What is the Russian Air Force called and how is it structured?: Since 2015 it is called the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS), merging the Air Force with Aerospace Defence. It covers combat aircraft, strategic bombers, transport aviation, and air-defence missile systems.Source: Russian Ministry of Defence
How have Ukrainian drone strikes on refineries affected the Russian Air Force?: By disrupting roughly 25% of Russia's central refining capacity by May 2026, including the Syzran refinery which directly fuels Russian Air Force units, Ukraine's campaign cuts jet fuel availability and forces the military to source fuel from more distant eastern refineries.Source: Reuters / Lowdown
How many aircraft has Russia lost in Ukraine?: Confirmed losses since 2022 include several hundred fixed-wing airframes; Ukraine and Western open-source trackers estimate higher totals, though exact counts are disputed due to Russian operational secrecy.Source: Oryx / open-source trackers

Background

The Russian Air Force (Vozdushno-kosmicheskiye sily, or VKS, officially the Aerospace Forces since 2015) is the aviation and air-defence branch of the Russian Armed Forces, comprising tactical combat aircraft, strategic bombers, transport aviation, and air-defence missile forces. It was reformed in 2015 by merging the Air Force with the Aerospace Defence Forces under a unified command. Russia's pre-war fleet included approximately 1,500 fixed-wing combat aircraft and 400 military helicopters; confirmed losses in Ukraine since 2022 include several hundred airframes across all categories.

In the Ukraine war the Russian Air Force has conducted strategic bombardment of Ukrainian cities and Energy infrastructure, deployed Shahed-type drones sourced from Iran, and adapted to sustained attrition by increasingly relying on stand-off weapons including Cruise Missiles and UAVs to avoid Ukrainian MANPADs and air-defence systems. Ukraine's drone campaign against Russian refineries has created a direct fuel logistics constraint: the Syzran refinery in Samara Oblast, which supplies jet fuel and diesel to Russian Air Force units across central and southern Russia, was struck on 21 May 2026 and shut down on 25 May.

By 20 May 2026, Ukrainian strikes had halted or reduced operations at nearly all major central Russian refineries, affecting approximately 83 million tonnes per year of capacity, roughly 25% of Russian total refining, with gasoline output down 30% and diesel down 25%. This forces the Russian Air Force to compete with civilian demand for a reduced domestic refined-product pool and to source kerosene from more distant eastern production areas, compounding logistics costs at a moment when attrition and territorial losses are already straining operational tempo.

How the World Sees Them

Russia

The VKS is presented domestically as conducting precision strikes; publicly the Kremlin attributes losses to Ukrainian provocations rather than structural capability gaps.

Ukraine

Kyiv targets Russian refinery fuel supply as a way to constrain Air Force sortie rates and degrade strategic bombing capability without direct air-to-air engagement.

Western allies

NATO intelligence tracks VKS attrition and adaptation; the refinery strike campaign is seen as a cost-effective way to impose operational limits on Russian air power.