanenko says Ukraine has an advantage in the war right now. (ABC News: Bradley McLennan)
Ukraine's Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov on Thursday announced his nation was imposing a "logistics lockdown" on the supply routes.
The Centre for European Policy Analysis, a non-partisan think tank "focused on strengthening the transatlantic alliance", has described the land bridge between Russia and much of the front lines as "a highway to hell" because's of Kyiv's attacks.
Russian war blogger Rybar said the drone attacks meant there was "no rear" to the front lines any more and that travelling on the logistics routes had become "a lottery".
Keir Giles, an expert in Russia's military and author of multiple books, told the ABC that Ukraine's technological advances were significant.
"It's one of the area in which Ukraine is demonstrating that it has, through long hard work, arrived at a situation where it holds an advantage," he said.
Mr Giles said the increasing strikes on Russian military equipment and logistics well behind the front lines had been noticed abroad.
"Russia will be watching with a certain amount of dismay how the global perception of this [war] has shifted towards Ukraine no longer being a passive victim but actually having initiative in the war," he said.
'Russia still possesses some significant advantages'
Earlier this month, a Kremlin-installed governor in occupied Ukraine closed a section of the main motorway linking Russia and Crimea to civilian traffic, reportedly due to the influx of drone strikes.
John Lough is the head of foreign policy at the New Eurasian Strategy Centre, a London-based think tank focused on Russia.
He agreed that the war was in a "new phase" but warned people not to assume that would lead to the end of the fighting.
"I don't think that we should just conclude that the Ukrainians now have suddenly, against the odds, have a winning hand and they're going to end up defeating the Russian army because I think that's very far from the case," he said.
"And Russia still possesses some significant advantages sometimes. The size of its economy, the size of its defence industry, of course the size of its population."
A Ukrainian soldier prepares to launch drones with a range of almost 200km earlier this month. (Reuters: Valentyn Ogirenko)
Compounding Moscow's headaches on the battlefield is the country's mounting number of casualties.
Neither Ukraine nor Russia release official numbers of their soldiers that are deemed dead, injured or missing.
Earlier this week, however, a senior figure in Britain's intelligence sector, Anne Keast-Butler, said nearly 500,000 Russians had died fighting in Ukraine.
Analysts believe that, for the past five months, Russia's ability to recruit new soldiers has been outpaced by its numbers of casualties. In other words: its army is shrinking.
"The Russians demonstrably still treat human beings as the most disposable military commodity," Mr Giles said.
Moscow has been pounding infrastructure in Ukraine in recent days, including hitting civilian targets. It has also warned foreign governments, including Australia, to evacuate its embassies amid increasing missile and drone attacks.
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