Inside Putin’s campaign of ‘psychological terror’ in Kyiv: Why Russia keeps bombarding the capital
Less than two weeks after Donald Trump promised an end to the bloodshed in Ukraine, Russia pounded Kyiv with the second worst aerial assault of the war so far on Thursday – killing at least 23 people and injuring 48.
Residents of the Ukrainian capital, which lies hundreds of miles from the frontline, have been forced to adapt to a constant cycle of devastating missile and drone strikes since the beginning of the war in February 2022. The sound of air raid sirens and bomb shelters have become a daily reality.
In the past few months, Russia has ramped up strikes on towns and cities in a move experts say is a deliberate attempt to sow fear among civilians and break their morale.
“Russia is pressuring Ukraine through psychological methods and intimidation. This is a strategy to exhaust our moral and instil psychological terror,” Liliya Sky, from Kyiv, told The Independent.
“It is a methodical, constant campaign of moral and physical exhaustion so that people surrender and agree to give up territories for the sake of simply ending the war,” the PhD student said.
“But Ukrainians have a different mentality: I would rather die than submit.”
At least 100 buildings, including a shopping mall, were damaged in the overnight attack. Rescuers dug through rubble on Kyiv’s left bank to recover bodies while firefighters battled blazes in residential buildings.
Keir Giles, a fellow of the Russia and Eurasia programme at Chatham House, told The Independent that Moscow was seeking to “cause the maximum possible misery and suffering among the civilian population”.
“That’s the principle we saw applied in Syria, in Chechnya, and in countless others of Moscow’s wars dating back decades and centuries,” he said.
Natia Seskuria, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), said that the “systematic targeting of civilian infrastructure forms a central element of Russia’s strategy, designed to terrorise the Ukrainian population and erode public morale.”
“The underlying calculation is that a war-weary society, subjected to sustained attacks, might exert pressure on the government to accept almost any settlement that promises an end to hostilities,” she told The Independent.
“Thus far, however, this strategy has proven ineffective, as Ukrainians have demonstrated remarkable resilience and determination in the face of ongoing aggression.”
Some 629 missiles and drones hit Ukraine on Thursday, most of which hit the capital city.
Only one other Russian air attack has surpassed this scale since June: an attack comprised of 741 missiles and drones on 9 July which targeted the city of Lutsk.
