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Theo Jorden
On the eve of one of the most consequential gatherings in NATO’s recent history, Russia Launches Missile a devastating wave of drone and missile strikes on Ukraine’s capital, killing at least 12 civilians and wounding more than 60 others. The timing was not coincidental. With the NATO Summit in Ankara, Turkey, opening on July 7
On the eve of one of the most consequential gatherings in NATO’s recent history, Russia Launches Missile a devastating wave of drone and missile strikes on Ukraine’s capital, killing at least 12 civilians and wounding more than 60 others. The timing was not coincidental. With the NATO Summit in Ankara, Turkey, opening on July 7 to 8, 2026, the attack carried unmistakable strategic messaging from the Kremlin: Moscow will not be sidelined by diplomacy, and it intends to shape the summit’s atmosphere on its own terms.
Ukraine’s air force reported that Russia fired 351 drones and 68 missiles overnight, targeting mainly the capital. Of those, 29 were ballistic missiles and every single one struck its intended target. Four districts across Kyiv suffered destruction and damage, with the Podilsky district hit hardest, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko. Entire families were pulled from rubble in residential apartment blocks. Cars burned on city streets. Residents described waking at 2 a.m. to walls collapsing around them and stairwells filling with smoke and fire.
The attack came just days after a separate Russian strike on Kyiv on July 3 killed 31 people, the third deadliest assault on the capital since the war began. Taken together, the two strikes in under a week represent a sustained campaign of escalating intensity that civilian air defense infrastructure has struggled to contain.
President Volodymyr Zelensky had warned hours before the assault that Moscow was “preparing a new massive strike.” He connected the timing directly to the NATO summit, writing on X that the attack was “typical of Putin: right after America’s Independence Day and before the NATO Summit in Ankara.” The statement was precise and intentional. Russia has a documented pattern of escalating military activity around major Western diplomatic gatherings, using force as a signal of leverage while allied leaders negotiate support packages for Ukraine.
This latest Russia launches missile today scenario delivers several messages at once. It tests the limits of Ukraine’s air defenses publicly, exposes gaps in interceptor supplies ahead of an alliance where those shortages are on the agenda, and reminds NATO members that the war is not a frozen conflict nearing resolution. It is an active, intensifying one.
Zelensky’s message to allies was sharp and specific. Ukrainian forces performed well against drones and cruise missiles during the attack, but against the Russian ballistic missiles, they could not intercept a single one. The reason, he said, was an “insufficient supply of interceptor missiles.”
Air force spokesman Yurii Ihnat confirmed the gap on national television: “Russians are certainly using the fact that there is a serious deficit of interceptor missiles now, in Ukraine and the world.” Each Patriot interceptor is capable of engaging incoming short range ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and drones at altitudes up to 15 kilometers and distances of up to 35 kilometers, but only if Ukraine has enough of them in stock to mount a sustained defense.
Zelensky used the attack as a direct platform for his summit asks, calling on the US and European partners to “come out of the NATO Summit in Ankara with strong decisions in support of our air defense.” The message arrived with footage of burning apartment blocks and covered bodies to reinforce the urgency.
The NATO summit in Ankara opens against this backdrop with three core priorities: advancing allied defense investment, bolstering transatlantic defense industrial capacity, and sustaining support for Ukraine. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has outlined the summit’s ambition as breathing life into a stronger Europe within a stronger NATO, one that remains rooted in American commitment while reducing dependence on Washington as its sole guarantor.
The alliance is expected to announce a pledge of 70 billion euros in military equipment, training and assistance for Ukraine in 2026. Most of that funding will flow through European bilateral commitments and EU financing rather than new direct US contributions, reflecting Washington’s increasingly transactional posture toward allied burden sharing.
For Ukraine specifically, the summit agenda now includes an urgent, real time argument for Patriot interceptor resupply. According to reporting ahead of the summit, Ukraine is expected to sign major defense deals with at least seven NATO countries by year’s end. But those agreements cannot compensate for interceptor shortages that are already allowing Russian ballistic missiles to strike residential towers unchallenged in the middle of the night.
Russia launches drone attack and missile operations on Ukrainian cities at near nightly frequency, and civilian casualties in 2026 are already significantly higher than during the same period in 2025, according to the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine. Meanwhile, Ukraine has also ramped up long range strikes against Russian territory, targeting oil refineries, ports and military factories. Russia’s defense ministry claimed its forces shot down 519 Ukrainian drones launched toward Russian territory overnight into Monday, illustrating that the conflict has entered a high volume, reciprocal bombardment phase with no sign of deceleration.
The drone and missile strikes on Kyiv today carry weight well beyond the immediate death toll. They are a statement from Moscow that it retains the capacity to inflict mass casualties on Ukraine’s civilian population whenever allied leaders gather to discuss further support, and that any NATO summit news that points toward stronger commitments to Kyiv will be met with escalatory pressure on the ground.
For Trump, who is attending the Ankara summit and plans to meet Zelensky bilaterally, the strikes present both a challenge and a pressure point. He has repeatedly promised to end the war quickly but has not produced a negotiated framework. The images from Kyiv’s burned apartment blocks arriving hours before Air Force One lands in Turkey may sharpen the urgency of those conversations, or expose the distance between American diplomatic ambition and the realities on the battlefield.
For ongoing reporting on the Ankara summit and its implications for Ukraine’s air defense strategy, follow our full NATO summit news coverage.
External Source: Read the full Council on Foreign Relations analysis on what NATO must deliver in Ankara at cfr.org.
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