The Ukrainian air force reported weapons from all across Moscow’s arsenal, including Geran suicide drones, Iskander ballistic missiles, Kalibr cruise missiles, and Kinzhal hypersonic missiles. Likewise, Ukraine used every air defense system in its arsenal, including missile defense batteries, electronic warfare, mobile fire teams with machine guns, and its new F-16 fighter jets.

Ukraine’s air force reported the death of 32-year-old F-16 pilot Lt. Col. Maksym Ustymenko, who was killed after shooting down several aerial targets.

“While engaging the final target, his aircraft was damaged and began to lose altitude,” the Ukrainian air force said in a statement. “Maksym Ustymenko did everything he could to steer the aircraft away from a populated area but did not manage to eject in time.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky praised his bravery while condemning Russia for its increased drone and missile assaults.

“Moscow will not stop as long as it has the capability to launch massive strikes. Just this week alone, there have been more than 114 missiles, over 1,270 drones, and nearly 1,100 glide bombs. Putin long ago decided he would keep waging war, despite the world’s calls for peace,” he said in a post on Facebook, requesting further U.S. missile defenses.

Despite the large number of drones and missiles used in the assault, Ustymenko was the only death reported.

Ukraine claimed to have shot down or neutralized 475 of the 537 drones and missiles fired, though Ukraine and Russia are known to inflate the effectiveness of their air defense capabilities.

While most air and missile attacks are concentrated on one or a handful of cities, the Sunday strike was notable for hitting targets in nearly every region of the country. Hits were recorded in the Sumy, Dnepropetrovsk, Kharkov, Ivano-Frankivsk, Khmelnytsky, Ternopil, Vinnytsia, Odesa, Zhytomyr, Rivne, Kirovohrad, and Kyiv regions.

Several oil refineries were hit, including facilities near Drohobych, in Lviv Oblast, and Kremenchuk, in Poltava Oblast. Videos posted on Telegram show a large fire near Kremenchuk after the attack.

Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk during Russian drone & missile attack last night.

Fires, explosions visible on the horizon. pic.twitter.com/bD613pG7wo

— Status-6 (Military & Conflict News) (@Archer83Able) June 29, 2025

Other targets included a research university in the city of Smila, in Cherkasy Oblast.

Ukraine has largely been on the defensive since its loss in the Battle of Avdiivka in February 2024. Its primary hope in avoiding defeat is Russia’s economic collapse, an increasingly unlikely assertion illustrated by Moscow’s growing defense manufacturing. The drastically increased strikes indicate that despite unprecedented sanctions, Russia has vastly increased its missile and drone arsenal since the beginning of the war.

June has seen progressively larger drone and missile attacks against Ukraine, with Kyiv’s Operation Spider Web, which used first-person view drones snuck into the country to take out several heavy bombers, seemingly unable to make a significant impact on Russia’s missile capabilities.

A report from Ukraine’s general staff found that in the three months before last August, Russia launched 1,100 drones. The number escalated over the ensuing three months to 818 in August, 1,410 in September, and over 2,000 in October. By May, the number was over 4,000, while 1,451 were launched over the past week. Russia has averaged hundreds of drones and missiles launched every day in June.

Ukrainian Security Service spokesman Artem Dehtiarenko told the BBC that Russia has significantly modified its Geran drones, the Russian version of Iranian Shahed drones, since their debut in the fall of 2022.

“Russian engineers have been tasked with increasing their destructive power in order to maximize devastation and civilian casualties,” he said. “In addition, efforts are being made to make the Geran drones less vulnerable to Ukrainian air defences.”

Part of the Geran’s effectiveness lies in its low cost, which allows Russia to produce thousands for constant use. Ukrainian intelligence believes it produces 200 Gerans per day with a stockpile of over 6,000. Worse yet, the large and constant pace of Russia’s aerial attacks is straining Ukraine’s air defenses to the limit.

Ukraine is completely out of ammunition for its two vital missile defense SAMP/T batteries, the Franco-Italian version of the U.S. Patriot missile defense system, according to sources speaking with Le Monde late last month. It’s almost or completely out of ammunition for its short-range anti-aircraft Crotale system, and its stocks of Patriot missiles have grown wearily thin.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio indicated in May that the United States has no more Patriot missiles to give, while President Donald Trump recently said he would “consider” providing more, though missile defense supplies were further strained by the “12 Day War” between Iran and Israel.

As Russian drones and missiles batter Ukraine’s infrastructure and logistics, its ground forces continue a slow but steady advance across the roughly 750-mile front as part of its summer offensive. Ukrainian Armed Forces commander in chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said recently that Russia had greatly boosted its forces across the front line, increasing its forces around the strategic city of Pokrovsk from roughly 70,000 in December to 110,000 currently. Despite this, he declared Russia’s summer offensive had already begun “fizzling out,” a claim met with skepticism even from some Ukrainian sources.

DeepState, a Ukrainian open-source analyst, said Ukrainian “defenses continue to collapse rapidly, and the enemy is making significant advances … with constant assaults” in the Pokrovsk area.

Russia and Ukraine are constantly innovating their tactics to counter each other, with Russia effectively coordinating its arsenal of FPV drones, glide bombs, and small infantry assault groups in a new “Triple Chokehold” tactic, used to great effect. Ukraine has used its FPV drones and adaptability to increase the effectiveness of its stretched defensive lines, though it’s continually strained by manpower problems.

Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin appears to be as confident as ever in his ability to secure victory in Ukraine.

At the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum on June 20, Putin declared that “all of Ukraine is ours” in theory and that “wherever the foot of a Russian soldier steps is Russian land.”