warfare

Moscow is accused of running sabotage and espionage operations across Europe, targeting nations supporting Ukraine.

Authorities in Poland have arrested eight individuals across the country on suspicion of espionage and sabotage.

In a brief statement on social media, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on Tuesday that the case is developing and that “further operational activities are ongoing” without providing further details.

The detentions come amid accusations that Russia is operating a network of spies and saboteurs across Europe.

Referring to the prime minister’s post, the coordinator of Poland’s special services, Tomasz Siemoniak, said that the detained people are suspected of engaging in espionage and planning attacks.

They were arrested due to “conducting reconnaissance of military facilities and critical infrastructure, preparing resources for sabotage, and directly carrying out attacks”, he said.

While Warsaw has not directly linked the arrests, officials have said previously that Poland has been targeted with such attacks in a “hybrid war” waged by Russia to destabilise nations supporting Ukraine.

Several other European countries have also pointed the finger at Moscow as they have suffered similar attacks since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Polish authorities have detained dozens of people over suspected sabotage and espionage over the past three years or so.

Moscow denies the accusations, insisting that they are the result of “Russophobia”.

In May last year, Polish authorities arrested three men for an arson attack. In September, Lithuanian prosecutors broke up a network that they said planned arson and explosive attacks in several European Union states.

The same month, Latvia’s security service announced the detention of a man suspected of passing military intelligence to Russia, and British police arrested three people suspected of running sabotage and espionage operations for Russia.

The United Kingdom has also repeatedly accused Russia of orchestrating sabotage and spy operations on its soil and beyond. The Kremlin has accused London of blaming Moscow for “anything bad that happens”.

Drones increasing concern

This autumn, drone incursions have added to the European security concerns, with Belgium, Denmark and Germany among several countries reporting sightings.

The incursions provoked airport closures in both Germany and Denmark.

“We are at the beginning of a hybrid war against Europe,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said. “I think we are going to see more of it … We see the pattern, and it does not look good,” she added.

Tusk pledged to urgently upgrade Poland’s air defences after NATO forces shot down several drones over his country last month.

The European Union, recognising the inefficiency of using multimillion-euro weapons to battle cheap drones, has reacted to the incursions with proposals to develop a “drone wall” on its eastern borders.

New pictures offer the best look to date of an Air Force HC-130J Combat King II combat search and rescue aircraft (CSAR) carrying an Angry Kitten electronic warfare pod. Originally developed to simulate enemy electronic warfare attacks during training and testing, Angry Kitten has been evolving into a system that could help protect friendly aircraft from those threats during real combat missions. Pairing HC-130Js and the pods is now being eyed as part of the answer to an increasingly vexing question of how to provide adequate CSAR coverage for future operations in and around heavily contested airspace.

Fred Taleghani of FreddyB Aviation Photography caught the HC-130J Combat King II with the Angry Kitten pod flying around Point Mugu, California, back on September 11. The aircraft in question belongs to the California Air National Guard’s 129th Rescue Wing, which is based at Moffett Federal Airfield, situated some 275 miles to the northwest. HC-130Js can support CSAR missions in various ways, including by helping to deploy pararescuemen, refueling HH-60W Jolly Green IIs and other helicopters, as well as Osprey tilt-rotors, in mid-air, and acting as airborne command and control nodes.

The Angry Kitten pod is seen mounted via a Special Airborne Mission Installation and Response (SABIR) system installed in place of the HC-130J’s left rear paratrooper door. SABIR includes a pylon on an arm that can be extended below the aircraft’s fuselage while in flight, giving whatever is loaded onto it a more unobstructed field of view. The replacement paratrooper door also features an enlarged observer’s window. It can be fitted with a chute for launching sonobouys, smoke markers, and other similar tubular payloads, though it is not clear if that capability is installed on this Combat King II. The port for the chute is visible, but it may be blanked off. The U.S. military and foreign armed forces use SABIR as a relatively simple way to integrate other sensors and systems onto different C-130 variants, as you can read more about here.

The Angry Kitten-toting HC-130J is understood to have been in the Point Mugu area at the time to take part in the U.S. Navy-led Gray Flag 2025 test and evaluation exercise, which ran between September 5 and 19. It was staged out of Naval Base Ventura County and involved sorties over the expansive Point Mugu Sea Range. Gray Flags are regularly used to showcase new and improved munitions and other advanced capabilities, such as electronic warfare systems, including ones that are still in development. Units from across the U.S. military, as well as key American allies, routinely take part. Combat King IIs have participated in these exercises in the past.

As noted, Angry Kitten is not new. Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) began development of the podded system in 2013, and it first started flying under the wings of F-16 Viper fighters in 2017. Angry Kitten is an outgrowth of the AN/ALQ-167 electronic warfare pod, variants of which have been in use for decades, primarily to mimic hostile electronic warfare threats for training and testing purposes. There are also documented examples of AN/ALQ-167s being used on aircraft during actual combat missions, at least on an ad hoc basis.

Unlike the older AN/ALQ-167s, Angry Kitten is designed to be more readily modifiable and updatable to more rapidly adapt in parallel with the threat ecosystem. This is enabled in part by advanced Digital Radio Frequency Memory (DRFM) technology, which allows radio frequency (RF) signals to be detected and ‘captured,’ as well as manipulated and retransmitted. Electronic warfare systems that use DRFM can project signals from hostile radars (and radar seekers on missiles) back at them to create false or otherwise confusing tracks. Data collected via DRFM can also be used to help improve and refine the system’s capabilities, as well as for other intelligence exploitation purposes.

In general, electronic warfare systems need to be able to accurately detect, categorize, and respond to waveforms based on information contained in their built-in threat libraries to work most effectively. This, in turn, requires specialists to routinely reprogram systems to keep them as up to date as possible. Automating and otherwise shortening that process at every step of the way by developing what are known as cognitive electronic warfare capabilities has become a major area of interest for the entire U.S. military. The absolute ‘holy grail’ of that concept is an electronic warfare system capable of adapting its programming autonomously in real-time, even in the middle of a mission, as you can read more about here.

With all this in mind, and given prior operational use of the AN/ALQ-167, it’s not hard to see how interest has grown in using Angry Kitten to help shield friendly aircraft from threats during real-world missions.

“We had a jammer called ‘Angry Kitten.’ It was built to be an adversary air jamming tool,” now-retired Air Force Gen. Mark Kelly, then commander of Air Combat Command (ACC), told TWZ and other outlets back in 2022. “And all of a sudden, the blue team said, ‘you know, hey, we kind of need that, can we have that for us?’ And so I see this iterating and testing our way into this.”

To date, in addition to F-16s and HC-130s, Angry Kitten is known to have flown on Air Force A-10 Warthog ground attack jets and MQ-9 Reaper drones, as well as Navy F/A-18s fighters. As of March, the Air National Guard Air Force Reserve Command Test Center (AATC) said there were plans to at least evaluate the pod on KC-135 and KC-46 aerial refueling tankers.

It’s also interesting to note the parallels here with the U.S. Marine Corps’ Intrepid Tiger II electronic warfare system, which has been fielded in different podded forms for the AV-8B Harrier jump jet and the UH-1Y Venom armed light utility helicopter. A roll-on/roll-off version for the MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor is in development, and there are plans to integrate the capability in some form onto the KC-130J tanker/transport. Different variants of Intrepid Tiger also offer degrees of secondary intelligence-gathering capabilities.

AATC has also explicitly highlighted the potential benefits of combining Angry Kitten with the HC-130J in the context of the CSAR mission.

“Angry Kitten pod is showing promising results in protecting larger radar cross-section (RCS) platforms that traditionally lack robust electronic warfare capabilities,” according to a release AATC put out in March. “This success is particularly significant for combat search and rescue platforms that often operate in contested environments without electronic warfare protection.”

“We had minimal hopes for what we could do for larger body aircraft, but it’s showing that we actually have good effects,” Chris Culver, an electronic warfare engineer involved in the work, had said.

For years now, TWZ has been highlighting growing concerns about the basic feasibility of traditional fixed-wing CSAR aircraft and helicopters performing their mission amid a threat ecosystem that is steadily expanding in scale and scope. Future high-end fights, such as one against China in the Pacific, will involve air operations in areas where even stealthy platforms are expected to be increasingly at risk. In 2022, the Air Force announced it was scaling back purchases of new HH-60W CSAR helicopters in light of this reality. Top service officials have talked in the past about having to approach this still critical mission set differently going forward.

“There are a lot of other assets around that, if somebody goes down at sea, for example, we could use to pick them up,” then-Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall said in 2023. “We’re going to do it [the CSAR mission] with existing assets, either our own or provided by other military departments.”

Many of these same general concerns apply to the Air Force’s existing non-stealthy KC-135 and KC-46 tanker fleets. Air Force officials regularly point to add-on defensive capabilities, which might include Angry Kitten, as one near-term option for increasing the survivability of its key aerial refueling assets.

Integrating Angry Kitten on larger aircraft could have other implications as another important stepping stone for new cognitive electronic warfare capabilities.

“The C-130 testing features innovative real-time updates to electronic warfare techniques,” according to the AATC release in March. “Unlike the F-16 tests, where pre-programmed mission data files were used, the C-130 testing includes development engineers aboard the aircraft who can modify jamming techniques mid-mission based on feedback from range control.”

“They are making changes [in] real-time to the techniques and pushing updates to the pod, seeing the change in real-time,” Culver, the electronic warfare engineer, had also said. “This approach allows for rapid optimization of jamming techniques against various threat systems.”

A follow-on Advanced Test and Training Capability (ATTACK) pod, also referred to unofficially as Angry Kitten Increment 2 Block 2, is also now in the works. The “next-generation system will feature a complete hardware refresh, transitioning from analog to digital receivers for improved sensitivity and frequency agility,” according to AATC.

Altogether, the HC-130J seen carrying the Angry Kitten pod around Point Mugu earlier this month is an important sign of things to come.

Contact the author: [email protected]

German defense startup Helsing unveiled its first major weapons platform on Thursday: the CA-1 Europa, an autonomous combat drone it hopes will compete with American and European defense giants in shaping the future of aerial warfare. The full-size prototype, presented near Munich, will undergo its first test flights in 2027, with operational readiness targeted by 2031.

Weighing four tonnes and designed with a V-tail and angular stealth features, the Europa belongs to the growing class of Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles (UCAVs). These drones, powered by AI and designed to operate either independently or alongside crewed fighter jets in “loyal wingman” formations, reflect a shift toward cheaper, expendable systems that can survive in contested airspaces.

Why It Matters
The Europa marks Germany’s entry into the race for next-generation combat drones, a field already dominated by U.S. firms like General Atomics and startups like Anduril. For Europe, where air defense has become a strategic priority amid Russia’s war in Ukraine, the project signals an attempt to reduce reliance on U.S. platforms and create indigenous systems that match NATO’s evolving needs.

The unveiling also highlights the accelerating role of AI in military operations. Unlike traditional drones used for reconnaissance or strikes, UCAVs are designed for complex missions: jamming enemy radar, acting as decoys, or swarming in coordination with other drones. Their relatively low cost compared to fighter jets, Helsing says “a fraction” makes them attractive to militaries facing budget pressures and the risk of attrition in high-intensity conflict.

What Can Happen Next
If successful, Helsing’s project could become a cornerstone of a more integrated European defense-industrial base. The company has pledged hundreds of millions of euros in investment and partnerships with other European firms, potentially aligning with EU initiatives to foster defense autonomy. However, challenges remain: regulatory hurdles over autonomous weapons, questions about AI ethics in combat, and competition from established aerospace giants.

For NATO, the Europa represents both opportunity and uncertainty. It may bolster Europe’s credibility within the alliance, but also raises thorny debates about the pace of automation in warfare. As Ukraine’s battlefield has shown, drone innovation moves faster than regulation, meaning Helsing’s Europa could become a test case for how Europe balances military necessity with democratic oversight.

With information from Reuters

A first-person view (FPV) type quadcopter drone controlled via a fiber optic cable was among the participants in a U.S. Navy-led exercise earlier this year focused on exploring new distributed electronic warfare capabilities. Fiber optic kamikaze FPVs, which Russia first began using in Ukraine last year and have now become a fixture on both sides of that conflict, are notably immune to jamming and many other forms of electronic warfare.

The Michigan National Guard released pictures yesterday of the fiber optic FPV and other uncrewed systems that took part in Exercise Silent Swarm 25. The event itself took place back in July at the Alpena Combat Readiness Training Center (CRTC) in Alpena, Michigan. The Navy’s Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division (NSWC Crane) has been holding Silent Swarm events annually at the Alpena CRTC in cooperation with the Michigan National Guard and other elements of the U.S. military since 2022.

“During the series of technology experiments, private companies, academic institutions, and military organizations used swarms of unmanned systems to ‘attack’ and ‘defend’ locations in Thunder Bay, off the coast of Alpena in Lake Huron,” according to a press release on the exercise the Michigan National Guard put out today. “As the two forces conducted their operations, all parties collected data on which technologies offered the greatest advantages.”

“The hypothesis for Silent Swarm is to identify those systems that can outmatch and have an impact in the most challenging environments,” Rob Gamberg, project lead for Silent Swarm at Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division (NSWC Crane), also said in a statement. “We are learning from each other with every iteration, which is exactly what we hope to see.”

“Silent Swarm is a series of events focused on experimentation with early development Electromagnetic Spectrum Operations (EMSO) capabilities that can be employed on attritable, multi-domain Unmanned Systems (UxS),” NSWC Crane also said in call for participants in Silent Swarm 25 that it put out last year. “The Silent Swarm series provides a challenging and flexible experimentation environment to enable rapid development of emerging technology. Selected participants will be able to further develop their technologies while operating in an operationally relevant sandbox environment alongside subject matter experts (SMEs) from joint operational and technical communities.”

How many total fiber optic FPVs took part in Silent Swarm 25, and whether they were used as ‘attackers’ or ‘defenders,’ or both, is unclear. However, their inclusion in the exercise at all makes good sense. As noted, Russia first began using FPVs with this kind of control method last year, primarily in response to growing electronic warfare threats.

Fiber optic control offers additional benefits, including a more reliable, secure, and higher-speed link with lower latency (key for FPV operation) that is also immune to cyber intrusion. The hard link helps mitigate the effects of terrain that can interfere with radio control, something that is also a factor for operating drones inside buildings. Fiber optic drones also do not pump out radio frequency emissions that passive sensors can detect, making them harder to spot. The control scheme is not without its own disadvantages, including the potential for the cable to become tangled on or severed by various obstacles. The drones are also not invulnerable, including to laser and microwave directed energy weapons.

Still, Ukrainian forces followed suit in adopting fiber optic FPVs for the same general reasons. Fiber optic cables have also since emerged as a means to control small uncrewed ground vehicles.

“The idea is great, because you are operating in total radio silence, so you cannot be detected by any radar system [passive sensors]. And any electronic warfare means that later on, they are just inefficient,” the commander of the 12th Special Forces Brigade Azov of the Ukrainian National Guard’s Unmanned Systems Battalion, who uses the call sign Yas, told TWZ in an interview in May. “At the same time, the use of fiber optic cables, as with any FPV drone, has its own peculiarities of operation, and if the pilot is not skilled enough, that is going to lead to significant losses in such equipment and systems.”

“I would like to say that at the moment, Russian electronic warfare is undoubtedly one of the leading in the world,” he added. “So I do not want to underestimate the enemy. We need to accept, to acknowledge, the level of the enemy.”

The use of fiber optic FPV in Ukraine has become so commonplace that videos have begun to emerge showing dense, tangled webs of leftover cables littered on the ground.

There are also signs now that fiber optic FPVs may be starting to proliferate outside of Ukraine.

Wow, for the first time, fiber-optic drones have been spotted in use by the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) in Mali, who are fighting against both the Malian Armed Forces and Russia’s Africa Corps/Wagner Group. The drones and training were likely provided by Ukraine, with previous… pic.twitter.com/OxemaEbWwO

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) July 28, 2025

All of this makes them a threat that the U.S. military could be increasingly likely to encounter in various hot spots around the world. It is also a capability that America’s armed forces could itself be interested in employing. Seeing how they perform in an exercise like Silent Swarm could, in turn, be beneficial when it comes to exploring potential countermeasures, including different means of both detecting and defeating them, as well as gaining additional insights into the benefits they could offer in friendly hands.

“We are so far behind,” U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Joseph Ryan, the service’s deputy chief of staff for operations, plans, and training, said in March about the U.S. military’s response to the impact fiber optic drones are already having. Ryan’s comments came during a panel discussion at an Association of the U.S. Army (AUSA) conference.

At the same time, “any Soldier paying attention to technological advances in warfare in Ukraine over the past three years undoubtedly notices a cat and mouse game of drone versus counter-drone scenarios being played out on the battlefield,” an unclassified paper on fiber optic drones that the Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL) published in July, which also highlights Ryan’s comments, notes. “As one side develops a new drone capability giving it tactical advantage for a short period of time, inevitably the other side develops a counter technology to offset that advantage.”

All of this underscores the value of including fiber optic drones in an exercise like Silent Swarm.

“To build an agile, lethal and ready warfighter, we must continuously experiment with and adapt the best technologies the market has to offer,” Army Maj. Gen. Paul D. Rogers, adjutant general and director of the Michigan Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, also said in a statement about Silent Swarm 25. “Events like Silent Swarm are critical for accelerating innovation, allowing the Joint Force to test, train with, and rapidly integrate emerging capabilities to stay ahead of evolving threats and maintain our strategic edge.”

It is worth noting here that Ryan’s comment back in March reflects broader criticism of how the U.S. military had continued to lag behind in the actual fielding of new uncrewed capabilities, in general, especially to smaller units. When it comes to drones, as well as counter-drone systems, America’s armed forces have long seemed mired in endless experimentation and demonstrations. In July, the Pentagon moved to try to finally break those cycles for good with a swath of major policy changes as part of a “Unleashing U.S. Military Drone Dominance” initiative, which you can read more about here.

“Drones are the biggest battlefield innovation in a generation, accounting for most of this year’s casualties in Ukraine. Our adversaries collectively produce millions of cheap drones each year,” Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wrote in a memo kicking off the initiative. “While global military drone production skyrocketed over the last three years, the previous administration deployed red tape. U.S. units are not outfitted with the lethal small drones the modern battlefield requires.”

“Drone technology is advancing so rapidly, our major risk is risk-avoidance,” that memo added. “The Department’s bureaucratic gloves are coming off.”

Silent Swarm separately remains an important part of broader efforts to develop and field new heavily networked electronic warfare capabilities, an area where the U.S. Navy has been making significant investments for years now. Years ago, the Navy outlined a vision for an advanced, multi-faceted, cooperative, and distributed electronic warfare ecosystem as part of an effort once referred to as Netted Emulation of Multi-Element Signature against Integrated Sensors, or NEMSIS, which TWZ was the first to report on. Drones, as well as drone-like decoys, are still seen as key elements of that overarching plan.

Overall, given their growing prominence, fiber optic drones are likely to become a feature in more U.S. military exercises going forward, both as threats and potential friendly assets.

Contact the author: [email protected]

Kyiv, Ukraine – Swarms of Russian kamikaze drones broke through Ukrainian air defence fire early on Tuesday, screeching and shrilling over Kyiv in one of the largest wartime attacks.

Oleksandra Yaremchuk, who lives in the Ukrainian capital, said the hours-long sound of two or perhaps three drones above her house felt new and alarming.

“This horrible buzz is the sound of death, it makes you feel helpless and panicky,” the 38-year-old bank clerk told Al Jazeera, describing her sleepless night in the northern district of Obolon. “This time I heard it in stereo and in Dolby surround,” she quipped.

Back in 2022, she crisscrossed duct tape over her apartment’s windows to avoid being hit by glass shards and spent most of the night in a shaky chair in her hallway.

This week’s Russian attack involved seven missiles and 315 drones – real, explosive-laden ones as well as cheaper decoys that distract and exhaust Ukraine’s air defence, Kyiv’s officials said.

The assault was the third since Ukraine’s June 1 sting to destroy Russia’s fleet of strategic bombers on four airstrips, including those in the Arctic and Siberia.

The wave of attacks also showed Russia’s tactics of overwhelming Ukrainian air defence units with the sheer number of targets that approach from different directions.

“The drones have been evolving for a while, now [the Russians] use massiveness,” Andrey Pronin, one of Ukraine’s drone warfare pioneers who runs a school for drone pilots in Kyiv, told Al Jazeera.

The attack mostly targeted Kyiv, killing one woman, wounding four civilians, damaging buildings in seven districts and causing fires that shrouded predawn Kyiv in rancid smoke.

It damaged the Saint Sophia Cathedral, Ukraine’s oldest, whose construction began a millennium ago after the conversion of Kyivan Rus, a medieval superpower that gave birth to today’s Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.

The onslaught also hit the southern city of Odesa, killing two civilians, wounding nine and striking a maternity ward in the Black Sea port that lies close to annexed Crimea and lacks Kyiv’s Western air defence systems.

‘The Russians learn, every time, after each flight’

The Russia-Ukraine war triggered the evolution of drones that already rewrote the playbook of warfare globally.

While Kyiv focuses on pinpointed strikes on Russian military infrastructure, oil refineries, airstrips and transport hubs, some observers believe Moscow deliberately chooses to strike civilian areas to terrify average Ukrainians – and perfects the strikes’ lethality.

“Of course, [Russians] learn, every time, after each flight. They make conclusions, they review how they flew, where mobile [Ukrainian air defence] groups were,” Pronin said.

To save pricey United States-made anti-drone missiles, Ukraine employs “mobile air defence units” that use truck-mounted machineguns often operated by women and stationed on the outskirts of urban centres.

The Russians “used to fly the drones in twos, now they fly in threes,” Pronin said about the Iranian-made Shahed drones and their modified Russian Geran versions that carry up to 90 kilogrammes of explosives.

Nikolay Mitrokhin, a researcher with Germany’s Bremen University, named three factors that contribute to the harrowing efficiency of recent drone attacks.

Firstly, the number of Russian drones rose dramatically, requiring more air defence power and, most importantly, more ammunition, he told Al Jazeera.

“The latter causes most problems, and after three massive attacks within a week, their number possibly didn’t simply suffice,” he said.

Earlier this week, the White House diverted 20,000 advanced anti-drone missiles intended for Ukraine to Washington’s allies in the Middle East.

Secondly, the Geran (“Geranium”) drones “evolve” and fly more than five kilometres above the ground at a height unreachable to firearms and many surface-to-air missiles, Mitrokhin said.

These days, Gerans have a range of 900km (660 miles) and are linked to their operators via satellite, US-made Starlink terminals smuggled into Russia or even hacked SIM cards of Ukrainian cellphone operators, according to Ukrainian officials and intelligence.

A Russian plant in the Volga River city of Yelabuga started manufacturing Gerans in 2023 and now churns out some 170 of them daily.

Thirdly, Russia uses more decoy drones that waste air defence ammunition, Mitrokhin said.

Therefore, Kyiv “needs massive amounts of drones that could quickly gain the height of five to six kilometres, locate flying Gerans and their analogues and shoot them down”, he said.

Instead, Ukrainian forces have focused on long-distance strike drones such as Lytyi (“Fierce”) that have hit military and naval bases, oil depots, arms factories and metallurgical plants in western Russia, he said.

“Now, Ukraine needs to quickly change its strategy and produce 5,000-10,000 high-flying drone hunters a month. Which is not easy,” he concluded.

‘I felt the return of what we all felt in 2022’

Russia’s attacks underscore Washington’s failure to start the peace settlement of Europe’s largest armed conflict since 1945.

The attacks “drown out the efforts of the United States and others around the world to force Russia into peace,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram, hours after Tuesday’s attack.

US President Donald Trump pledged to end Russia’s war on Ukraine “in 24 hours,” but his administration’s diplomatic efforts yielded no results.

Despite occasional criticism of the Kremlin’s warfare in Ukraine, Trump prefers not to use the White House’s diplomatic and economic arsenal to force Russia to start a peace settlement or even a 30-day ceasefire that Kyiv proposed.

While Washington continued to supply US military aid in accordance with the commitments of President Joe Biden’s administration, Trump’s cabinet did not pledge to provide any additional arms or ammunition shipments.

“This administration takes a very different view of that conflict,” US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told a congressional hearing on Tuesday.

“We believe that a negotiated peaceful settlement is in the best interest of both parties and our nation’s interests, especially with all the competing interests around the globe,” he said, without specifying the extent of cuts.

Trump’s policies leave many Ukrainians reeling.

“He single-handedly lost the Cold War to Putin,” Valerii Omelchenko, a retired police officer in central Kyiv told Al Jazeera. “I honestly can’t fathom how one can be so indecisive and cowardly towards Russia.”

The horror of drone attacks, however, helps further unite Ukrainians, he said.

“In the morning, I felt the return of what we all felt in 2022, when we were treating total strangers like family, asking them how they were, trying to help them,” he said.