What did Ukraine's choices around 1 July 2025 signal?
A look back at a period of heavy Russian air attacks, a Ukrainian drone strike inside Russia and a decision on landmines.
What was Ukraine weighing as it entered July? On 1 July 2025, a Ukrainian SBU drone attack hit a military factory in Izhevsk, Russia, that produced Tor surface-to-air missile systems. Three people were killed and 45 injured. Aleksandr Brechalov, Head of the Udmurt Republic, later declared a state of emergency.
The pressure from the air
Two days earlier, on 29 June 2025, Russian forces had launched more than 500 drones and missiles at Ukraine, targeting critical infrastructure and injuring at least 12 people. Ukraine said it was the largest Russian air attack on the country since the start of the war.
The target set was familiar. Russian strikes on energy had been under way since 2022, and later accounts describe the country as having only a third of its pre-war electricity generating capacity by mid-2024, with some gas distribution and district heating also hit. Strikes on power infrastructure are considered a war crime.
Two kinds of answer
The Izhevsk attack showed one response: reaching a factory making air-defence systems deep inside Russia. The plant's output, Tor surface-to-air missile systems, is the kind of equipment relevant to the air war described above, though the reports of the day drew no direct link.
The other response was legal and political. On 29 June 2025, President Zelensky signed a decree withdrawing Ukraine from the Ottawa Convention on anti-personnel mines.
Reading the moment
Taken together, the three events show a country under the largest air assault of the war while using both military and legal instruments. The drone strike and the decree on mines were separate decisions, and neither was presented at the time as a response to the other. What they share is the setting: a state adjusting its tools after a record bombardment.
