This autumn, Russia launched four times more missiles and drones at Ukraine compared to last year, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Over the course of three months this autumn, the Russian Federation launched more than 6,000 missiles and drones at Ukraine. This figure is four times higher than in the autumn of 2023.

As reported by RBK-Ukraine, this is confirmed by calculations from The Wall Street Journal.

According to the publication, 92% of all long-range munitions released in the last three months were drones and decoy targets. These are low-cost decoy drones that Russia uses to exhaust Ukraine's air defense systems. Up to half of the drones currently launched may be unarmed decoys.

It is likely that the production of such a large number of drones aimed at Ukraine has been facilitated by a factory in Tatarstan. According to sources cited by WSJ, Russia can produce 1,200 Iranian Shahed analogs per month.

At the same time, Ukraine is trying to counter these attacks and is increasingly utilizing electronic warfare methods for this purpose. Specifically, in October, 93% of all drones were intercepted or lost, compared to just over 8% for ballistic and hypersonic missiles. Furthermore, in November, the interception rate for ballistic and hypersonic missiles sharply increased to over 40%.

WSJ believes that the interception rate of enemy drones in Ukraine is also influenced by the lower quality of Russian Shahed analogs compared to the original drones.

Drone Attacks on Ukraine

Since the beginning of autumn, Russians have intensified drone attacks on Ukraine. The enemy launches dozens of "Shaheds" almost every night. However, most of the enemy targets are successfully destroyed by Ukrainian air defense forces.

Earlier, we wrote about why Russia has "paused" missile attacks and strikes with drones every night.

Additionally, the General Staff reported that in August, September, and October 2024, Russia launched 4,300 strike drones at Ukraine. These included both Shahed drones and UAVs of other types that mimic real "Shaheds".

In September of this year, Russia launched drones similar to "Shahed" across Ukrainian territory every day. On average, 44 "Shaheds" were launched daily over the territory of Ukraine.