Kiev Bridges..Moscow changes its goals in Ukraine

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The bridges linking the two banks of Kiev have entered the circle of repeated Russian targeting, in an escalation that threatens to disrupt the movement of residents and supplies across the Dnipro River, and increases pressure on the Ukrainian capital. Although none of the bridges fell in the attacks, the damage and fears of repeated bombings prompted the authorities to close some of them and restrict traffic on others, which means that the impact of the strikes will extend to the movement of residents, their work, and the arrival of goods, in a city that relies on these crossings to connect its residential neighborhoods to the centers of administration and commercial activity.

In the latest episodes of targeting, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced, via the “X” platform, on Sunday that a Russian drone had again struck the “Pevnychny” Bridge, known as the Northern Bridge, this morning.

He also explained that Russia launched 135 attack drones overnight, including more than 50 with jet engines, targeting the regions of Kiev, Dnipro, Kharkiv, Donetsk, Sumy, and Zaporozhye, with electricity cut off in some residential communities.

This attack came after six strikes that targeted the capital's bridges within three days. Three drones hit the southern bridge last Thursday, and it was subjected to two strikes on Friday, before targeting a bridge north of the city on Saturday morning.

As a result, movement was restricted or suspended on five of the six road bridges, to varying degrees. The northern bridge was temporarily closed, while car and metro traffic through the southern bridge stopped, and restrictions were imposed on three other crossings.

Passenger traffic was not far from danger; The first strike on the South Bridge coincided with a metro train crossing without any casualties recorded, while a later circulated clip showed it being hit by another drone as people passed by on foot.

While the geography of Kyiv explains the seriousness of this escalation; The residential East Bank, which includes about a million people, relies on bridges to reach the West Bank, where government institutions and corporate headquarters are concentrated.

Food supplies and equipment, along with residents, also cross the river that divides Ukraine from north to south, which makes disrupting the crossings a burden on the capital and its associated supply networks.

In this context, Ukrainian officials and military experts believed that targeting bridges was part of a campaign to weaken the economy and undermine the war effort, in parallel with exhausting the population by complicating the details of their daily lives. This reading is reinforced by the increase in strikes on warehouses, trains, data centers, medical supplies stores, and steel factories, in addition to the electricity network. These are Ukrainian estimates of the campaign’s motives, not goals announced by Moscow.

On the other hand, the lack of air defense systems has increased the difficulty of protecting far-flung facilities, while the growing Russian arsenal allows attacks to be intensified and distributed geographically.

Although bringing down huge concrete bridges requires multiple strikes, hitting their supporting elements may be enough to close them until inspections and repairs are completed.

The cost of closure increases with limited alternatives. The nearest bridge south of Kiev is about 90 miles away, forcing long detours for residents and supply trucks. Thus, the capital could face a prolonged transportation crisis even without its bridges collapsing. Preventing transit is enough to disrupt business, delay supplies, and turn a regular daily trip into a recurring challenge, in a city exhausted by years of war and the pressures of bombing.