Simplicius observes that either Russia has come up with a new way to avoid missile-launch detection or the USA has cut off its intelligence to Ukraine:
Last night Russia struck Kiev with a series of what is claimed to be ballistic missiles. Routine though it may seem, what was not routine about the attack was Ukraine’s reported lack of the usual forewarning by allies…. Whether or not Russia is using S-400s or some other “special system”, the lack of intel forewarning can mean only one of three things, all of them damning for Ukraine:
- That Russian S-400s launched in ballistic mode are not detectable by the most advanced US space assets, which is precisely what Andriy Sybiha appears to imply in the earlier video.
- US Patriot installations inside Kiev are incapable of detecting these missiles with their radars.
- Russia is using some kind of new weapon that is not detectable to any of the above US systems.
Or perhaps if Sybiha is lying, and the US did in fact withhold intelligence, it would still be intriguing given that we know US Patriot systems protect Kiev. Who operates these Patriots, Ukrainians or Americans? If Americans, that would mean they may have detected objects flying to Kiev but were ordered to stand down and not provide radar forewarning to the Ukrainians, if they even detected them at all. Or if it’s the Ukrainians, then surely they simply would not have detected the missiles, which means the highly “advanced” Patriot radar is incapable of detecting whatever it is that Russia has been sending.
My guess, and it is only that, is that Sybiha is lying, the US is withholding intelligence, and it will continue to do so until Zelensky is removed and the Kiev regime surrenders on terms satisfactory to Russia. Which I believe will amount to Russian annexation of not only the areas that it presently occupies, but also Odessa. That is the only viable outcome that permits Ukraine to continue to survive as a sovereign state; if the war is continued by the regional European powers, not only will all of Ukraine be occupied, but quite possibly the Baltic states and parts of other Eastern European countries as well.
Russia has no desire to march to Berlin, let alone Paris, but if history teaches us one thing, it is that the Russians can and will do so if sufficiently provoked to the point that they deem it is necessary to end the war. Fortunately, the US government appears to finally be recognizing that Russia is not “a gas station with nukes” but the same major power that has repeatedly demonstrated it is capable of successfully defeating all of the regional European powers combined.