Military — 2026-06-29

Ukraine Navy Reveals Crimea Strikes Are Part of Years-Long Multistage Operation Targeting Kerch Bridge

BLUFCrimea's rail ferry elimination tightens the logistics noose, but a direct Kerch Bridge strike remains unlikely within 90 days of June 28 given no visible assembly of requisite strike assets.

Ukrainian Navy spokesman Dmytro Pletenchuk stated June 28 that strikes on Russian logistics in Crimea are stages of a multi-year operation with the Kerch Strait bridge as the explicit terminal objective 12. He traced a sequential campaign: destruction of large landing ships first, then railway ferries, then conventional ferries, with Russian air defense radar stations struck in parallel; as of June 28, Pletenchuk confirmed no rail ferries remain operational in Crimea 34. Russia retains conventional ferry capacity, Pletenchuk said, but "nowhere near what it used to be," and characterized air transport as "extremely expensive, difficult, and slow" compared to rail 3. Separately on June 28, Ukrainian forces struck a railway bridge near İçki in occupied Crimea and drones hit the Sakska thermal power plant near Saky, with NASA's FIRMS satellite data confirming the blaze at approximately 03:13 1.

Analysis
Rail ferry attrition has moved from disruption to confirmed elimination, clearing the penultimate isolation layer and leaving Kerch Bridge as the binding constraint on Russian Crimea logistics. Kyiv has now publicly named the bridge as the campaign's terminal objective for the first time, though the disclosure rests on a single Pletenchuk interview with no independent access to the underlying briefing. A direct kinetic strike within 90 days is unlikely. Low confidence reflects the absence of observable indicators that Ukraine has assembled the strike assets and targeting data required. Pletenchuk's disclosure may instead function as an IO move designed to force Russia into costly bridge-defense reallocation rather than reflect operational planning. For precision munitions and ISR suppliers, the bridge's status as logistics bottleneck shapes the timeline for Russian sustainment adaptation in Crimea with or without a strike.

5 sources

Russia thought occupied Crimea was its fortress. Ukraine Navy says it has been pulling the walls down for years - Euromaidan Press
Ukraine's Navy details multistage operation targeting Crimea - Ukraine Today
No rail ferries currently operating in Crimea, Ukrainian Navy spox says - Ukrinform
No railway ferries remain operational in occupied Crimea - Odessa Journal
Strikes on Russian logistics in Crimea part of long-term operation – Navy spox - Ukrinform