Drone attack coverage stifled by Kremlin
Moscow’s refusal to allow strike footage to be shown suggests it may not have been ‘false flag’ attack
RUSSIAN state TV refused to show footage of the drone strike on the Kremlin in muted coverage of the attack that prompted Russian hawks to call for Volodymyr Zelensky’s assassination.
Yesterday, the Kremlin accused the US of orchestrating the attack, which it said was carried out by Ukraine.
The White House denied the “ludicrous” claims.
State TV last night parroted the Kremlin accusations, but would not show footage of the drone exploding over Vladimir Putin’s residence.
The incident, described as the first attack on the Russian seat of power since 1942, is highly embarrassing for the Kremlin, especially as it happened just a few days before the annual Victory Day parade that showcases Russia’s military prowess.
The reluctance to cover the attack suggests it may not have been a “false flag” attack by Russia to justify escalating the war, analysts said.
Russia sent a wave of missiles and drones over Ukraine early yesterday in an apparent retaliation. There were also reports of drones being shot down late yesterday, with some suggesting further attacks were imminent.
Vitali Klitschko, Kyiv’s mayor, reported “explosions and fire in the Solomyansky district of the capital” and warned of potential drone debris. The alerts came after Kyiv saw another wave of attacks in the night between Wednesday and yesterday.
Yesterday morning, Sergiy Popko, the head of Kyiv’s military administration, said: “Our city has not experienced such intensity of strikes since the beginning of this year.”
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman, said: “Attempts to disown this, both in Kyiv and in Washington, are, of course, absolutely ridiculous. We know very well that decisions about such actions, about such terrorist attacks, are made not in Kyiv but in Washington.”
John Kirby, a US national security spokesman, said: “Obviously, it’s a ludicrous claim. The United States had nothing to do with this.”
The Institute for the Study of War, a US think tank, suggested that Moscow “likely staged this attack in an attempt to bring the war home to a Russian domestic audience”.
However, state media coverage appears to indicate otherwise. Channel One, in its four-minute segment, chose not to show the drone strike but ran the Kremlin statement on the attack.
It suggested that Kyiv was “provoking an escalation” and “confirms its doctrine of sabotage and terrorism”. Neither of the major channels ran the commentary of hard-liners who called for the assassination of Mr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, among other things.
Like other Russia watchers who cast doubt on the false flag attack suggestion, Dmitri Alperovitch, a Russia analyst, said it is unlikely “due to how long it took Russia to acknowledge it”.
He said: “The Kremlin was clearly in shock over this.”
Komsomolskaya Pravda, Russia’s best-selling tabloid, covered the attack as a front-page story on its website but sought to play down its impact.
But on late-night TV talk shows, pro-kremlin commentators called for blood. Andrei Gurulyov, a hawkish MP, said that Ukrainian leaders “should no longer be on the face of the Earth”.
sir – It defies belief that a hostile drone could have come within striking distance of the Kremlin without being picked up and destroyed by Russian air defences (report, May 4).
This smacks of a blatant and very naive false-flag action by Vladimir Putin, to be used as an excuse for an escalation of his offensive against Ukraine. The world would watch and laugh if only the implications were not so serious.
John Chillington
Wells, Somerset