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Dan Rice, a former special adviser to the commander of Ukraine’s armed forces, has been blunt about one simple truth of modern warfare: when a regime can no longer keep its people warm and fed, its legitimacy crumbles. His long experience inside Kyiv’s military decision-making gives weight to the argument that sustained strikes on energy infrastructure are not merely tactical blows, but strategic pressure on Vladimir Putin’s social compact.
Over the past year Ukraine’s forces have dramatically expanded long-range strikes against Russian energy and industrial sites, moving the battlefield deeper into Russia’s logistical heartland. Independent analysts from the Institute for the Study of War document a steady increase in the volume, range, and intensity of these attacks, which target refineries, pipelines, and power hubs that keep Russia’s cities and war machine running. Those strikes are no accident; they are a campaign designed to degrade Moscow’s ability to project force and sustain itself through winter.
Reports also indicate that Western intelligence has played a role in enabling Ukraine’s deep-strike campaign, providing targeting and mission planning that help one-way drones and missiles evade Russian air defenses. Major outlets have reported U.S. intelligence support to Kyiv on energy targets, a sober reminder that this proxy phase of the conflict has American involvement beyond mere rhetoric. For conservatives who believe in confronting aggression, this is a hard-nosed application of pressure on the adversary rather than open-ended boots on the ground.
The effect on Russia’s refining capacity and fuel distribution has been measurable and worrying for the Kremlin. Recent assessments show losses to refining throughput and prolonged outages at top facilities, producing real shortages and price spikes that ordinary Russians now feel at the pump and in dimly lit homes. When citizens see the state fail to provide basic utilities during cold months, political loyalty becomes transactional — and that fragility can be exploited without resorting to reckless escalation.
From a conservative standpoint this is a vindication of strong, focused pressure on our enemies rather than appeasement or faint moralizing. The choice politics in Washington faces is stark: either back a strategy that degrades an aggression-prone adversary’s capacity to wage war, or accept a long, grinding conflict that bleeds allies dry and emboldens dictators. Those who worry about escalation should remember that restraint that simply preserves the status quo only rewards aggression in the long run.
Policymakers must pair this pressure with clear objectives and iron discipline: prioritize the weapons and intelligence that reliably achieve strategic effects, insist on accountability for how American aid is used, and keep the diplomatic endgame in sight. Quantitative analyses from think tanks show that kinetic strikes on energy infrastructure are a deliberate, measurable strategy — one that can yield political outcomes if coupled with sustained international resolve. If the West wants peace without capitulation, it should double down on the tools that are already producing results while demanding transparent, achievable goals from its leaders.
