Russian missile barrage puts Ukrainian air defenses in check

Kiev, Ukraine – A swarm of drones and a barrage of cruise missiles rocked cities and towns across Ukraine on Thursday, the largest assault in weeks and the latest in a wave of increasingly sophisticated dogfights that put I compare Russia’s evolving tactics with Ukraine’s growing arsenal of air defense weapons.

At dawn in Kyiv, the capital, trails of missiles or anti-aircraft weapons remained in the sky and fragments of intercepted missiles fell on a children’s playground and on private homes.

Russia, the Ukrainian defense ministry said in a statement, had “reserved for the last days of the year one of the most massive missile attacks since the start of the full-scale invasion”.

The air defences Ukrainian companies have sometimes been overwhelmed.

Iranian-made explosive droneswhich Russia began acquiring last summer, were launched in a first wave, ostensibly to bog down air defenses ahead of cruise missile strikes, the Ukrainian air force said.

The Ukrainian Air Force stated that its defense forces had shot down 54 of 69 missiles cruise ships and had also shot down drones.

The attack is likely to prompt further calls from the Ukrainian authorities for more Western air defense systems, as the growing arsenal of advanced weapons sent by Kiev’s allies has failed to stop Moscow’s debilitating attacks on energy infrastructure, which have caused widespread blackouts as the country grapples with freezing winter temperatures.

Following the bombings, the Russian Defense Ministry posted an image on its official channel Telegramthe social messaging app, showing a Kalibr cruise missile and a message:

“The Kalibr will never run out.”

The White House condemned the attacks as part of Russia’s “barbaric war” and vowed to continue helping Ukraine defend itself.

“This is another example of putin’s brutality, attacking Ukraine’s critical infrastructure, which supplies light and heat to Ukrainian civilians,” Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said in a statement, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The new wave of attacks has once again hampered the work of crews trying to fix Ukraine’s electricity grid and has raised the prospect of many Ukrainians going out of power over the New Year holidays.

For three months, Russia has fired barrages of cruise missiles and drones on Ukraine’s energy grid, in what military analysts say is a strategy to plunge the country into cold and darkness to lower morale.

The latest bombing left two dead and four injured, including a 14-year-old girl who was hit by falling debris, according to authorities.

Air defense weapons shot down four of six cruise missiles near Lviv in western Ukraine, but the two that managed to get past the power plants knocked power out of the 90% of the city, as stated by the mayor, Andriy SadovyjIn an interview.

“Putin is using the scenario to demoralize the Ukrainian people,” Sadovyi said.

But Lviv will hold out, he said.

Diesel generators have been turned on in the hospitals so operations could continue, he said, and the city is well stocked with firewood for the emergency heating of shelters.

Amid the barrage, two oblasts – Dnipropetrovsk in central Ukraine and Odessa in the south – have preemptively cut off electricity to limit damage in the event of a short circuit in the grid during a strike, a utility company said in a statement.

In Kiev, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said the attacks cut off electricity to 40% of the capital.

Amidst the chaos in the sky, as missiles and drones approached and Ukraine launched air defense missiles, a Ukrainian S-300 interceptor missile flew towards Belarus and was shot down by the Ukrainian military, the defense ministry said Belarusian.

There was no immediate information about the victims or indications that Belarus, close ally of Russia, will treat the incident as something other than an accident.

In November, an errant Ukrainian air defense missile landed in Poland, killing two and briefly raising fears that the conflict could escalate.

In Ukraine, the attack began when air raid sirens sounded at around 5:30 in the morning.

The Ukrainian army’s southern command said two Russian ships in the Black Sea showed signs of preparing to launch missiles, ringing alarm bells.

As the sun rose, reports of attacks poured in from cities across the country, and seven or eight explosions went off in Kiev.

One of them tripped the windows and car alarms in the city centre.

Leonid Fatkulin, 79, was in bed on the first floor of his two-story brick house in a suburb when the missiles hit.

“I was about to get up to shave when the explosion shook the house,” he said.

A pipeline caught fire.

“It’s not a war,” said Fatkulin, standing by the remains of his house, wearing a coat over his bathrobe.

“It’s a crime against humanity.”

In Kiev, Klitschko said on messaging app Telegram that Ukrainian air defenses had been shot down 16 missilesabove the city, but the falling debris injured three people, including the teenager.

The Ukrainian General Staff headquarters said in a statement that Russia had fired 13 Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones at Kharkiv’s energy infrastructure and air defense systems had shot down all but two of them.

Five more Shahed drones were shot down around the southeastern Ukrainian city of Dnipro, according to the military.

The cruise missiles were launched after the Ukrainian Air Defense Forces fired on the drones.

The Russian military has launched the missiles from various directions, firing from planes and ships at sea, according to the air force statement.

But Ukraine is now able to fight back with a growing and increasingly sophisticated arsenal of air defense weapons.

The Pentagon has delivered the first two of the nation’s eight advanced surface-to-air missile systems, featuring radar-guided missiles capable of targeting drones and cruise missiles. Germany has supplied the first of four state-of-the-art Iris-T systems so new they have never been used on the battlefield, while France and the Holland they also promised more air defense missiles.

During his visit to Washington last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was offered a battery of Patriot missiles, the most advanced US land-based missile defense system.

But it is likely to be several months before Ukrainian crews are trained and deployed.

Ukraine’s air defense capability was one of the surprise successes of the war, as improved coordination between early warning systems and ground units tasked with shooting down rockets helped Kiev forces stop a wide percentage of Russian attacks.

But Russian barrages are often so overwhelming — according to Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, about 75 missiles are fired in a typical barrage — that many of them get inside.

And Russia appears to have more weapons in its arsenal, due in part to the growing supply of explosive drones from Iran.

And even successful takedowns come with risks as debris of silvery, twisted metal rains down on cities.

On Thursday, two fragments fell into a children’s playground in Kiev’s Pechersk district.

“It was the first time it happened this close to us,” said Galina Khomina, a graphic designer who was pushing her 3-year-old daughter, Nastya, on a park swing just hours after the attacks.

He said he couldn’t stay home out of fear, despite being so close to it.

“Let’s hope it ends soon,” Khomina said.

“We are used to it and we are not afraid. Life goes on. You only have one life.”

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