Day after day over recent weeks, Ukrainian drones have pummeled giant depots belonging to Wildberries, the country’s biggest online retailer, burning estimated billions of dollars’ worth of merchandise and bringing the war home to the broad public.

The attacks began on a July weekend and have continued for a month, stretching from Moscow and St. Petersburg, to cities in the south, and eastward to the Ural Mountains. The targets weren’t oil refineries, maritime hubs or arms plants hit by other Ukrainian strikes, but warehouses that bring the convenience of online shopping across the breadth of Russia.

Ukraine’s drones have pummeled the giant depots belonging to Wildberries, Russia’s biggest online retailer, burning billions of dollars’ worth of merchandise and bringing the war home to the broad public.

The attacks on about 20 Wildberries facilities have underlined Kyiv’s ability to strike far and wide inside Russia and posed a new challenge to President Vladimir Putin nearly 4½ years into his full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

They have badly shaken the empire built by Tatyana Kim, the country’s richest female entrepreneur, whose fortune has been estimated at $8.1 billion.

  • 🌞 Alexander Daychilde 🌞@lemmy.worldEnglish
    18·
    18 hours ago

    I upvoted you becasue I think it’s respectfully written and a valid thought experiment.

    I think the experiment fails, or has a negative result:

    1. Wildberries specifically had a category for essentially “Buy this and have it sent to the front for our soldiers to use”
    2. They were sending so much stuff that they set up dedicated infrastructure for that purpose
    3. Arguably, this had become a significant segment of their business

    So it’s a matter of degree. This isn’t like an American buying boots and sending them to their soldier somewhere. The scale of operations is wildly different.

    I do think there would also be a contributory factor of “But… but this is us, not them!”, but I think the difference is very clear, and Wilberries is a valid target, whereas Walmart would not be.