Drones Hit Residential Areas in Moscow for First Time

[gadje]

I’ll apologize for the Apple News link.

https://apple.news/AetguYN86R-e99cp3GB8eJQ

[SteveG]

Russia says drones lightly damage Moscow buildings before dawn, while Ukraine’s capital bombarded
https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukrain...db7a6b6e3a
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A rare drone attack jolted Moscow early Tuesday, causing only light damage but forcing evacuations as residential buildings were struck in the Russian capital for the first time in the war against Ukraine. The Kremlin, meanwhile, pursued its relentless bombardment of Kyiv with a third assault on the city in 24 hours.

The Russian Defense Ministry said five drones were shot down in Moscow and the systems of three others were jammed, causing them to veer off course. President Vladimir Putin called it a “terrorist” act by Kyiv.

The attack, while causing only what Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said was “insignificant damage” to several buildings, brought the war home to civilians in Russia’s capital.

Two people received treatment for unspecified injuries but did not need hospitalization, he said in a Telegram post, adding that residents of two high-rise buildings damaged in the attack were evacuated.

Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the wider Moscow region, said some of the drones were “shot down on the approach to Moscow.”

Ukraine made no direct comment on the attack, which would be one of its deepest and most daring strikes into Russia since the Kremlin launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than 15 months ago.

Putin said Moscow’s air defense “worked in a satisfactory way,” but added it is “clear that our task is to plug the gaps” in the system.

“The Kyiv regime ... attempts to intimidate Russian citizens and strikes at civilian buildings,” he said at a public event, responding to a question from the head of a Kremlin-allied think tank. “It is, of course, a clear indication of terrorist activity.”

Asked by The Associated Press whether there is high-level concern that the invasion of Ukraine is endangering Russian civilians, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said only that attacks on Russia reinforce the need to prosecute the war.

Russian political analyst Tatiana Stanovaya, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, said the Kremlin’s policy is to play down the attacks.

“You ask, why is Putin behaving like this, does he really not understand and fear the consequences?” she wrote in a Telegram post. “Apparently he isn’t afraid, and everything is built on the idea that has been voiced more than once about a patient people who will understand everything and endure everything.”

Still, the attacks raised questions about the effectiveness of Russia’s air defenses.

A senior Russian lawmaker, Andrei Kartapolov, told Russian business news site RBC that “we have a very big country and there will always be a loophole where the drone can fly around the areas where air defense systems are located.”

Kartapolov said the purpose of the attacks was to unnerve the Russian people. “It’s an intimidation act aimed at the civilian population,” RBC quoted him as saying. “It’s designed to create a wave of panic.”

Moscow residents reported hearing explosions before dawn. Police were seen working at one site of a crashed drone in southwest Moscow. An area near a residential building was fenced off, and police put the drone debris in a cardboard box before carrying it away.

[more at link]

[Ted King]

I'm concerned that these attacks may be coming from a neo-Nazi group of Russians that have probably carried out other attacks in Russia:

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/05/26/...raine-news

A group of fighters aligned with Ukraine, who had participated earlier this week in the most intense fighting inside Russia’s borders since the invasion, gathered the foreign and local press in an undisclosed location on Wednesday to celebrate, to taunt the Kremlin and to show off what they called “military trophies” from their incursion into their native land: Russia.

Their leader, Denis Kapustin, was proud that his force of anti-Putin Russians at one point controlled, he said, 42 square kilometers, or 16 square miles, of Russian territory.

“I want to prove that it’s possible to fight against a tyrant,” he said. “That Putin’s power is not unlimited, that the security services can beat, control and torture the unarmed. But as soon as they meet a full armed resistance, they flee.”

It was the rhetoric of a dissident freedom fighter, but there was a discordant note that emerged as clearly as the neo-Nazi Black Sun patch on the uniform of one of the soldiers: Mr. Kapustin and prominent members of the armed group he leads, the Russian Volunteer Corps, openly espouse far-right views. In fact, German officials and humanitarian groups, including the Anti-Defamation League, have identified Mr. Kapustin as a neo-Nazi.