As the drone and aerial war between Russia and Ukraine continues heating up, there's been another 'close call' which is being viewed as a possible direct threat by a NATO member country.
Ukrainian officials said Friday that Russian forces sent drones on a Ukrainian town on the border with NATO member Romania in Odessa region, as cited in Reuters.
"The attack hit the town of Izmail, Ukraine's biggest port on the Danube river, which is important for critical imports and which lies across the river from Romania," the report underscores.
There were reports of damage, including the total destruction of a post office and parcel center, regional Governor Oleh Kiper said, but no immediate reports of casualties.
Throughout the war there have been similar border town strikes, but they remain rare, as Moscow is seeking to avoid any action which can be seen as a brazen attack on NATO territory.
Still, there have at times been threats connected with Western-supplied F-16s, as the Kremlin long ago warned that if these jets take off from NATO airbases next to Ukraine, those very bases could be 'fair game'.
But both sides have thus far carefully avoided build-up to nuclear-armed confrontation pitting Russia vs. the NATO bloc, led by the US. Russia may at this point be increasingly targeting 'command centers' in Ukraine as well.
Drone warfare over the past months has been greatly expanded by both sides. Ukraine too has been pummeling Russian territory with constant nighttime drone attacks, in hopes of crippling the country's infrastructure and destabilizing Russia's leadership.
Ukrainian military leaders have boasted of some startling figures, which can't be verified:
Ukrainian soldiers hit and destroyed in May more than 89,000 Russian targets using drones of various types, Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said on May 30.
Syrskyi did not specify which targets were hit. Throughout Russia's all-out war, Ukrainian drones have been used to target Russian vehicles, troops, as well as fortified positions.
"Each drone means a destroyed enemy, and therefore a saved life of a Ukrainian serviceman. A special emphasis is placed on the destruction of enemy UAV (unmanned aerial vehicles) operators and their command centers," the commander said. Presumably he's tallying all drone use, whether on the front lines inside Ukraine or sent against Russian territory or Crimea.
But these nightly tit-for-tat assaults threaten to derail Trump-backed efforts to achieve peace, at a sensitive moment going into the second round of Istanbul talks, scheduled for Monday. Analysts are currently setting expectations low, also given the Russian delegation is made up of mid-level officials.
