In the ongoing war against Ukraine, Russia has continued to launch large-scale aerial assaults, including a record 614 drones and missiles in a single attack as recently as August 2025. However, beneath these headline-grabbing barrages lies a stark reality: Russia’s missile production capabilities are in a state of collapse, crippled by Western sanctions, Ukrainian deep strikes and economic pressures.
This degradation not only limits the quantity and quality of missiles available but also renders effective strikes increasingly impossible, as Ukrainian defenses intercept the majority, and Russia’s reliance on outdated or foreign-sourced alternatives undermines precision and impact.
Before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia, according to Kremlin propaganda, boasted one of the world’s largest stockpiles of advanced missiles, including cruise missiles like the Kh-101 and ballistic systems such as the Iskander. Production was supported by a vast military-industrial complex (OPK) inherited from the Soviet era, capable of churning out sophisticated weaponry.
However, even then, vulnerabilities existed: heavy dependence on imported components for guidance systems, electronics, and microchips from Western and Asian suppliers. By 2025, these weaknesses have been exacerbated, transforming what was once a formidable arsenal into a patchwork of improvised solutions.
Intelligence from Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Agency (GUR) highlights specific failures, such as Russia’s inability to meet production goals for the Kh-59 air-to-surface missile due to sanctions-induced component shortages. Production rates for air-launched cruise missiles have plummeted to 5-10 per month, far below pre-war levels and insufficient to sustain previous launch tempos. This shortfall has forced Russia to ration strikes, with bomber-launched cruise missile attacks dropping 42% from an average of 33 per month in April-May 2025 to just 19 in June-July 2025.
International sanctions, imposed by the U.S., EU and allies since 2022 and intensified in 2025, have targeted Russia’s access to critical technologies, leading to a sharp decline in industrial imports essential for missile manufacturing.
Imports fell from $10.5 billion in 2023 to $7.4 billion in 2024, with electronic components from the U.S., Europe, Japan and South Korea dropping 17-fold. China, once a key supplier, has reduced exports in previous volumes, forcing Russia to rely on convoluted supply chains through countries like Turkey, Kazakhstan, India and even Gabon and Haiti.
These restrictions have degraded the OPK’s capacity to produce modern missiles. For instance, the Kh-101 requires 138 military-grade components, many from U.S., Taiwanese, Japanese, Dutch, and Chinese firms – now largely inaccessible due to bans like Taiwan’s on dual-use exports.
As a result, Russia has shifted to producing higher quantities of less sophisticated weapons, such as artillery shells and glide bombs, while retrofitting older systems. Quality has suffered: refurbished tanks and missiles are often unfit for their intended roles, with hit rates for systems like Shahed drones falling to just 3% between August 2024 and March 2025. Sanctions have also created shortages of CNC machines, industrial lubricants and microelectronics, reducing overall production reliability and output.
This “innovation stagnation” means Russia is regressing to Soviet-era designs, unable to modernize due to dependency on third-party suppliers and failed import substitution efforts. By 2025, while Russia can still produce “good enough” systems to threaten Ukraine in the short term, it lags far behind Western and Chinese technological advances, with projections indicating simplified and slowed production in the coming years.
Compounding sanctions are Ukraine’s targeted deep strikes on Russian production facilities, which have crippled key nodes in the missile supply chain. In 2025, Ukraine executed coordinated attacks on microchip and electronics plants essential for missile guidance and avionics. Facilities like the Avangard plant in St. Petersburg (producing components for ballistic and cruise missiles), the Bolkhov Semiconductor Device Plant (supplying parts for Iskander and Kinzhal missiles), the Strela plant in Suzemka (microchips for Tor air defense), and the Kremniy El plant in Bryansk (components for Pantsir and Iskander systems) were hit, causing fires, structural destruction and production halts.
Satellite imagery confirmed the Strela plant’s near-total demolition, requiring full rebuilding. Additional strikes targeted missile plants in Tula, Izhevsk, Nizhny Novgorod and a helium facility in Orenburg, disrupting onboard computers and other critical elements.
Operation “Spiderweb”, a Ukrainian drone campaign, destroyed and damaged 41 aircraft, including a third of Russia’s strategic bombers like the Tu-95 and Tu-160M – irreplaceable since Russia no longer produces these models. This has created a launch bottleneck, relocating surviving bombers to distant airfields and reducing strike frequency.
These operations have forced Russia toward lower-tech alternatives, diminishing weapon effectiveness and increasing frontline losses. Ukrainian intelligence reports that such strikes, combined with sanctions, have stopped Russia’s fulfillment of state orders for missiles like the Kh-59.
Russia’s faltering economy in 2025 further erodes missile production sustainability. Oil revenues, a lifeline for military spending, have slumped by a third due to prices dropping to around $60 per barrel from $100 at the war’s start, driven by weak global demand and a strong ruble. This has widened the budget deficit to its largest in over three decades, with high inflation and interest rates straining resources. Despite record military expenditures, these fiscal woes limit investments in production, exacerbating shortages.
Russia’s increasing reliance on allies like North Korea (supplying 100 ballistic missiles) and Iran (providing drones and missiles) highlights domestic failures, but this creates vulnerabilities, including potential obligations that could aid their nuclear programs. Belarus is ramping up component production for Russia, but this underscores Moscow’s inability to self-sustain.
Even when Russia launches missiles, effectiveness is minimal. Ukrainian air defenses intercept the majority, with systems like the KN-23 and Shahed proving unreliable. Strikes often target civilians rather than military objectives, causing 13,883 deaths and 35,548 injuries from 2022 to July 2025, but yielding little strategic gain. Russia’s shift to drones – launching a record 6,297 in July 2025 – reflects missile shortages, but drones are less lethal and more susceptible to electronic warfare.
Russia is not able to interdict Ukrainian forces effectively, resorting to punishment strategies against fixed targets. With production degraded and unsustainable, sustained effective strikes are impossible without major geopolitical shifts, such as eased sanctions or new alliances – prospects dimmed by ongoing pressures.
In summary, Russia’s missile production is collapsing under the weight of sanctions, strikes and economic strain, rendering its strikes increasingly symbolic rather than decisive. As of August 2025, this trajectory points to a prolonged erosion of Moscow’s military edge.