Putin talks nukes as Kyiv slated for US air defenses
'I hope they will not be required,' Putin said of nuclear weapons on Russian state TV
What happened
Russian President Vladimir Putin again raised the specter of using nuclear weapons in Ukraine, in a state film broadcast Sunday. A day earlier, Kyiv said it shot down two Russian Su-30 fighter jets over the Black Sea using modified U.S.-made missiles fired from Ukrainian sea drones. As Russia intensifies its airstrikes on Ukraine, Kyiv is getting at least one more U.S. Patriot air-defense system, The New York Times said Sunday.
Who said what
One Patriot system is being moved to Ukraine from Israel after refurbishment and "Western allies are discussing the logistics of Germany or Greece giving another one," the Times said. President Donald Trump's "public remarks on the war have softened in favor of Ukraine," but a former White House official said the "Biden administration had secured the agreement with Israel in September."
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy late Saturday called Ukrainian intelligence's first-ever downing of a Russian warplane from a marine drone "brilliant" and "a testament to Ukraine's capabilities." The attacks "demonstrate the threat Ukraine poses to Russia" and "seek to challenge Moscow's narrative that its victory in Ukraine is inevitable," The Wall Street Journal said. The Kremlin is "trying to scare Ukrainian people into essentially accepting capitulation, when the realities of the battlefield for Russia are far from Russia actually winning," Kateryna Stepanenko of the Institute for the Study of War told the Times. Last year "was the deadliest for Russian forces" since 2022's full-scale invasion, the BBC said.
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What next?
"There has been no need to use [nuclear] weapons ... and I hope they will not be required," Putin said in the Russian state film. "We have enough strength and means to bring what was started in 2022 to a logical conclusion with the outcome Russia requires."
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