DEEP behind enemy lines, Ukraine’s special ops unit marked a turning point in modern warfare after drones blitzed Vladimir Putin’s prized bombers beyond repair.
Ukraine’s Security Service – the SBU – is wiping out the Russian tyrant’s war machine with stunning success.
On Sunday, the SBU’s Operation Spiderweb destroyed a third of Putin’s nuclear bomber fleet.
It set a new high point for Ukraine’s spies – showing incredible ingenuity, reach, and coordination inside a hostile country.
The SBU, led by Vasyl Malyuk, carried out the attack and has proved itself to be one of the best agencies in the world.
Over the three years of the war, the SBU has repeatedly assassinated commanders, bombed key sites, and attacked Putin’s beloved bridge in Crimea.
Despite Russia being larger, stronger, and holding the cards at the start of the war – it is Ukraine who has carried out a string of daring sabotage attacks.
Experts told The Sun why they think Ukraine and the SBU has been able to pull off these attacks – and what they could strike next.
Best spies in Europe
Former MI6 intelligence officer Matthew Dunn said Spiderweb showed the SBU were the best spies in Europe.
He said: “Being an intelligence officer, there’s no static, fixed rule book about what one does.”
One question the world has been left asking is how Ukraine managed to get the drones inside Russia.
The bestselling spy novelist and podcast host at SafeHouse Productions said there is no clear answer.
He said: “The commanders involved in this at high level, they would have been very open-minded about how to get these drones into the country.”
Dunn said SBU spies could have smuggled drones over the border on foot, via parachute, or even a raft – whatever was the safest and easiest way.
He said: “The intelligence operation and the officers involved would have been as creative as possible.
“The issue is, the more people you involve… the higher the risk of compromise.
“Sometimes with these kind of things, risky and daring as they can be, sometimes simplicity is the answer.”
Dunne thinks the stunning success of Spiderweb means the SBU will only continue being pragmatic and open-minded.
Dunne said: “The [Spiderweb] punch to Russia is [the SBU] saying, ‘we’re not giving up, and this is our reach. This is what we can do’.”
He said the SBU would choose their victims on a “case by case” basis as it continues to cripple the Russian war machine.
That’s bad news for Putin – who will likely only going to see more goons assassinated, infrastructure attacked, and his beloved Crimea bridge bombed.
And foreign intelligence agencies will be watching and trying to figure out the SBU’s methods.
Russians as spies
Dr Jade McGlynn said the SBU uses civilians to sabotage Russia in the exact same way Vlad does to the West.
The expert in Ukraine’s resistance fighters at King’s College London said she expected apathetic and bribed Russians to have played “at least some role” in Sunday’s attack.
McGlynn believes Ukraine targeted Russians who didn’t care for their country or the invasion and needed a bit of spare cash.
She said: “We keep on seeing this outsourcing, where they’ll [Ukraine’s spies] pay random people, maybe lure them in, they know they [Russian civilians] need a bit of money, and then they’ll try and bomb a shopping center.”
Russian bloggers accused Ukraine’s spies of hiring Russian lorry drivers to get the shipping crates into position next to the air bases.
Lorry drivers reportedly said they received instructions from an “Artem” and had no idea what was in the containers they transported.
Ukraine later released footage of the containers starting their journeys – as drivers took the vehicles to their fateful destinations.
Eyes and ears
On the ground, Putin is also battling to stop partisans, groups of militants, inside Russia who oppose his rule.
He’s fighting against both Ukrainians caught behind the front line and Russians who hate Putin.
McGlynn said it was hard to know exactly how big resistance groups are, how many of them there are, and what exactly they do given the secrecy involved.
But she warned that some are the “eyes and ears” of Ukrainian intelligence in Russia.
McGlynn said: “They’re people who just go around and check coordinates, who send things through encrypted special bots.
“There’s a base here is at this location, or we’re seeing a lot of equipment going here, and then the Ukrainians can use that for drone attacks.
“That’s similar to the way that the French resistance helped with knowing where the German defences were ahead of D-Day – that information targeting [role].”
Other groups, such as the Freedom of Russia Legion, are more militant and fight Russia directly.
This provides the SBU with agents on the ground inside Russia who can carry out attacks, recruit Russians to do their bidding, and provide key information.
Vlad’s ‘doomed bridge’
While Spiderweb was carried out with flying kamikaze drones, the SBU has also pioneered the use of sea drones.
They’ve rendered Vlad’s Black Sea fleet useless after destroying 11 Russian ships – including the flagship Moskva – with the unmanned water vehicles.
Ukraine has also repeatedly bombed Putin’s beloved £3b bridge crossing the Kerch Strait.
The tyrant built the span after he annexed Crimea in 2014 and it is key for linking the peninsular with Russia.
But to Ukraine it represents Putin’s imperialism.
A sabotage attack in October 2022 saw Ukraine cause part of the span to collapse after spies placed a bomb on a truck.
Russia arrested five of its own citizens as well as three others and accused them of organising the attack.
But it’s not just human intelligence the SBU deals with – they have attacked the bridge several other times with sea-based drones.
Known as Sea Baby drones, the water-based vehicles have caused havoc to Russia.
Two Sea Baby’s packed with 850kg of explosives each tore apart a section of the stretch in 2023.
Why have Ukraine spies beat Russians?
Ambassador John Herbst – who was Washington DC’s man in the country between 2003 and 2006 – said Ukraine’s spies had been allowed to innovate.
In Russia, decision-making is centralised and bureaucratic but in Ukraine officers are given more freedom, he said.
Herbst said: “Ukrainian ingenuity has been a regular feature of this war, not to mention the fact that they not only surprised Putin, but they surprised the entire US.
“It’s very clear that the Ukrainians are operating pretty easily and exceptionally, effectively across Russia.”
But Herbst said as much as cultural differences mattered – so did similarities.
One factor benefiting Ukraine is how familiar they are with Russia – having been a member of the Soviet Union.
Their cultural links and shared history meant that Ukrainian spies know how to work inside Russia, deal with Russian civilians, and understand the army.
He said: “This is the flip side of something the entire world has been talking about since Ukraine emerged as an independent country, which is the fact that the Russians have had great success in planting agents in Ukrainian intelligence agencies and co-opting those agencies.
“Parts of the Ukrainian elite were junior partners [in the Soviet elite] which gave Ukrainian great insight, better insight than we have, into how the Soviet Union operated, and how Russia still operates.”
Inside Operation Spiderweb
By James Halpin, Foreign News Reporter
Ukraine’s shock sleeper drone blitz on Russia’s bomber fleet has delivered a hammer blow to Vladimir Putin’s nuclear arsenal.
The SAS-style strike against four airfields deep inside Russia is reminiscent of the most daring raids of the WW2 that turned the tide against the Nazis.
Volodymyr Zelensky oversaw Operation Spiderweb – much like Winston Churchill did as Britain struck deep behind enemy lines.
The Ukrainian said: “It’s genuinely satisfying when something I authorized a year and six months ago comes to fruition and deprives Russians of over forty units of strategic aviation.
“We will continue this work.”
Putin’s doomsday bomber fleet is now crippled with 41, or a third, of his most prized aircraft lying in smouldering wrecks on tarmac.
Ukraine said the sneak attack was worth $7bn (£5.2bn) in damage to Russia – caused by only 117 cheaply made drones.
Like Israel’s mass pager sabotage against Hezbollah, Kyiv has rewritten the rule book in how to strike the heart of their enemy.
Ukraine’s spies spent 18 months putting the plan into action and struck on the eve of fresh peace talks in Istanbul.
