Ukraine on Wednesday, October 14, accused the United States of helping Russia by failing to warn it of incoming missile strikes and by hobbling its military response through changes to the Starlink system it uses on the battlefield, AFP reported. Ballistic missiles struck Kyiv two nights running before air raid sirens could sound in time.
A senior official in Kyiv confirmed to AFP that the United States had in recent days threatened to stop providing intelligence about Russian missile launches that Ukraine uses to thwart attacks. President Donald Trump denied doing so on Tuesday. "It's obvious they are helping Russia for some reason," the official told AFP.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, speaking to British journalist Piers Morgan, called on Elon Musk to restore Starlink, saying he hoped it was a mistake or a huge technical problem. Musk said the Starshield system Ukraine relies on for battlefield communications is owned and controlled by the US government, and that any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately the president. Former Ukrainian defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov later said Starlink operation was being restored.
The Kyiv Independent, citing Ukrainian and American sources, reported that no decision had been taken to cut intelligence sharing. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said on October 13 that the cooperation continues. A senior Ukrainian official said US counterparts told Kyiv they had not seen the launch. Fabian Hoffmann of the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies told the outlet that launch-detecting satellites are highly reliable but can be impaired by dense, unusually high cloud cover.
AFP said 15 people were killed across the country in the latest strikes, while damage to energy facilities cut power to large parts of Kyiv. Power plants in the Kharkiv region were hit by ballistic missiles, and Zhytomyr, Sumy and Chernihiv were also struck. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia was carefully noting the developments but that it was too early to draw systemic conclusions.