Following an extremely intense aerial assault against Kyiv early Tuesday morning that involved drones as well as cruise and ballistic missiles, two government officials in Washington said that the U.S.-made Patriot air defense system likely suffered damage, but was not destroyed.
The U.S. officials’ statements, which were reported by CNN, followed claims made by Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov that a “high-precision strike by a Kinzhal hypersonic missile system hit a US-made Patriot air defense system.”
Meanwhile, Ukrainian air force spokesperson Yuriy Ihnat, in comments given to national media on Wednesday, May 17th, refuted claims that a Russian hypersonic missile had destroyed the U.S.-supplied missile defense system during the barrage. “Destroying the system with some kind of ‘Kinzhal’, it’s impossible. Everything that they say there, it can remain in their propaganda archive,” he said.
The massive overnight onslaught, which the Ukrainian defense ministry says was “one of the most intense attacks” on the capital since the onset of the war, is reported to have included nine Kalibr cruise missiles launched from ships in the Black Sea, three short-range, S-400 ballistic missiles launched from the ground, six Kinzhal missiles launched from MiG-31K warplanes, and a number of drones.
“It was exceptional in its density—the maximum number of attack missiles in the shortest period of time,” Serhiy Popko, the head of Kyiv’s city military administration, wrote on social media.
Ukrainian officials on Tuesday, May 16th, claimed that all 18 missiles aimed at Kyiv were successfully shot down, including the six hypersonic missiles. “Another unbelievable success for the Ukrainian Air Forces!” Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov wrote in a Twitter post.
Later the same day, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu disputed Ukraine’s claims, telling the state-run RIA-Novosti news agency: “We have not launched as many Kinzhals as they allegedly shoot down every time with their statements.”
There has been much speculation as to whether the Patriot air defense system has the capability to intercept Kinzhal hypersonic missiles, which travel at 10 times the speed of sound, and which were believed by a host of experts to be too fast to be detected by radars in time for air-defense systems to intercept them.
If Ukrainian claims are true, it would be the second time the Patriot air defense system has managed to intercept the hypersonic Kinzhal missile. Moscow has denied such claims.
Russia’s latest aerial bombardment against the Ukrainian capital is the eighth of its kind this month, according to a report from The Associated Press. It comes just days after Russia announced that it had successfully destroyed an ammunition depot and a hangar at an airbase in the city of Khmelnytskyi, in western Ukraine.
The Khmelnytskyi Oblast Military Administration confirmed in a post on Telegram that “critical infrastructure” had indeed been hit in the drone attack on the night of Friday, May 12th.
Commenting on the attack, spokesman for the air force of Ukraine Yuriy Ihnat said: “Unfortunately, not all drones were destroyed that night—17 out of 21 UAVs. There are four hits in the Khmelnytskyi region.”
According to local Ukrainian news agencies, which cited the Khmelnytskyi Oblast Military Administration, at least 21 civilians were injured during the strikes.
