Cui bono? With no evidence offered, Russia’s claim of a Ukrainian attack on Putin’s residence looks designed to derail peace talks
The ‘attack’
On Monday afternoon, December 29, Russian state media reported Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s allegation that Ukraine’s armed forces had attacked President Putin’s official residence in the Novgorod region the night before. Ukraine supposedly launched 91 drones at “Dolgiye Borody” (also known as “Valdai” and “Uzhin”), and Russia’s air defenses purportedly downed all of them without sustaining damage.
Lavrov said the attack would not go unanswered and that the targets and timing of Russia’s response had already been determined. According to the foreign minister, the Ukrainian authorities’ shift to a “policy of state terrorism” gives the Kremlin grounds to revise its negotiating position. At the same time, Lavrov said that Moscow does not intend to withdraw from dialogue with the United States on a peaceful settlement.
Less than half an hour later, Volodymyr Zelensky responded to Lavrov’s remarks. He called the claim of an attack on Putin’s residence “another lie” and suggested that the Kremlin was fabricating pretexts for further strikes on Kyiv, particularly against government buildings in the city center. A more important goal for the Kremlin, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha argued, was to “undermine and impede the peace process” amid intensifying negotiations between Ukraine and the U.S.
At nearly the same time that Lavrov spoke publicly, Putin appears to have relayed the same account to the U.S. president, portraying Ukraine as not genuinely committed to the peace process. About an hour after the foreign minister spoke, the Kremlin moved quickly to brief the public on the results of Putin’s call with Trump. Presidential adviser Yuri Ushakov told state media that the American leader had been “shocked and outraged” by the drone raid on the Valdai residence and said he could not have imagined “such insane actions.” Trump allegedly also expressed readiness to change his approach to working with Zelensky. Putin, meanwhile, informed Trump of Russia’s intention to respond to the attack and to revise its negotiating position.
The U.S. president also commented publicly that same evening during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He partially confirmed Ushakov’s account of the conversation, saying that the information about the attack had made him “very angry” and that “this is not the right time” for such operations. However, Trump said nothing about Zelensky and acknowledged that Washington had no proof that the drone attack on Putin’s residence had actually happened.
Missing evidence
As of Tuesday night, Moscow time, December 30, there is still no proof of a massive drone attack on Putin’s Valdai residence. The Kremlin, moreover, appears to have no plans to provide any evidence. Putin’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, put it bluntly, telling journalists: “I don’t think there should be any evidence here.” At the same time, he did not rule out that the Russian military might later release something, such as wreckage from downed drones.
So far, however, no one has seen them. In its initial daily briefing, Russia’s Defense Ministry said that between 11 p.m. on December 28 and 7 a.m. on December 29, air defense systems intercepted and destroyed a total of 89 Ukrainian drones over Russia’s entire territory — fewer than the number Lavrov claimed took part in the attack on the Valdai residence. The ministry provided this detailed breakdown:
- 49 — over the Bryansk region
- 18 — over the Novgorod region
- 11 — over Adygea
- 7 — over Krasnodar Krai
- 1 each — over the Sea of Azov, and the Oryol, Rostov, and Smolensk regions
Later, the Defense Ministry added another 23 drones to its list, allegedly shot down over the Novgorod region between 7 and 9 a.m. on December 29.
After 9 a.m., only hours before Lavrov’s bombshell comments to the press, Putin met with Russia’s military leadership to discuss the front-line situation and did not mention any Ukrainian attack on his residence.
To explain the discrepancies in its numbers, the Defense Ministry issued another statement on the evening of December 29, after the Kremlin had already begun amplifying the scandal over “the attack on Valdai.” This time, the total finally reached the 91 drones cited by Lavrov: 41 allegedly shot down over the Novgorod region, 49 over the Bryansk region, and one over the Smolensk region. In Bryansk and Smolensk, the drones were moving “in the direction of the Novgorod region,” the military now claimed.
It is unclear how officials could have concluded that these drones were aimed specifically at Putin’s residence, given that their route passed through at least the Tver region, which contains other possible targets for Ukrainian strikes.
Other circumstances also cast doubt on whether a massive raid on Valdai actually took place.
- Novgorod Governor Alexander Dronov reported no attacks on Putin’s presidential residence. On his Telegram channel, Dronov merely cited the Defense Ministry’s statistics about 41 drones shot down on December 28 and 29 and thanked the military for neutralizing the threat.
- The news outlet Agentstvo noted that on December 29, the authorities in the Valdai district reported no drone attacks at all. The topic was not discussed in local online communities either.
- The outlet Mozhem Obyasnit also reported that residents of the Novgorod region — including those in the city of Valdai, located 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) from the residence — did not receive SMS alerts about an air threat that day and did not hear the sounds of drones flying or explosions from their destruction.
- Putin’s Valdai residence is a questionable target for an effective drone attack. According to an August investigation by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, “Dolgiye Borody” is heavily protected by at least 12 air defense units (mainly Pantsir-S1 systems), and these defenses have likely only been reinforced since.
None of this, however, directly proves that Russian authorities fabricated the attack. There is not enough information to sustain that conclusion.
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It’s like Lenin said: you look for the person who will benefit, and, uh, uh, you know…
With the information currently available, the most convincing explanation for the Valdai attack story is that the Kremlin is trying to derail or complicate the U.S.-led peace process.
Why would Moscow do this? Whether the report was fabricated, the scope of the attack overstated, or even if the information turns out to be accurate is beside the point. What matters is that the Kremlin found a pretext to harden its negotiating position at a moment when Zelensky and Trump claimed that “90–95 percent” of the peace deal’s terms had already been agreed. Kyiv, it appears, is doing everything it can to fit into the U.S.-brokered settlement — while simultaneously trying to convince Trump that all of the Donbas should not be handed over to Putin’s control.
The Kremlin has responded with an unexpected maneuver, centered on the purported “drone attack on Valdai,” playing to Trump’s ego, claiming it was a “terrorist attack directed against the efforts” of the peace talks’ chief mediator. Even if Trump does not shift back toward Putin, Moscow can claim a new rationale for another demonstration of force and for a “retaliatory strike,” possibly involving the destruction of a prominent symbol of Ukrainian statehood in central Kyiv. The Kremlin may see this as a way to bolster its negotiating position either way.
Why would Kyiv do this? It is unclear why Ukraine would escalate the conflict by striking Putin’s residence now. Zelensky’s public rhetoric in recent weeks — apart from some tough talk in a Christmas speech, wishing for Putin’s death — has been aimed more at finding a compromise on the most difficult issue, territorial questions. The Ukrainian president has even hinted that he is ready to organize a referendum on the fate of the Donbas. Any attempt to find political logic in an attack on Valdai looks conspiratorial — for example, claims that Ukraine is secretly trying to sabotage negotiations in hopes of securing more favorable peace terms. Additionally, there is no convincing evidence that the attack happened at all.