Russia targeted Ukraine overnight with 574 drones and 40 missiles, the Ukrainian Air Force said. Most of the weapons were intercepted by Ukraine’s air defenses, but the massive assault was far from unusual, and officials said at least one person was killed and 15 injured.
Ukrainian officials said the Russian attack hit energy infrastructure, private homes, an American electronics factory — where President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the 15 injuries were sustained, and a kindergarten.
“Last night, the Russian army set one of its insane anti-records. They struck civilian infrastructure, residential buildings, and our people,” Zelenskyy said in a message posted on social media. He called the electronics plant an “American investment” and an “ordinary civilian enterprise” producing “everyday items as coffee machines.”
“This is also a target for the Russians. Very telling. The fire is still being extinguished at the enterprise. As of now, 15 people are known to have been affected by this strike. All of them have been provided with the necessary assistance,” he said.
Emergency services and firefighting teams work at the scene after a Russian missile attack hit a U.S.-owned factory in Zakarpattia, Ukraine, Aug. 21, 2025. / Credit: Ukrainian Presidency/Handout/Anadolu/Getty
Alluding to President Trump’s efforts to broker a peace deal to end the war, including the bilateral summit between Mr. Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin just a week earlier, Zelenskyy condemned Moscow for launching the new strike “as if nothing had changed at all. As if there were no efforts by the world to stop this war.”
“A response is needed,” he added. “So far, there has been no signal from Moscow that they are really going to engage in meaningful negotiations and end this war. Pressure is needed. Strong sanctions, strong tariffs.”
There has been a lot of talk — outside of Ukraine — about a peace deal amid Mr. Trump’s ramped-up diplomacy. But inside Ukraine, people continue to live and die in a war zone more than three years after Russia launched its full-scale invasion. Many in the country, like their president, simply don’t believe that Putin really wants to end the war. They think he’s just playing along with the ceasefire narrative to avoid angering Mr. Trump.
And in the meantime, Putin’s army continues to expand its massive seizure of territory in eastern Ukraine. The Russian defense ministry claimed Thursday that forces had captured yet another village in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region.
A map of Ukraine shows the percentage of different regions under Russian control, displayed in the Oval Office during President Trump’s meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders, on Aug. 18, 2025. / Credit: BBC News
Major Taras Berezovets of the Ukrainian forces told CBS News that even if Putin were to agree to a ceasefire, the Russian leader simply should not be trusted.
“Absolutely not,” Berezovets told CBS News. “He’s a cheater, he’s a criminal… and he would never accept the fact that independent Ukraine still exists.”
That is why Ukraine wants security guarantees — a promise of protection from the U.S. and its NATO allies in the event Russia should invade again after any eventual ceasefire is implemented.
President Trump has been adamant that such a guarantee would not involve U.S. boots on the ground, and Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday that Europe would have to bear most of the costs.
But getting all sides, including Russia, to agree to those security guarantees may be next to impossible. After his meeting with Putin, Mr. Trump met with Zelenskyy and European leaders in Washington to hold separate talks.
But Moscow has downplayed the prospects of a Putin-Zelenskyy summit any time soon, and officials have said Russia should be included in any looming discussions on security guarantees for Ukraine.
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