Russia increases missile strikes on civilian targets

Russia has launched more than 480 missiles in Ukraine since the start of the Kremlin’s invasion, with forces showing a “willingness to hit civilian infrastructure on purpose,” a senior U.S. defense official said Thursday. 

Moscow’s forces have targeted “media towers and media facilities,” government infrastructure and residential areas in cities including Kyiv and Kharkiv, Ukraine’s capital and second-most populous city respectively.  

“As [the Russian forces have] gotten somewhat geographically closer to some of these population centers, the bombardments have increased,” the official told reporters. “It’s clear they are trying to weaken the governing structures that are resident in these population centers.” 

The U.S. military previously observed Russians hitting civilian infrastructure in the ex-Soviet nation but said at the time that it was unclear if it was on purpose or not. 

The missiles being fired off are of “all stripes and sizes,” including short-range, medium-range, surface air missiles and cruise missiles, with more than 230 fired from Russian mobile systems placed within Ukraine. 

More than 160 additional missiles have come from Russia, more than 70 from Belarus and less than 10 have been observed to come from ships in the Black Sea, the official added. 

On the ground, Russia has moved into Ukraine 90 percent of the combat power it had assembled along the border prior to the invasion, now in its eighth day. 

In southern Ukraine, Russia claims that its forces have seized Kherson — a major city situated on the Dnipro River with a population of roughly 250,000 people — though the U.S. cannot independently verify that claim, according to the official. 

The major port city of Mariupol is also facing increasing missile strikes and staring down Russian advancement from the north and the coastline, but it is still under Ukrainian control, the official said.  

Across the north, Kremlin forces are “largely stalled,” but as the official noted, “That doesn’t mean that they aren’t making any progress.” 

The U.S. has observed “increasing bombardment” against the cities of Kyiv, Kharkiv and Cherniv, but believes that the large, 40-mile Russian military convoy headed toward Kyiv from the north is “stalled,” the official said. 

“We still assess that the convoy that everybody’s been focused on is stalled. We have no reason to doubt Ukrainian claims that they have, that they have contributed to it being stalled by attacking it,” the official said. 

The convoy — which includes tanks, armored vehicles and towed artillery meant to assault Kyiv and decapitate the government — is assessed to be roughly 19 miles outside the capital, according to Western intelligence. 

But the official cautioned that Russia, though hampered, is not “running out of juice.” 

“We still assess that they have available to them — in and outside Ukraine — the vast, vast majority of their total combat power. They still have an awful lot of capability left in them,” they said.