For the second time in two days, a bridge in Kyiv has come under Russian attack. On Saturday, Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported on Telegram that the North Bridge had been struck, writing that emergency crews were rushing to the scene and that traffic between the river's left and right banks had come to a halt. It was a grim echo of Thursday's strike on the city's Southern Bridge, where passengers on a passing train described dust from the blast forcing its way into their carriage through the ventilation system. The pattern points to something broader than a single night of bombardment.

After Friday's emergency meeting of Kyiv's defence council, Klitschko described the capital as facing a "very dramatic situation," with Russian forces targeting not just military sites but the infrastructure that keeps a city running: bridges, power lines, housing, transport links. Metro services were suspended following the Southern Bridge strike, and although road traffic eventually resumed, similar disruptions returned on Friday after further attacks. For residents, the disruption is becoming routine, which is itself remarkable. Moscow, for its part, frames these strikes as retaliation, with President Vladimir Putin insisting Russia is merely responding to Ukrainian attacks on Russian energy facilities.

Yet this account omits that it was Russia which first struck such infrastructure targets in Ukraine, a sequence that Kyiv and its Western allies have been quick to point out. The dispute over who started the infrastructure war matters less to commuters than the practical question of whether the next bridge they cross will still be standing. What is emerging, across two continents' worth of diplomatic wrangling in Washington, Brussels and Moscow, is a war increasingly fought over the unglamorous arteries of daily life rather than front lines alone.