After the unprecedented Russian air strikes against Ukraine with many deaths, US experts have warned of further violent attacks. “Russia will continue to conduct large-scale attacks against Ukraine in order to weaken Ukrainian morale and Ukraine’s ability to sustain its war effort against Russia,” said the daily report from the US Institute for the Study of War (ISW) on Friday evening.
At the same time, the analysts emphasized that after almost two years of aggressive war, Russia is unlikely to be able to attack regularly on a large scale with missiles, given its reserves and production capacities, but more consistently with drones.
In the most serious attack since the start of the war, the Russian army fired almost 160 rockets, cruise missiles and drones of various types at the neighboring country on Friday, according to official information from Kiev. As a result, more than 30 people were killed and around 160 injured in several regions of Ukraine shortly before the New Year. The Ukrainian leadership spoke of terror against the civilian population.
According to an ISW analysis, in preparation for the devastating bombardment, the Russians had previously experimented for months with various combinations of drones and missiles in order to find out weak points in the Ukrainian air defense system.
Meanwhile, Ukraine reported another Russian drone attack during the night. The military said three unmanned missiles were repelled in the Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. The Ukrainian air defense was able to shoot down five of a total of ten Russian drones across the country.
