2023-12-08 18:40:00
An operation in the heart of Russia and some 4,500 kilometers from the Ukrainian border. On the night of November 29 to 30, then that of November 30 to December 1, the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) allegedly managed to blow up two sections of railway tracks as trains passed in Buryatia, a region located in the Extreme -Russian East, according to a source within Ukrainian law enforcement interviewed by Agence France-Presse.
This railway provides the link between Russia and China. This is also where North Korean military aid is delivered. Ukrainian agents have thus succeeded in penetrating deep into Russian territory. A spectacular operation, but which should not have much effect.
Two railway tracks destroyed
Wednesday, November 29, in the Russian night, impressive flames rose above the trees in the Buratia region. Several videos taken on the evening of November 29 film the first moments after what could be an SBU sabotage operation. Another video shows several tank cars stopped, some with their sides blackened by what appears to be a fire, while on the ground hundreds of small fires illuminate the scene.
According to the AFP source, four explosive devices were detonated during the passage of a convoy of petroleum products in the Bessolov tunnel in Severomouisk, the longest in Russia. This axis connects China and Russia. More recently, it is through this route that North Korean munitions were delivered.
Yesterday, Russian media began reporting that a train carrying fuel caught fire while moving in the Severomuysky tunnel in Buryatia.
In the evening of the same day, Russian media again reported that a train caught fire in the Severomuysky tunnel. The train caught fire on the… pic.twitter.com/sdjX0l7DSr
— Special Kherson Cat ������ (@bayraktar_1love) December 1, 2023
The next day, a second sabotage operation targeted a section of the railway line to which traffic had been diverted, at the time when a convoy “passed over a 35 meter high bridge”, said the same source. On Thursday, the Russian security services (FSB) announced in a press release the arrest of a Belarusian national, accused of having committed these two attacks on behalf of Ukraine.
“Technically, blowing up a track is not complicated,” analyzes Olivier Mas, former DGSE executive, who runs the YouTube channel Talk with a spy. “All it takes is a few pieces of plastic [un explosif très stable, malléable comme de la pâte à modeler, NDLR] to damage a track. On the other hand, the infiltration phase [la présence d’agents ukrainiens sur le territoire russe, NDLR] is more complicated,” he adds.
For Thibault Fouillet, scientific director of the Institute for Strategy and Defense Studies (IESD), these sabotages, if they are indeed the work of the SBU, show its “capacity for projection in very isolated areas”, with a “partisan war” type process.
A “symbolic and political blow above all”
If the Russian Army is highly mechanized due to the Soviet heritage, it nevertheless remains strongly linked to rail transport for its logistics, due to a lack of large numbers of trucks. Thus, Russia relies on ten railway brigades. “They specialize in security, construction and repair of railways, while rolling stock is supplied by state civil companies,” explained the specialist site War on the Rocks in a 2021 article.
Sabotage of the two routes in Buryatia could disrupt supplies for “a few days or several months”, but “it is above all a symbolic and political blow”, estimates Thibault Fouillet. “We don’t know the extent of the damage, or how many munitions North Korea has already delivered. » Since the start of the war in February 2022, the Russian railway network, the second largest in the world with 86,000 km of tracks, has been the target of several acts of sabotage, the origin of which often remains unknown. Impossible to monitor all the routes, as Olivier Mas summarizes: “It is by definition a soft target, that is to say one which will not be defended everywhere and all the time, unlike military sites . »
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