Burning $200M To Kill 5 Ukrainian Civilians: A Snapshot Of The Doomed Economics Of Russia's Invasion

[RainCaster]

A great opinion piece that tells a very positive story about Putin's war time economics. No paywall at the link.
https://abovethelaw.com/2025/10/burning-200m-to-kill-5-ukrainian-civilians-a-snapshot-of-the-doomed-economics-of-russias-invasion/

Russia’s misuse of its military resources was on full display during its recent bombardment of Lviv. Five people were killed — four of these innocent victims were a whole family whose house was flattened — with terrorism being the only apparent purpose of the attack. Yet, the people of Lviv were not at all terrorized. The bombing took place early in the morning on a Sunday. By that afternoon, there were more people sitting out convivially on the sidewalk patios of Lviv’s numerous cafes and bars than there had been the previous day. That night, an impromptu street dance sprang up in a historic Old Town square. Nobody was cowed.

Russia spent at least $200 million to accomplish nothing beyond murdering five noncombatants. According to the governor of the Lviv region, Maksym Kozytskyi, the Russians struck Lviv with 140 Shahed kamikaze drones and about two dozen cruise missiles. Earlier versions of the Shahed drones imported by Russia were significantly more expensive, but now that Russia is increasingly producing them domestically, costs have fallen to an estimated $70,000 per unit. That’s still almost $10 million worth of drones alone.

Ten million dollars spent on drones is a pittance compared to the cost of the cruise missiles. Although Ukrainian authorities did not delineate the exact number of each type of missile that was fired into Lviv, we do know some of them were Kalibr cruise missiles launched from the Black Sea (cost: $6.5 million apiece), at least one was a Kh-101 cruise missile ($13 million) and some were Kinzhal air-launched ballistic missiles (with a whopping sticker price of $15 million per unit). Even if you assume that the majority of the missiles were of the cheapest variety, Russia was well past $200 million spent on military hardware alone in this bombing, to say nothing of all the other costs like fuel and personnel.

[Kaleva]

1. Canada has a larger economy than Russia has