Russia Pummels Kyiv in Apparent Retaliation for Ukrainian Drone Assault

The attack on Friday, which killed at least four people nationwide, came two days after Russia vowed retaliation for an audacious drone assault on its strategic bomber bases.

Russia on Friday launched one of the largest barrages of missiles and drones of the war at targets across Ukraine, killing at least four people and damaging buildings nationwide, in what Moscow suggested was retaliation for Ukraine’s recent audacious assault on Russian strategic bomber bases.

Kyiv appeared to be one of the main targets. The thuds of air-defense batteries and the staccato bursts of heavy machine guns echoed through the night in the Ukrainian capital as military units defending the city tried to take down missiles streaking overhead and attack drones that swooped in, their ominous buzz trailing over neighborhoods.

Over the course of some five hours after midnight, Russia launched 407 drones and decoys, nearly 40 cruise missiles and six ballistic missiles from land, air and sea at towns and cities across the breadth of the nation, the Ukrainian Air Force said in a statement. It appeared to be the second-largest drone assault of the war, after Russia launched nearly 500 drones last weekend.

“Russia doesn’t change its stripes — another massive strike on cities and ordinary life,” President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine wrote on social media. “They targeted almost all of Ukraine.”

Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a statement that the attack was “in response to terrorist acts” by Ukraine, in an apparent reference to its strikes on the Russian bomber bases last weekend. On Wednesday, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia told President Trump that Russia would retaliate for these strikes, Mr. Trump said, further dimming hopes for a cease-fire that were already faint.

The Ukrainian attack, which involved smuggling drones deep into the Russian heartland and launching them from semi trucks, destroyed or damaged at least a dozen aircraft, including many of Moscow’s nuclear-capable strategic bombers.

On Friday, when asked whether Ukraine’s drone strikes on Russian bombers over the weekend had changed his view of whether Mr. Zelensky held any cards (Mr. Trump previously said that Mr. Zelensky had no cards), the president replied: “Well, they gave Putin a reason to go in and bomb the hell out of them last night. That’s the thing I didn’t like about it. When I saw it I said, ‘Here we go, now it’s going to be a strike.’”

Combined with a renewed ground offensive in the east, Friday’s attack was part of an intensifying Russian campaign to bombard Ukrainian cities with swarms of drones and missiles to overwhelm Ukrainian air defenses.

Overall, Russia has launched more than 1,000 drones per week at military and civilian targets in Ukraine in recent months, the Ukrainian authorities have said.

Mr. Trump compared Russia and Ukraine to two fighting children who needed to work out their differences before their war could end.

“Sometimes you’re better off letting them fight for a while and then pulling them apart,” Mr. Trump said in the Oval Office as Germany’s chancellor, Friedrich Merz, urged him to leverage the power of the United States to end the conflict.

Mr. Trump avoided answering a question about whether he was willing to increase pressure on Russia. The Kremlin has repeatedly resisted his calls for an unconditional cease-fire.

In Friday’s strike by Russia, Ukrainian fighter jets, antiaircraft missile troops, electronic warfare and unmanned systems units, and mobile fire groups took out 406 of the 452 air attack vehicles, with strikes reported in 13 locations, according to the air force. These figures could not be independently verified.

Multiple fires were reported across Kyiv, including at a 16-story apartment block. Another fire near the city center covered an area of more than 5,000 square feet.

Three people died in Kyiv, all of them rescuers who had rushed to extinguish the fires, the Ukrainian authorities said. Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, also said that 20 people had been injured in the capital. Mr. Klitschko initially said Friday morning that four people had been killed in Kyiv, but later revised the toll to three.

Parts of western Ukraine that have not come under frequent attack were also targeted.

The city of Ternopil, which is hundreds of miles from the front, came under heavy assault, the local authorities said, with at least 11 people injured, including six emergency workers.

In Lutsk, in northwestern Ukraine, Russia struck a high-rise apartment building and other locations, killing one person and injuring at least 27 more, Ukrainian emergency services said.

The Russian military said it had struck various military targets on Friday, though this could not be independently verified. Throughout the war, Russia has repeatedly targeted urban areas, increasing the risk of civilian casualties. The Ukrainian military did not disclose any information about casualties among its ranks or damage to its facilities.

Since the beginning of this year, the Russian military has carried out attacks against Ukraine using nearly 27,700 aerial bombs, almost 11,200 Shahed drones, about 9,000 other attack strike drones and more than 700 missiles, including ballistic ones, Mr. Zelensky said on Thursday.

“This is the pace of Russian strikes, and they deliberately set this tempo from the very first days of the full-scale war,” Mr. Zelensky said. “Russia has restructured its entire state, society and economy to be able to kill people in other countries on a massive scale and with impunity.”

Before the overnight bombardment, Russia launched high-explosive aerial bombs at the center of the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson on Thursday morning, partly destroying the Regional State Administration building and damaging several surrounding structures.

On Wednesday night, Russia attacked the city of Pryluky in the northeastern Chernihiv region, killing at least five people, including a 1-year-old baby, Ukrainian officials said.

Ukraine also continued its campaign to slow the bombardments by attacking Russian military installations deep inside Russia. The governor of the Russian Saratov region, Roman Busargin, said that overnight on Thursday, there was a large fire after an oil depot at the Engels air base came under attack by Ukrainian drones.

“There are no casualties as of yet,” he said.

A powerful explosion was reported by an airfield in the Bryansk region, and the local governor, Alexander Bogomaz, said that some 46 Ukrainian drones had targeted the area. He said there were no casualties.

Jonathan Swan contributed reporting.

Our Coverage of the War in Ukraine

• Trump’s Analogy: As Germany’s chancellor, Friedrich Merz, sat beside him watching in silence, President Trump compared Russia and Ukraine to two fighting children who needed to work out their differences for a while before anyone could intervene.
• Russian Gas: Amid the geopolitical jockeying touched off by President Trump’s re-engaging with President Vladimir Putin of Russia, the future of Europe’s energy supply has emerged as a source of tension and vulnerability.
• Flipping the Script: A drone attack on airfields and warplanes in Russia revealed how Ukraine is changing how wars will be waged in the 21st century, U.S. officials and military analysts said. A Times analysis of videos and satellite images shows the extent of the attack, which appeared intended to demonstrate that continuing the war carries big risks for Moscow.
• Defending Ukraine: European nations are increasingly optimistic that they can support Ukraine financially and militarily against Russia even if President Trump decides to wash his hands of the conflict.
• North Korea and Russia: Kim Jong-un seized on Russia’s need for support in its war against Ukraine. His reward is a rapidly modernizing military that threatens the delicate balance of power on the Korean Peninsula.
• Push for Sanctions: A bipartisan pair of American senators traveled to Ukraine to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky, using the visit to champion a broadly supported push in Congress to impose sweeping sanctions on Russia.

How We Verify Our Reporting

• Our team of visual journalists analyzes satellite images, photographs, videos and radio transmissions to independently confirm troop movements and other details.
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