2:22
Through the darkness will come the Ukrainian light. In Crimea, that is truer than it is anywhere else in the occupied territories. For months, Ukraine has been engaged in a campaign of isolating Crimea, turning the occupied peninsula into an island marooned from Russian support. Then, the night of June 24, 2026 happened. Ukraine just plunged Crimea into its darkest night ever. But it gets so much worse for Russia. Something dark happened beyond the lights going out. Something really dark. With the electricity cut, Ukraine destroyed everything!
We take you first to the Balaklava power plant in the city of Sevastopol. This city is supposed to be the crown jewel of the entire Crimean occupation for Putin. It was the home of the Black Sea Fleet, at least until that fleet was driven out by Ukraine's brilliant campaign against Russia's warships. But now, Sevastopol is vulnerable. And Ukraine proved that with a devastating series of overnight strikes on June 24 that plunged the entire city into darkness. The Balaklava thermal power plant was the primary target, and Ukraine's aerial
assault did precisely what it was supposed to do. Cut the power. Plunge the occupiers into darkness. On a night where explosions were also recorded by Ukrainian monitoring channels in Kerch, Bakhchysarai, and close to Mount Ai-Petri, which is an important base in its own right due to hosting a radar station used by a radio-technical battalion of the Russian Aerospace Forces, Ukraine clearly caused enough damage to the Balaklava plant to plunge Crimea's occupiers into a deep and dark night. Details of the scale of the damage caused are still unclear. But the panic
coming out of the Russian puppet authorities on the peninsula tells us all that we need to know. Moscow-installed Sevastopol governor Mikhail Razvozhayev has taken to Telegram to explain what happened, claiming that his city temporarily lost power as a result of Ukrainian strikes against infrastructure. Follow-up posts saw the governor make the strange claims that a combination of air defenses, mobile fire teams, and Russian military and aviation had "repelled two attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces," shooting down 70 drones in the process. But "repelled" is an interesting
choice of words. Russia's air defenses have tried to stop Ukraine's attacks on Crimea. However, they have clearly failed, and Razvozhayev even unintentionally revealed that in an update post where he confirmed that power has yet to be restored in the Leninsky and Gagarinsky districts, along with several streets inside Sevastopol. Erm… Razvozhayev. You can't claim an attack was repelled when an entire city has been plunged into darkness because of those attacks. What Razvozhayev doesn't say in his Telegram posts is that Crimea was already dealing
with power issues before Ukraine's June 24 strike. Rolling power cuts had already been instituted across much of Crimea on June 23, which authorities claimed was a "preventative" measure. What they were supposed to be preventing isn't exactly clear. The Kyiv Independent reports that these rolling blackouts have already affected half of Crimea, and they uncoincidentally came in the wake of a Ukrainian attack on fuel reservoirs stored at the Kerch Thermal Power Plant. Keep Kerch in mind. We're going to be coming back to it. Russian proxy and occupation spokesperson Oleg Kryuchkov explained the situation, stating,
"We are seeing almost daily attacks on Crimea's energy infrastructure. There is maneuvering and redistribution of power. Preventive load shedding schedules have been introduced: if there is an overload in the Crimean power grid, they will be implemented periodically, everything depends on the situation." Well, the situation just got a hell of a lot worse. A peninsula that largely relies on the Ukrainian mainland for its electricity is being cut off, and Ukraine has just gone after one of the few power stations on Crimea itself to drive the point home.
Beyond all of the panic, Razvozhayev also tried to cut an inspiring figure for the occupiers that Ukraine has plunged into darkness. "They will not intimidate us with the absence of light. We have lived through worse, and we will stand now as well," the Sevastopol governor declared as he also meekly told residents that it was probably a good idea to conserve the battery lives of their phones if they wanted to stand any chance of making emergency calls. Oh, the irony. "They will not intimidate us?" Really? From a puppet governor for a regime that has made attacking
Ukraine's energy grid, especially during the winter, one of its key strategies for terrorizing Ukrainian civilians and placing pressure on the country's government, this statement rings hollow. After all, it was only on June 2 that a Russian missile and drone attack left eight regions of Ukraine without electricity. And Russia engaged in an aerial campaign against Ukraine's energy grid that led to most of the nation's regions imposing blackouts just to survive throughout the winter. A call to action isn't going to work in Crimea. Especially when its occupiers are being forced to
feel the effects of a "special military operation" they were told would be long over by now. What we've seen here is a little dose of revenge from Ukraine, coupled with a massive dose of a strategy that is designed to isolate Crimea and make the peninsula untenable for Russia to maintain. A shift is happening in Crimea. But the worst of it is for Putin and his cronies is that June 24 was just the highlight. As Sevastopol was plunged into darkness, Ukraine had been striking all over Crimea in a wave of attacks that took an already bad situation and made it much worse for Russia.
Just the night before Ukraine gave Crimea its darkest night ever, it had delivered the fieriest night. The culmination of a sixty-target sweep took place, with Ukraine's Unmanned Systems forces adding a pair of launchers, an anti-air gun, and a radar to a count of 23 Russian air defense assets destroyed in June alone, Euromaidan Press reports. But there was so much more than that. Fuel sites, three expensive Russian drones, and plenty of other targets added up to the 60 that Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces said that they pulled off prior to forcing the blackout. There's a lot
to cover here, so stick with us. Near Baherove, Ukraine hit a Pantsir-S1 system. A little further away in Kurortne, Ukraine's drones took out an anti-aircraft gun and an S-300 launcher. Kerch was also hit (we told you to keep it in mind), and it lost a Nebo-U radar along with much more. Ukraine also took aim at fuel tankers throughout the occupied territories that were clearly intended to reach Crimea and help to alleviate a growing fuel crisis on the peninsula. In Horlivka, which is in the Donetsk oblast, Ukraine took out a fuel rail tanker. A supply transport was also
taken out in Zaporizhzhia, near the region of Pryazovske, and according to Euromaidan Press, plenty more fuel and supply convoys were taken out, both inside Crimea and across four occupied oblasts. Oh, and Ukraine also took out drones in Crimea, as well as a drone pilot training center in Debaltseve. Everything that Ukraine targets is getting hit. And bit by bit, Putin's grip on Crimea is being loosened. Let's come back to Kerch, as taking out an air defense system in that region was far from the only thing that Ukraine pulled off in its massive series of strikes.
The Kyiv Post reports that Ukraine also struck an oil depot at the Kerch seaport. That was a repeat strike. The depot was already burning following a strike carried out on June 21, so Ukraine double-tapped to keep the fires raging. Ukraine also hit the TES-Terminal oil product transshipment and storage complex, which Russia relies on as a logistics hub that enables it to transfer liquified natural gas and oil products into the occupied territories, including Crimea. Footage of these strikes has been made public by the Supernova+ Telegram channel, so Russia can't
deny a thing. There was also the thermal power plant strike we mentioned earlier, which took out at least one fuel storage tank, creating a plume of smoke that stretched almost 50 kilometers, as the Crimean Wind Telegram channel reports. The Kyiv Post adds that fires were reported at the entrance to Kerch, which is where Russia stations S-300 and S-400 air defenses, as well as at the Yuzhnaya railway station, which is also in the city. If Kerch sounds familiar, it's because the region is also the site of the famous Kerch Bridge, which allows Russia to transport troops and supplies from the mainland into occupied Crimea. Traffic on
that bridge had been stopped by 7 am on the day of Ukraine's mass strikes. How about a little more? Ukraine clearly had maximizing its attack in mind on June 23. Outside of Kerch, Ukraine also hit a Nasosnaya-2 electrical substation in the Sovetsky district in Crimea. That has been confirmed by NASA's FIRMS satellites locating a fire at the site, along with eyewitness reports of powerful explosions that began at around 2 am, the Kyiv Post reports. That strike also caused power outages, so that's a little more darkness to add to what happened on June 24. Ukraine's drones also caused a fire at the Arabat Spit.
You might think that we're done with the strikes. Russia would have certainly hoped that was the case on June 23 and June 24. But there's more. Before we dig into everything else that Ukraine did, take a breather for a second and subscribe to The Military Show. If this is the kind of insight into the Ukraine war that you want to see, we publish videos like this every single day. So, are you ready for more? On June 23, the Special Operations Forces, or SSO, of Ukraine took to the Threads social media platform to make a big announcement. "Sorry, but we have an official and
urgent matter here: The railway bridge over the North Crimean Canal in Crimea no longer exists," the SSO said with more than a tinge of sarcasm. It then teased showing exactly what happened, and it delivered on that promise with a video of the strike that shows that Ukraine's drones have absolutely devastated the bridge. Over and over, we see the view from incoming drones as they strike targets on the bridge. By the end of the attack, one of the bridge's spans had completely collapsed, a railway track that Russia relies on to move supplies into Crimea was destroyed, and,
once all of this had been confirmed by operatives on the ground, Ukraine also took aim at repair equipment, in addition to striking the remains of the bridge once more to ensure that Russia wouldn't be able to do a quick repair job to bring it back online. More details are shared by the Kyiv Post. It says that the bridge in question was near the village of Rozdolne, and that the attack took place on June 22, even though it was reported a day later. So, we have a trio of consecutive days of devastating strikes that are all aimed at hurting the Crimean occupiers.
Indeed, that's exactly what this strike did. The shattered bridge and rail line were part of the military-logistical network that Russia relies on to shuttle supplies, troops, equipment, and fuel through Crimea and often on to southern Ukraine. By the way, did we say a trio of days? Make that nearly a week of strikes. This very same bridge had also been hit in the days before the June 22 bridge strike, along with other Ukrainian attacks targeting crossings that link Crimea to the Ukrainian mainland. And while we're on the subject of Ukrainian strikes over the past week, we may
as well report on a few others, not all of which affect Crimea. June 20 saw Ukraine hit the Tyumen oil refinery, which is about 2,000 kilometers away from the Ukrainian border with Russia. We've also seen repeated attacks on Port Kavkaz since June 21, which is in Russian territory but regularly hosts ferries that transport supplies to Crimea's western coast. A fire was reported at the port, and several of the ferries that Russia has been using as makeshift logistical ships were hit. Phew! We've seen Ukraine pull off large strikes before. But nothing like this.
In the space of a few days, Ukraine has massively escalated its strategy to cut Crimea off from the occupiers on the Ukrainian mainland, as well as supplies transported from inside of Russia. Air defenses have been shattered. Oil depots are burning. Entire logistical arteries have been bled dry. And as we create this video, the power is still out in large parts of Crimea, and there seems to be no end in sight for the rolling blackouts that have been instituted on the peninsula. Ukraine just gave Crimea its darkest day as the crescendo of a brutal series
of attacks that serve to cripple the peninsula. And right now, the Russian occupation of Crimea is in absolutely terrible shape. The Commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, Robert Brovdi, has already delivered a warning to the Crimean occupiers in the wake of all of these attacks, "Moscow will go down in Crimea. The SBS 'birds' will keep doing their part," Brovdi roared in a Telegram post on June 23. And that was before the power was cut in Sevastopol, so the Russians in Crimea know that he's serious. Frankly, they must be wondering how it could get
any worse from here. They're already dealing with blackouts and the almost daily appearance of yet more Ukrainian drones in their skies. And on top of all of that, Ukraine's isolation strategy is starving the peninsula off from everything else. Take fuel, for example. Ukraine isn't hitting oil depots and fuel trucks for no reason. Every time Russian oil burns, Crimea is plunged deeper into a fuel crisis that has already swept the peninsula. At around the same time that Ukraine was engaged in its flurry of strikes, the Crimean authorities imposed
sweeping fuel sale bans to civilians, as the dwindling supply of fuel on the peninsula is being reserved for emergency services and the Russian military. The Russian-installed leader of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, instituted the ban on fuel sales, first in Sevastopol, and then the rest of Crimea. There is still fuel reaching the peninsula. As one frustrated motorist told the BBC, "There's petrol at the filling station, but they're not selling it. Apparently, it was delivered during the night, and during the day they were supposed to start selling it as usual, but after Aksyonov's decree,
they shut everything down." But what this tells us is that there is not enough fuel coming into Crimea. It is now being rationed. And the average person on the peninsula is the one losing out. Any work that involves driving has become practically impossible, and what is supposed to be one of the most attractive vacation destinations for Russians on the mainland has been turned into a no-go zone. Tour bookings have already fallen by 58% over the two weeks up to June 22, The New Voice of Ukraine reports, and it's only going to get worse for one of Crimea's chief sources of income.
Rail and transport disruption has also wracked the peninsula, the Kyiv Post reports. The peninsula's main rail operator, Grand Service Express, has already announced that all Tavria trains that leave Crimea would now only originate from Kerch, with all arriving trains terminating there. Anybody who wants to go deeper into the peninsula has to catch a bus. Public transport hours have been shortened, and shopping centers have restricted their opening hours. Not that visiting a supermarket does much good. On June 9, TVP World reported that Ukrainian authorities are
reporting food shortages, as Ukraine's attacks on logistics serving Crimea take their toll. We also can't help but wonder how long the trains will be running in Kerch, now that Ukraine has made it clear that it's going to hit that region hard and repeatedly. There are also stranger signs that Ukraine's isolation strategy for Crimea is working. For instance, Aksyonov has announced that all children's camps will be suspended until at least September 1, reportedly due to fear of Ukrainian strikes. But Ukraine doesn't target civilians. The real
reason for the suspension is that the fuel crisis spreading throughout Crimea has turned the buses that transport kids to these camps into luxuries that Crimea can no longer afford. Crimea has also instituted a nighttime ban on motorcycles, mopeds, scooters, pit bikes, ATVs, and similar vehicles. Again, that's supposed to somehow ensure public safety, as the noise the bikes make interferes with the work of air defense teams that are trying to tackle Ukraine's never-ending swarms of drones. And here's the craziest sign of Ukraine's success in Crimea: Air raid sirens have been suspended.
Occupiers now receive text alerts and emergency notifications when the drones come, which isn't a great strategy when rolling blackouts are making phone charging difficult. Oleg Kryuchkov, who is the advisor to Aksyonov, says that using air raid sirens would create a madhouse on the peninsula. Why? Because they would be sounding for 22 hours per day, including seven or eight times at night, making it impossible for the occupiers to live what remains of the lives they've tried to build on the peninsula. It comes to something when Ukraine's drone attacks are so constant and
successful that they've created a situation where air raid sirens are no longer used because they'd be blaring at all hours of the day. The Ukrainian noose is tightening around the Crimean neck. What we're seeing here is a blockade like no other. Surrounding territory to prevent supplies from getting in or out is hardly a new strategy. It has been used by militaries for millennia. But the way that Ukraine is doing it has never been seen before. Drones, in their thousands, are crippling Crimean logistics and leaving the peninsula a sitting duck for strikes that
Ukraine now appears to be able to carry out at will. Ukraine set all of this up by methodically weakening Crimea's air defenses throughout 2025 as it developed the middle-strike drone technology that enables the middle-range strikes that are now targeting Russia's logistical arteries that serve Crimea. We're now seeing the culmination of all of that hard work. On June 24, Ukraine gave occupied Crimea the darkest day in its 12-year history. In the days leading up to that, it gave Crimea the fieriest days that it has ever experienced. But as Brovdi says, much
more is coming. The dark days are going to become pitch black, as Ukraine's drones fill the skies. And the light will only come back to Crimea when Ukraine's job is done and the isolation strategy results in occupiers abandoning Crimea in droves. Putin's Crimea is over. And there is nothing that he can do to stop it. What was once Putin's prized conquest is being turned into such a strategic liability that it won't be long before Russia has to admit that keeping hold of Crimea is more trouble than it's worth. Ukraine's strategy is genius. Devastating. And you can learn
a lot more about it if you watch our deep dive into how Ukraine is isolating the peninsula and setting up for the derussification to come. And if you enjoyed this video, remember to subscribe to The Military Show as we track Ukraine's strikes on Crimea and the occupied territories.
