From Black Sea to Atlantic, Russian oil tankers taken down one by one

Russia’s ability to sustain its war effort increasingly depends on logistics that operate out of sight, across oceans far from the battlefield. The shadow fleet was built to bypass sanctions quietly, relying on distance, ambiguity, and the assumption that enforcement would remain fragmented. That assumption is now eroding as pressure shifts from paperwork and monitoring to physical disruption at sea. What matters is no longer whether Russian oil can find a buyer, but whether it can physically move without being stopped. When enforcement actions begin to overlap across different maritime theaters, distance stops being a shield and turns into a vulnerability. This creates a strategic environment where every voyage carries cumulative risk, and the shadow fleet itself becomes a fragile system rather than a reliable workaround.

‍