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By John Feng and Shane Croucher
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China urged all parties involved in the Russia-Ukraine war to cool down the conflict in response to Kyiv's stunning Operation Spiderweb against Russian airfields, which destroyed a number of Moscow's strategic nuclear bombers deep inside Russia.
The operation has been dubbed "Russia's Pearl Harbor" because of its shock value and significance. Ukraine said it hit 41 aircraft in total, causing an estimated $7 billion of damage, in a major material and psychological blow to Russian security.
Russia and China have deepened their strategic partnership over the course of Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. Beijing has supported Russia's war economy through large-scale oil purchases after Western allies imposed tough sanctions over the invasion.
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Asked by Newsweek about the recent Ukrainian operation, Liu Pengyu, spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Washington, DC, said China's position is "consistent and clear".
"It calls on all parties to abide by the 'three principles' for cooling down the situation, namely, no spillover of the battlefield, no escalation of the conflict and no fanning the flames," the spokesperson said.
"China will continue to maintain communication with the international community and play a constructive role in promoting the political settlement of the crisis."
Ukraine's Operation Spiderweb
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Ukraine on June 1 launched 117 individually-operated drones at four airbases across Russia, officials said, in an operation codenamed "Spiderweb".
The head of Ukraine's SBU security service, Lieutenant General Vasyl Malyuk, said that among the aircraft hit were Tu-95 and Tu-22 strategic bombers that Russia has used extensively to fire long-range missiles at Ukraine.
Ukraine also struck an A-50 spy plane, Malyuk said. The A-50 surveillance aircraft is an expensive and scarce asset for Russia, previously targeted by Ukraine.
"Russia has suffered a serious loss in striking power, not just vis-à-vis Ukraine, but also towards NATO as a whole," said Frederik Mertens, a strategic analyst at Dutch research organization, TNO.
Kyiv said it had targeted four airfields "simultaneously," while Russia's Defense Ministry said Ukraine had used first person-view (FPV) drones to target military airfields in five regions—Amur, Irkutsk, Ivanovo, Murmansk and Ryazan.
Moscow acknowledged "several" aircraft had caught fire in the strikes in Murmansk, in northwestern Russia, and Irkutsk, in Siberia.
The SBU did not name Ukrainka, an airbase in the Amur region reportedly hit by drones, as a target. An SBU spokesperson declined to comment when approached for clarification.
Russia has not yet responded, but is expected to do so forcefully.
"We can expect a great deal of sound and fury from Moscow," Keir Giles, from the London-based think tank Chatham House, told Newsweek on Monday.
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