Understanding the conflict one year on.
It was a nightmare scenario that Ukrainian and Western officials had feared for months. Western officials have watched as Russia stacked up precision-guided munitions to launch targeted attacks on Ukrainian critical infrastructure in the winter while keeping up the pace of strikes on cities using unguided “dumb” bombs.
It was a nightmare scenario that Ukrainian and Western officials had feared for months. Western officials have watched as Russia stacked up precision-guided munitions to launch targeted attacks on Ukrainian critical infrastructure in the winter while keeping up the pace of strikes on cities using unguided “dumb” bombs.
And on Friday morning, it became a reality. Russia conducted a hailstorm of strikes across Ukraine, hitting Kyiv, Dnipro, Lviv, Zaporizhzhia, Odesa, and Kharkiv. There were at least 158 drone and missile strikes in all, which damaged hospitals, a shopping mall, and schools, killing at least 31 people and injuring more than 160.
The numbers are still going up as search and rescue teams pick through the rubble. Russia fired its missiles with so much abandon that the Polish government confirmed one of the Kremlin’s projectiles entered its airspace. In the chaos that engulfed the Kyiv streets, one man tried to stop the fires from spreading by driving his burning car away from his neighbors.
The renewed barrages have Ukrainian officials and U.S. experts questioning how long they’ll be able to keep the lights on during winter—or hold territory—especially with the long tail of U.S. military aid running out, unless Congress acts soon.
Ukrainian officials believe that Russia’s capacity to strike is even greater than what it just showed off: The Kremlin can fire off about 300 Iranian-made suicide drones in one attack on Ukraine and about 150 ballistic missiles in one shot on Kyiv, said Sasha Ustinova, a Ukrainian lawmaker.
And with the Ukrainian counteroffensive stalled and fresh weapons not flowing until January at the........