Shocking news out of Moscow this morning, as the Russian government accused Ukraine of staging a drone attack intended to hit the Kremlin residence of and kill President Vladimir Putin. The Russian government said it had thwarted an attack by two drones and that Putin was not in the building at the time.
As usual, very little that the Russian government says can be independently verified. But there are some videos floating around social media, showing something flying above the dome of the senate building in the Kremlin, followed by some sort of explosion.
Here’s one bit of footage of the alleged drone strike on the Kremlin, here’s another.
Reasons to think it could be a genuine Ukrainian action:
One: The Ukrainians have proven to be willing to commit assassinations as part of their war effort. Back in October, the New York Times reported:
United States intelligence agencies believe parts of the Ukrainian government authorized the car bomb attack near Moscow in August that killed Daria Dugina, the daughter of a prominent Russian nationalist, an element of a covert campaign that U.S. officials fear could widen the conflict.
The United States took no part in the attack, either by providing intelligence or other assistance, officials said. American officials also said they were not aware of the operation ahead of time and would have opposed the killing had they been consulted. Afterward, American officials admonished Ukrainian officials over the assassination, they said.
For those who instinctively doubt the New York Times sources or the U.S. intelligence community, note this is an admission against interest. Neither the Biden administration nor the Times are likely to be eager to showcase that at least some factions within the Ukrainian government are the kind of people who use car bombs, aim to blow up a prominent Russian ultranationalist, and end up killing his 29-year-old daughter. Blowing up an unarmed civilian’s car is indeed a terrorist tactic.
Two: The Ukrainian have repeatedly demonstrated an ability to launch attacks against targets on Russian soil. In October, an explosion severely damaged the only bridge connecting the annexed Crimean Peninsula with the Russian mainland, hindering a key Russian supply route. In March, the Russian FSB office in the southern Russian city of Rostov, about 43 miles from the border with Ukraine, caught fire.
Three: The Ukrainian have repeatedly demonstrated an ability to launch drone attacks against targets on Russian soil, far from the Russian-Ukrainian border, and some not that far from Moscow. In December, three Russian soldiers were killed in two separate drone attacks at the Engels air base near the city of Saratov, far east of the war zone, and an air base in Ryazan, which is 115 miles southeast of Moscow. Saratov is at least 370 miles km from the nearest Ukrainian-held territory, and Ryazan is about 500 miles from the Ukrainian border.
In March, the Washington Post calculated “there have been at least 27 publicly reported drone attacks on high-value targets in Russia, primarily military bases, airfields and energy facilities. In some cases, drones crashed or were shot down before reaching their targets. At least three drones crashed near Astrakhan, a city close to the Caspian Sea near where Russia fires missiles into Ukraine.”
Note that it is possible there were other strikes or attempted strikes that the Russian government has managed to obscure. It is difficult for any journalist to get a full picture of national security matters in Russia, as the imprisonment of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich demonstrates.
Four: The allegedly impenetrable Russian air defense system has proven surprisingly vulnerable before. On May 28, 1987, 18-year-old West German private pilot Mathias Rust managed to fly his Reims Cessna 172P from Helsinki, Finland to a spectacular landing in Moscow’s Red Square.
Five: It is particularly difficult to defend against drone attacks, which would make them a tempting option for the Ukrainians. They’re much cheaper than manned aircraft, they don’t risk the lives of pilots, they can be mistaken for birds on air defense systems, and they’re relatively small targets for an anti-aircraft missile.
Reasons to doubt it is a genuine Ukrainian action, and a Russian false flag operation…
One: Who benefits from a move like this? If you’re Ukraine, and you want Russia to stop attacking and invading, do you think blowing up a part of the Kremlin and killing Putin is going to make the Russian people want to end the war? Or will it make them even more determined to continue it? Even if the strike got extremely lucky and managed to kill Putin, wouldn’t Putin’s temporary successor, Mikhail Mishustin,, or his long-term successor be extremely motivated to strike back hard at Ukraine for launching an attack right in the middle of the national capital?
Two: The Ukrainians almost certainly would have known Putin wasn’t there. It is apparently not much of a secret that when Vladimir Putin is in Moscow, he stays at a bunker in Novoe Ogarevo. (The architect shared the plans and blueprints with Western media.) If Western analysts in the private sector know this, Ukrainian intelligence knows this. Then again, it is possible this was a deliberate miss, meant to send a signal to Putin that the Ukrainians can attempt attacks on wherever he sleeps.
Three: Getting a drone over the Kremlin isn’t exactly easy. Just because it is difficult to defend against drone attacks, it doesn’t mean that the Russian military hasn’t poured considerable resources into defending the skies over Moscow. From that Post article in March:
In recent months, air defense systems such as the Pantsir-S1 and S-400 were lifted with heavy cranes and perched on rooftops or placed in city parks. Analysts noted that three systems in central Moscow — on the roofs of the Defense Ministry, the local Interior Ministry headquarters and a business center — effectively form a dome over the Kremlin.
“Moscow probably has the densest air defense coverage of any city on Earth,” said Dara Massicot, a senior researcher at Rand Corp.
Maybe the Ukrainians got lucky. Or maybe that drone made it through “the densest air defense coverage of any city on Earth” because the Russian government wanted it to get above the Kremlin.
Four: Who was up on the roof as the attack was happening? One of the videos reportedly shows two men climbing the cupola before the drone explodes above the site. There do appear to be two figures moving, on the left side of the screen; this could be an indication that some individuals within the Kremlin expected the attack and were preparing to out out any fires.
Five: The Kremlin wants us to see this. Multiple closed-circuit security system videos of the attack don’t get released on Russian social media if this is an enormous embarrassment to the Russian government.
Finally… what would or should Americans think? Ukraine is largely dependent upon the U.S. for a continued supply of weapons and munitions. As mentioned above, the U.S. government admonished Ukrainian officials over the assassination of Daria Dugina. How would the Biden administration greet a Ukrainian attempt to kill Putin by using a drone, blowing up in the Kremlin? if the world learned that this was a genuine assassination attempt by the Ukrainians, would NATO leaders respond with “attaboy, better luck next time” or “whoa, you guys are getting reckless, you had better pull back before you provoke the Russians into doing something even worse”?