Russia Unleashes New Wave of Terror After Buffer Zone Strategy Collapses
Rescuers work at the site of an apartment building which was hit by Russian missile and drone strikes, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine August 28, 2025. REUTERS/Thomas Peter TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY
On the night of August 28, Russia carried out a massive combined strike on Ukraine, launching 629 missiles and drones, including Kinzhal, Iskander, Kh-101, and Shahed. Ukrainian air defenses intercepted 589 of them.
Kyiv has suffered one of the largest attacks in recent months. In the Darnytskyi district, Russian forces destroyed part of a five-story residential building. Significant damage was also recorded in the city center, in the Shevchenkivskyi district. Among the affected facilities were the EU mission in Ukraine, the offices of Ukrainska Pravda and Radio Svoboda, the British Consulate, the Intercity train depot, and other civilian infrastructure. In total, around 100 sites were damaged.
The Russian strike on the Ukrainian capital on August 28 killed 23 people and injured another 53.
The main focus of the attacks was on civilian infrastructure. In this way, Russia is attempting to exert military and political pressure on Ukraine, seeking to force the country’s leadership into so-called “peace talks.”
It should be recalled that in his speech on September 30, 2022, Vladimir Putin referred to the Allied carpet bombings of Cologne and Dresden during World War II. As early as 2022, the Kremlin leader signaled to the West that Russia might deliberately target civilians and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine. The Ukrainian government and international organizations classify such strikes as Russian war crimes, stressing that they are intentional.
Russia has increasingly turned to ballistic missiles in its assaults on Ukrainian cities. These weapons are extremely difficult to intercept, as only Patriot or SAMP/T air defense systems are capable of downing them — and Ukraine has very few. The Kremlin is aware of this and has deliberately escalated strikes against residential areas.
Such missiles can reach Kyiv in as little as two minutes when launched from the Bryansk region. On the night of August 28, Russian forces fired Kh-47M2 Kinzhal hypersonic missiles from the Lipetsk and Voronezh regions, significantly reducing Ukraine’s air defense response time due to the proximity of launch sites. Similar tactics are used with Iskander missiles and their North Korean counterparts, the KN-23, launched from Bryansk and Voronezh, making timely detection and interception even more challenging.
Strikes on residential areas have intensified following remarks by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who said that negotiations between Russia and the United States on “security guarantees” should be conducted behind closed doors.
According to Peskov, the issue of security guarantees is the most important element in the “settlement” of the war in Ukraine, but public discussion of it would “harm the outcome.”
“Of course, one way or another, this topic always appears on the agenda of ongoing contacts… But we would not like to have a conversation on this topic in a public format now. We consider this useless for overall effectiveness,” Peskov stated.
In reality, Russia is attempting to create artificial tension between Ukraine, the United States, and European partners by insisting on a closed negotiation format. Having failed to establish “buffer zones” in the Sumy, Kharkiv, and Dnipro regions, Moscow is resorting to intensified strikes on civilian targets to compensate for its losses on the battlefield and to bolster its position in talks.
At the same time, these strikes are also intended to influence Western leaders, particularly Donald Trump, by highlighting civilian casualties and thereby increasing diplomatic pressure on Ukraine.
It should be recalled that after his meeting with Putin in Alaska on August 15, Donald Trump announced that he had reached an agreement “in principle” with the Russian leader involving a territorial “exchange” between Ukraine and Russia, and that he saw a chance Ukraine could ultimately accept such a deal.
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