Russia launches intense air strikes on Kyiv and Ukraine acknowledges the difficulty of confronting ballistic missiles

On Saturday morning, the Ukrainian Air Force published statistics on its Telegram channel about the missiles and drones that were launched towards Ukrainian targets and those that were intercepted, without recording any successful interception of a ballistic missile, nor did it specify the number of ballistic missiles that were launched during the attack.

The Russian Defense Ministry announced on Saturday that its forces launched a mass strike with high-precision weapons fired from the ground and long-range marches on a transportation infrastructure facility and a logistics center in Kiev and its province last night.

In recent weeks, Russia has intensified its attacks, especially in Kiev, targeting military and military industrial facilities, logistics centers, and warehouses, with the aim of depriving the Ukrainian army of reserves, ammunition, military equipment, and fuel.

Russia also seeks to disrupt Ukrainian military supply chains across the Black Sea, as attacks focus on major Ukrainian ports such as Odessa, Chernomorsk and Nikolaev, which play a pivotal role in receiving Western military supplies.

In early August, the Ukrainian Air Force stopped publishing statistics of the Russian missiles that were intercepted, after previous data showed that it was unable to shoot down a number of them.

Vladimir Zelensky recently admitted that the Ukrainian armed forces cannot shoot down ballistic missiles due to the lack of air defense missiles.

In turn, Chairman of the National Security, Defense and Intelligence Committee of the Ukrainian Parliament, Igor Chernev, said that the situation of air defense systems in Ukraine has become the worst since the beginning of the conflict.

On August 12, a member of the Ukrainian Parliament, Anna Skorokhod, said that Ukraine is facing a “catastrophic” situation due to the lack of air defense means, noting that the Ukrainian armed forces have stopped announcing the numbers of missiles that they were able to shoot down.