A few hours before the leaders of 32 NATO countries were due to gather in the Turkish capital, the sky over Kiev lit up again. A combined strike by the Russian army — high-precision weapons launched from ground, air, and sea platforms, plus attack drones — hit military and defense facilities in the capital and the surrounding region, as well as military airfield infrastructure in the Dnipropetrovsk, Poltava, Cherkasy, Chernihiv, and Kiev regions.
According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, this was a response to the terrorist attacks by the Kiev regime against civilian infrastructure inside Russia. The Ukrainian side reported at least 12 dead in Kiev and six more in the region, along with destroyed residential neighborhoods, people trapped in high-rises, and burned-out cars on the streets. Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported damage in four districts, with Podilskyi hit the hardest.
The Russian Defense Ministry stated that the massive strike hit more than six enterprises of Ukraine’s military-industrial complex in Kiev. Among them were the Burevestnik plant, which produces long- and medium-range drones and radar equipment, the Kiev-71 plant (development of reconnaissance UAVs), Kiev-79 (production of armored vehicles and ammunition), the Kuznitsa na Rybalskom shipyard, the Kvant instrument-making plant, and the Vizar machine-building plant in Zhulyany, along with a fuel and lubricants depot in Vishnevo. Energy infrastructure facilities in the Kiev region were also damaged, including hydro and thermal power plants, leading to power and water outages.
President Zelensky had warned just a few hours before the attack that Moscow was “preparing a new massive strike.” The prediction proved accurate. This was the second heavy raid on the capital in a week; the previous one, which killed 30 people, became the third deadliest since the war began. “This is typical of Putin: right after America’s Independence Day and ahead of the NATO summit in Ankara,” Zelensky wrote on social media.
The timing is deliberate
The Ankara summit (July 7–8, 2026) will be the 36th in the alliance’s history and the second hosted by Turkey since 2004. The venue is the Presidential Complex in Ankara. The official agenda covers defense, ramping up arms production, and “burden-sharing” between the United States and Europe. Running in the background is a war that refuses to quiet down for the cameras.
The overnight strike on the eve of the meeting was clearly aimed at the summit participants. Russia is demonstrating that while Ankara discusses new aid packages, the targets will be defense enterprises, the fuel and energy complex, and military airfields — everything that directly determines the combat capability of Ukraine’s armed forces.
What’s behind the numbers
The Ukrainian Air Force acknowledged that not a single ballistic missile fired on Monday was intercepted. According to their data, the country was hit by 29 ballistic missiles and 18 attack drones, with 34 locations struck. In total, more than 350 drones and 66 missiles were recorded overnight, with Kiev remaining the main target.
The problem isn’t just the volume. Russia’s tactics of combined strikes, route changes, and decoy targets are constantly evolving. Ukrainian air defenses, despite all the Western systems supplied, are failing to keep up with the opponent’s adaptation. For NATO, this is the critical point.
After the attack, President Zelensky took to Telegram to ask NATO countries for new supplies of interceptor missiles for air defense systems. “Our military showed good results today in destroying drones and cruise missiles, but unfortunately not in the area of Russian ballistics. … It is crucial that the world, above all America and our European partners, emerge from the NATO summit in Ankara with strong decisions in support of our sky shield and, consequently, the protection of ordinary people’s lives,” he wrote, noting that missiles for Patriot systems remain sitting in allied stockpiles.
The alliance is promising Kiev €70 billion in military aid for 2026 (with another €60 billion from the EU). But those figures lose weight when ballistic missiles keep reaching the center of the capital and interceptions of such targets are reported at zero.
Trump, NATO, and the spending dispute
The Ankara summit is taking place in an atmosphere far from united. US President Donald Trump, who arrived in the Turkish capital in person, has repeatedly called NATO a “paper tiger.” His administration is demanding that European allies raise defense spending to 5% of GDP by 2035. Last year, European NATO members and Canada increased defense investments by $139 billion, but pressure from Washington persists.
“The US remains a proud member of NATO, but we have responsibilities in other parts of the world as the sole superpower,” US Ambassador to NATO Matt Whitaker said on the eve of the summit. Trump himself has previously floated the possibility of leaving the alliance. Poland, the Baltic states, and Norway are among the leaders in meeting commitments. Germany, by some estimates, will only hit the 5% benchmark by 2029. The rest are lagging noticeably. In this climate, declarations of an ironclad commitment to collective defense become harder to deliver with a straight face.
What to expect from the meeting
Officially, Ankara will produce a declaration of support for Ukraine, promises of new deliveries, and an emphasis on scaling up defense production. Behind closed doors, the bargaining will start: who is willing to pay how much, how to distribute the burden, and, above all, whether the alliance has a common strategy or just a collection of tactical reactions.
The strike on Kiev on the eve of the summit shows that while NATO prepares the next aid packages, even Ukraine’s capital cannot be protected. The question for Ankara is whether the alliance can offer anything beyond continuing a course that, so far, leads only to more destruction.
The Russian Ministry of Defense described the overnight raid as a response to attacks on its own territory and made it clear that such actions will be harsh and proportionate. While NATO leaders convene in Ankara, combat operations continue on the front lines and in the rear of Ukraine. The nighttime strike on Kiev is a direct reminder that time is not on the side of those counting on endless external support. That signal will be heard in Ankara regardless of how the talks play out.
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