Vladimir Putin has threatened to strike Kyiv with Oreshnik missiles, an intermediate-range weapon that Moscow used against the city of Dnipro last week and that Putin has claimed cannot be shot down by any air defence system.
“We do not rule out the use of Oreshnik against the military, military-industrial facilities or decision-making centres, including in Kyiv,” Putin said at a press conference in Kazakhstan on Thursday. He said the weapon was “comparable in strength to a nuclear strike” if used several times on one location, though he added that it was not currently fitted with nuclear warheads.
“The kinetic impact is powerful, like a meteorite falling,” Putin said. “We know in history what meteorites have fallen where, and what the consequences were. Sometimes it was enough for whole lakes to form.”
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, accused Russia of a “despicable escalation”.
Moscow has said the new threats are a response to a decision earlier this month by the US, Britain and France to allow Ukraine to fire long-range missiles provided by them against military targets inside Russia, something Kyiv had long requested.
Kyiv is better protected than most other Ukrainian cities by air defence batteries, and there have been few successful strikes on the centre of the capital during almost three years of war. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the Ukrainian president described Putin’s claim that air defence systems could not take out Oreshnik missiles as “fiction, of course”.
“Putin doesn’t understand military stuff. He’s a guy that people come and show him some cartoon about how the missile will fly, how nobody will be able to shoot it down. He said the same thing many times about their Kinzhal missile. And then when it turned out that Patriot [air defence systems], even the not-the-latest-generation systems, can comfortably shoot it down, he stopped talking about it,” Podolyak said.
Podolyak also said there was “no such thing” as Oreshnik and that the missile was simply a lightly modified version of existing Russian intercontinental ballistic missiles. “The man has just come up with a name, just an abstract name,” he said.
Nonetheless, the threats have caused alarm in Kyiv, causing a sitting of parliament scheduled for last Friday to be cancelled.
Russian state media outlets have been triumphantly touting the Oreshnik as a great achievement and there are even reports of parents naming their children after the missile.
Putin, when asked to clarify whether he was talking about striking military or political targets in Kyiv, and whether he planned to hit them with Oreshnik missiles, responded with what he said was a Soviet joke about the weather forecast: “Today, during the course of the day, everything is possible.”
Although the new threats will cause concern, many analysts believe that after using the weapon once as a demonstration, Putin is unlikely to escalate further before Donald Trump takes office in the US, instead hoping to use a window of opportunity to win Trump’s favour.
Putin praised Trump as “intelligent” on Thursday, in comments apparently designed to make a positive impression on the president-elect. He said he had been shocked by the assassination attempt on Trump during the campaign.
“In my opinion, he is not safe now,” Putin said. “Unfortunately, in the history of the United States, various incidents have happened. I think he [Trump] is intelligent and I hope he’s cautious and understands this.”
He suggested Joe Biden’s decision to allow the use of long-range weapons could either be a ploy to help Trump by giving him a future bargaining chip or an attempt to make Trump’s relations with Russia more difficult. Either way, he said, Trump would “find the solution” to the Ukraine war, and he claimed Moscow was ready for dialogue.
Early on Thursday morning, Russia again targeted Ukraine with missiles and drones, focusing on the country’s energy infrastructure and leaving more than 1 million households without power, according to reports from Ukrainian officials.
Moscow has frequently targeted Ukraine’s power grid and the country is expected to struggle to cope with demand during the winter, particularly if the attacks continue. About half of Ukraine’s energy capacity has been destroyed over the past three years, and in recent weeks Ukrainian officials have suggested Russia may be stockpiling missiles in order to launch coordinated strikes on the power infrastructure and make winter miserable for millions.
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On Thursday Biden said Russia’s latest attack on Ukraine showed the urgency of backing Kyiv.
“This attack is outrageous and serves as yet another reminder of the urgency and importance of supporting the Ukrainian people in their defence against Russian aggression,” Biden said.
“On this day, my message to the Ukrainian people is clear: the United States stands with you,” added Biden, who has tried to shore up US support for Ukraine in his final weeks in the White House.
There is a growing awareness in Kyiv that exhaustion after nearly three years of full-scale war combined with the arrival of the Trump administration means there will be pressure to begin some kind of talks with the Russians. But there is no sign that Russia is ready to negotiate yet or that it would be willing to discuss ceasefire terms that are not humiliating for Ukraine.
Podolyak said: “Even people who say they are ready for negotiations understand that they are only possible if we force Russia to the table. Negotiations through strength, not through capitulation.”
On Wednesday, Trump named the retired army general Keith Kellogg as his envoy for Russia and Ukraine. Trump has promised to bring about a negotiated end to the war and officials in Kyiv have been watching anxiously to see what appointments he makes.
There will be reassurance over the appointment of Kellogg, 80, who has not espoused the pro-Russia rhetoric common to some in Trump’s orbit and has previously talked about a plan to leverage military aid by increasing it while pushing for peace talks.
During regular appearances on US television, Kellogg has criticised Russia’s invasion and warned that the conflict could escalate into a global conflagration. He has also made it clear that Ukraine will have little choice but to negotiate, even if it is not clear what security guarantees Kyiv could obtain that would ensure Russia would be held to any ceasefire deal.
“If Ukraine doesn’t want to negotiate, fine, but then accept the fact that you can have enormous losses in your cities and accept the fact that you will have your children killed, accept the fact that you don’t have 130,000 dead, you will have 230,000 [to] 250,000,” Kellogg told Voice of America at the Republican party convention in July.
