A daring assassination attempt against one of the most protected citadels in the world? A cynical military subterfuge designed to justify a violent response? Or a brazen operation to embarrass a seemingly powerful police state by revealing its vulnerability?
While intelligence analysts and defense experts scrutinize the scant details of the alleged drone attack on the Kremlin Early Wednesday morning, Moscow, Washington and Kiev disagreed over who was to blame and what the target was.
The two small drones with their limited payloads had almost zero chance of killing Russian President Vladimir Putin, known for not sleeping in his official Kremlin offices.
But whether they were operated from Ukraine, or by agents in Kiev, their journey is the most serious penetration into Russia’s – and Moscow’s – supposedly safe airspace since German teenager Mathias Rust landed a small plane nearby. at the adjacent Red Square in 1987.
This has prompted hesitation among some experts to declare this a Russian-led “false flag” potentially aimed at justifying a new escalation in Ukraine. It would be a significant risk, they argued, for Putin to insinuate that his military prowess is misplaced or that one of the country’s most protected sites is vulnerable.
What happened?
Videos posted online and verified by the Financial Times showed two drones flying towards the Kremlin about 16 minutes away in the early hours of Wednesday morning.
The first drone flew in from the west and was filmed exploding against the dome of the Senate Building inside the Kremlin walls at 2:27 am local time, according to the clock tower in the video. The second flew from the east at 2:43 am, exploding near a flagpole atop the same dome which displayed a Russian tricolour. Social media footage showed two people climbing the burning dome when the second attack occurred.
The two drones were small and, from the size of their blasts, appeared to be carrying limited payloads. Moscow said an investigation was underway, leaving only the low-quality videos shared on social media to analysts.
Lt. Gen. Scott Berrier, director of the US Defense Intelligence Agency, said Thursday the drones do not appear to be of the size of weapons that could cause significant damage to the Kremlin. Based on photos and videos he had seen, Berrier said the drones potentially required the controller to be in relatively close line of sight.
About 10 hours after the incidents, the Kremlin issued a statement accusing Ukraine of what it called a “terrorist attack” and an “attempted assassination,” swearing punishment of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in response.
The next day, Thursday, Putin’s administration switched to blaming Washingtonaccusing the United States of dictating the Ukrainian attack “from across the ocean”.
Both Kyiv and Washington have categorically denied involvement.
How was it done?
Were this a Ukrainian operation, reaching one of the most heavily defended cities in the world and then striking its political heart would demonstrate considerable planning, luck, daring and astonishing capability.
Moscow is surrounded by radar and air defense missile systems, which have been spotted atop government buildings in recent months, including at Russia’s Defense Ministry. The Kremlin is protected by a GPS spoofing system that tricks cell phones and GPS-based navigation systems into believing they are elsewhere.
On Thursday, one day after the attack, GPS spoofing in Moscow appeared to be operating at full capacity. Local residents have reported so many signal diversions in central Moscow that people have struggled to order taxis or locate electric scooters.
The Kremlin also reportedly has two Pantsir air defense systems stationed around it and a Krasukha-4 ground jamming system which is capable of dropping drones from the sky. In addition, Kremlin guards have portable anti-drone weapons, according to a study by Mark Galeotti, a veteran Kremlin observer and defense expert.
Even so, General Valeriy Zaluzhny, head of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, spoke explicitly of the need for Ukraine to probe Russia’s remoteness and its distant “center of gravity,” which allows Russian citizens not to “perceive losses, the failures and, above all, the cost of this war”.
Ukraine has successfully used drones to attack other highly guarded targets inside Russia, including two separate attacks in December on Engels Air Base which is 600km inside the country and hosts Russia’s capable bombers. nuclear.
Even Pantsir air defense systems are no guarantee against drones, as Russia has found in Syria and Libya. Additionally, small drones can be difficult for radar to detect due to their size, low-flying ability, and, in some cases, a non-reflective exterior made from composite materials.
“Ukraine has shown that it can take off-the-shelf products, scale them up and then use them to creative and lethal effect,” said a senior Western defense official. “Ukraine’s previous attacks with unmanned vehicles also show how difficult it can be to defend against these attacks.”
Even so, analysts said the small size of the explosion suggested that, if it was a Ukrainian attack, its purpose was purely symbolic and demonstrative.
The drones used “very small warheads or low-grade, non-military high explosive explosives,” said Justin Bronk, a senior research scientist at the Royal United Services Institute in London. “If it was Ukrainian, it was incongruously poorly aimed and armed to cause actual damage.”
Could Ukraine have done it?
Michael Kofman, director of the Russia studies program at CNA, believed the most likely explanation was that the operation was at the very least orchestrated by Ukraine.
“The simplest explanation is exactly what it sounds like,” he said, aiming to show Russia was vulnerable and diminish the Kremlin’s power.
US intelligence documents leaked online this spring allegedly showed that Ukraine’s GUR military intelligence agency wanted to carry out a series of attacks on Moscow, but was rebuffed by Zelensky. The head of the GUR, Major General Kyrylo Budanov, has a reputation for conducting brazen and sometimes risky operations.
Analysts are divided over whether the drones could have been flown from Ukraine – a journey of some 760km from Kiev – or launched from within Russia.
Ukraine has little or no drone capability that will be able to precisely fly and evade Russian air defenses, especially through the secure area around the Kremlin, said a former European military adviser who recently spent months in Kiev to help evaluate the purchase of military-grade drones.
“It’s an equation of size, speed and accuracy. [Ukraine’s] smaller drones won’t fly that far, larger ones will be detected soon, and neither will be able to fly hundreds of kilometers without loss of accuracy,” the person said.
More likely, the person said, the drones seen in the video were flown from a location near Moscow and traveled fast, consuming fuel and battery, en route to the target. “This doesn’t rule out a Ukrainian operator, but it makes the mission much more complex,” she said.
“It is important to understand that this attack may have been orchestrated not only by a government, but also by a non-state actor,” said Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, a defense think tank in Moscow. . “It is possible that Zelensky was unaware.”
Pukhov pointed to examples in other conflicts where non-state actors like ISIS had been able to assemble strike drones from readily available off-the-shelf parts.
“There are powerful volunteer groups in Ukraine. It may have been a group of fanatics who contributed money,” she said, estimating that it would cost less than a million dollars to prepare such an attack.
Could this be a ‘false flag’?
The Kremlin’s initial response underlined its right to retaliate. This has led some analysts to suggest that the attacks may have been carried out by Russia itself, both to arouse popular anger against Ukraine and to justify a military escalation.
But others say the incident casts a deeply negative light on Russia’s security apparatus and ability to protect itself, a key pillar of Putin’s 23 years in charge of the country. “I have my doubts about a false flag operation because the political damage to Putin is enormous,” said a senior Western diplomat.
Another Western official made comparisons with the Nord Stream explosions in September 2022. These crippled three of the four pipelines under the Baltic Sea from Russia to Germany, but have led to a whirlwind of theories about who was at fault or who stood to gain.
“The whole war is full of false flags,” they said. “Every day there are events all along the front line or in Russian territory where we can’t be sure who did what and why.”
Repeated public denials from Zelenskyy and other top Ukrainian officials were to be expected, Kofman said. “Ukraine has a number of partners who support it in the war. . . Some will rejoice at these types of attacks, others may see them as reckless,” he said. “In past experience, the US administration does not always view attacks in Russia positively.”
Additional reporting by Felicia Schwartz in Washington, Mehul Srivastava in London and Roman Olearchyk in Kiev
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