Putin spent a Friday circling his own capital in the Flying Kremlin with nowhere to land. A swarm of Ukrainian drones had shut all four Moscow airports while he flew home from Turkmenistan. By the account of an officer familiar with the operation, the timing was pure chance. His plane was not the target. Still, it tasted sweet to a nation that had been fed a daily dose of bad news.
The Operation Called M&Ms
The campaign The Atlantic first reported in August, under the code name M&Ms, has a version like this one. Ukrainian drones have interfered with air traffic over the Russian capital almost every day since early last month. The authors of the plan say it uses no American technology and no American intelligence.
These are Ukrainian-built drones with AI guidance. The same authors say this is only the beginning.
Nearly 500 Drones, Second Closure
The Friday closure was part of a pattern. On Tuesday night nearly 500 drones went at Moscow. The city's mayor again confirmed that the airports had to shut.
Russia can shrug this off as a minor inconvenience. It cannot pretend the capital's skies belong to it.
Why the Sky, Not the Runway
For now Ukraine is flooding the airspace around the airports rather than hitting them directly. The planners say the effect is similar. Nothing lands. Nothing takes off.
Zelensky reportedly prefers this approach because it avoids strikes on civilian aircraft, though the line has blurred at least once. Over the weekend, debris from a downed drone fell on Sochi airport and set an administrative building on fire.
The Plan Zelensky Has Not Signed Off On
The original plan was far uglier for Moscow. Up to 1,000 drones a day, AI steering them around Russian air defense, hitting airports in Moscow and other cities, making flights impossible. Zelensky judged it too dangerous at the start of the year. He still let then-defense minister Fedorov keep building the AI drones for it. He kept the trigger in his own hand.
A co-author of the plan says these drones will soon be mass-produced. Ukrainian manufacturers are still finishing the specialized fleet, built around map matching technology that picks targets and the moment to strike.
The September 1 Threat That Was Not Yet Real
Public pressure pushed Zelensky to announce the campaign on September 1, when he called on every international airline to stop flying to Russian airports. At that moment, a person behind the operation admits, Ukraine did not have dedicated drones capable of keeping Moscow's airports shut for any real length of time. The threat ran ahead of the hardware. The hardware is catching up.
My Own Position
This is where I part ways with the cautious approach. Russia must lose its civilian fleet. Every airliner should burn where it stands on the apron, with nobody aboard. A state stops functioning when it cannot move people, goods, and money. Destroying civil aviation chokes the movement of people and cargo. Destroying data centers chokes the movement of money. Together they strike at the machinery of a government that has been bombing our cities for nearly five years and has drained us the whole time.
Every Russian should feel this war personally. In the airport. In the supply chain. The bank transfer failed. Russians have been comfortable for five years while Ukrainian apartment blocks burned. Airport closures are the first time many of them notice the war reaching their own sky. They have not felt enough yet.
Washington is busy buying Russian diesel and shielding Russian refineries, and support from the US is wobbling, Starlink included. Ukraine can keep pressing without anyone's permission. These drones are Ukrainian-made and Ukrainian-guided. They are aimed at the one place Putin cannot hide.
Every Russian should feel this war personally.