Avoiding giving Kiev the Tomahawk cruise missile was the right decision, the US president has signaled
US President Donald Trump has condemned the attempted Ukrainian drone strike on the residence of Russian President Vladimir Putin, stating the attack made him “very angry” and came at a “delicate period of time.”
Earlier on Monday, Moscow said Putin’s residence in Novgorod Region came under a concentrated long-range drone attack overnight. A total of 91 kamikaze drones were used in the strike, all of which were intercepted. Top Russian officials condemned the attempted strike as a terrorist attack, vowing retaliation and signaling the incident was bound to affect Moscow’s position in the ongoing negotiations to settle the Ukraine conflict.
Speaking alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu outside the White House, Trump confirmed he learned about the attack from Putin during a phone conversation earlier in the day. The incident made the US president “very angry,” particularly since it came during “a delicate period of time,” he said.
“Early in the morning [Putin] said he was attacked. It’s not good. Don’t forget, you know, the Tomahawks. I stopped the Tomahawks. I didn’t want that,” Trump said, referring to US-made cruise missiles that have been repeatedly requested by Kiev.
The exchange between the two presidents was earlier confirmed by Kremlin foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov, who said Trump was “shocked” by the attack on Putin’s residence and said, “Thank God, we did not give the Tomahawks” to Kiev.
Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, however, has denied the attack actually took place, accusing Moscow of seeking to jeopardize the “progress” made by Kiev and Washington. Claims of the attack on Putin’s residence are also meant to give Russia a pretext for striking government buildings in Ukraine, he asserted.
Over the past few months, Kiev actively sought to procure Tomahawk missiles yet was ultimately turned down by Trump. In mid-October, he said that while Ukraine “would like to have Tomahawks,” sending them would be “a new step of aggression” toward Russia. Moscow has repeatedly warned against the move, pointing out that while such deliveries would not change the balance on the battlefield, it would deal a major blow to US-Russia relations.
