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Live from Lviv
Updates on the war in Ukraine
This week saw three major twists in Putin’s war to forcibly reassemble the Russian empire/stay in power.
One was another successful attack on Russia’s second biggest refinery near St. Petersburg. Ukranian attacks on refining capacity is a particular vulnerability for Russia in several ways. First, in attacking refining rather than production it is less disruptive to global supply and hence doesn’t increase crude oil costs and inadvertently help petro-autocracies. Second, severely diminishing refinery infrastructure reduces Russian oil exports and profitability. Third, the reduced capacity creates logistical difficulties for the Russian forces in Ukraine, and lastly, the diversion of resources to protect and repair the refineries is having a seriously negative effect on the Russian economy and war effort.
The second was a shocking yet surprisingly ineffective attack on Lviv, Ukraine’s “safe” city in the far west of the country. Lviv is close to the Polish border and thus NATO. It is also a large, cosmopolitan city with a rich culture. Up until now, Lviv was largely untouched by Russia for a variety of reasons and thus served as a haven for internally displaced Ukrainians, visiting journalists, aid workers, even orphaned pets from around the country. With no commercial flights and hostile borders on three sides, Lviv…
