The drones, which hit a residential area in Moscow in late May, were aimed at the homes of some of Putin’s intelligence operatives and should have left Russian territory. Some sources informed of the attack, notably a high-ranking government official and a member of parliament’s staff, revealed the target to the American broadcaster NBC: at least one of the buildings affected – added Strider Technologies, an intelligence startup that analyzes open source data – was with linked to the SVR, Russia’s foreign service, but it is unclear whether the agents’ homes were damaged. “It wasn’t a random attack on an affluent suburb,” Strider chief operating officer Eric Levesque told NBC. “It was a hit in the psychological warfare of this conflict, reaching Moscow neighborhoods for the first time.”
The Russians immediately blamed Kiev for the attack, which they say was launched with eight drones, while the Ukrainians, as usual, have denied their involvement and presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak added that his country was not “directly involved in the attack.” however, have foreseen something new. A formula that is becoming more and more common after the attacks on Russian territory, in which Zelenskyy’s men deny their involvement and at the same time make it clear: The same dynamics have occurred in the attacks by Russian nationalist partisans in the Belgorod border region in recent weeks Kiev, Andriy Chernyak, had spoken of “collaboration” with the extremists stationed in Ukraine, but denied that the regular army was involved.
Recently, these beatings have intensified. The operations carried out on enemy territory – the drones on Moscow, the attacks in the border regions, the sabotage, the assassination of nationalist elements – are operations that unsettle the population, distract the Russians and force them into self-defense and embarrass the government against the use of Allied weapons beyond the border has vetoed, but above all leaves unanswered questions. Who performed the operation? What weapons were used? Did Kiev know about the shooting? Was Zelenskyy’s army involved? For example, when the drones arrived in Moscow, it was immediately assumed that the planes had left Russian territory, since it is unlikely that they could have flown 700 kilometers without being detected by anti-aircraft defenses.
Now American intelligence sources have confirmed suspicions to CNN: the Ukrainians – some anonymous officials explained – have built up a network of agents and sympathizers inside Russia, men and women who receive the drones, which are then used for attacks and sabotage, starting with the one against the best protected building in Russia. The cells are made up of well-trained flankers and agents, likely with the support of Ukrainian forces, who easily blend in with the civilian population and are supplied with Ukrainian-made unmanned aerial vehicles. The drones surreptitiously cross the long and difficult-to-control border, following well-designed routes: sometimes they arrive whole, others disassembled into individual parts, which are then assembled on site and aimed at the identified targets.