First up, the Russian acknowledgement that this happened and Russia's framing of the event from the old propagandists at RT, May 25:
Ukraine attacked key element of Russia’s nuclear umbrella — Russian senatorThe US is so deeply involved in the conflict that it likely knew about Kiev’s plans, Senator Dmitry Rogozin says
The US should be seen as directly responsible for a presumed Ukrainian strike on a key element of Russia’s nuclear umbrella, Senator Dmitry Rogozin has said, warning that such attacks could lead to the collapse of the entire global nuclear security architecture.
In a statement on Telegram on Saturday, Rogozin, a senator who previously headed up the Russian space agency Roscosmos and is now in charge of a military technical center called Tsar’s Wolves, said that the apparent attack targeted a nuclear early warning system in the southern Krasnodar Region. The Russian Defense Ministry has yet to comment on the matter, while the extent of the damage remains unclear.
Although Rogozin did admit the possibility that Kiev acted alone in the presumed attack, he said it was extremely unlikely that the strike, which Ukrainian media reported involved several drones, was carried out without US involvement.
According to the senator, Washington has always sought to achieve military superiority over Moscow since the very dawn of the nuclear age, but this rivalry was mostly limited to a battle of minds between scientists, strategists, and policymakers.
This seems to have changed, however, as “the US has commissioned a crime by hiring an irresponsible bandit” to attack Russia’s early warning system, the official said, apparently referring to Vladimir Zelensky.
Rogozin claimed that Washington’s “deep involvement in the armed conflict and total control over Kiev’s military planning means that the version that the US does not know about Ukrainian plans to strike Russia’s missile defense system can be discarded.”....
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Next up, American acknowledgement that this happened and America's framing of the event from the old propagandists at the Washington Post, May 29:
U.S. concerned about Ukraine strikes on Russian nuclear radar stationsWashington conveyed to Kyiv that attacks on Russian early-warning systems could be destabilizing.
The United States fears that recent Ukrainian drone strikes targeting Russian nuclear early-warning systems could dangerously unsettle Moscow at a time when the Biden administration is weighing whether to lift restrictions on Ukraine using U.S.-supplied weapons in cross-border attacks.
“The United States is concerned about Ukraine’s recent strikes against Russian ballistic missile early-warning sites,” said a U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity.
Washington has conveyed its concerns to Kyiv about two attempted attacks over the last week against radar stations that provide conventional air defense as well as warning of nuclear launches by the West. At least one strike in Armavir, in Russia’s southeastern Krasnodar region, appeared to have caused some damage.
“These sites have not been involved in supporting Russia’s war against Ukraine,” the U.S. official said. “But they are sensitive locations because Russia could perceive that its strategic deterrent capabilities are being targeted, which could undermine Russia’s ability to maintain nuclear deterrence against the United States.”
A Ukrainian official familiar with the matter, however, said that Russia has used the radar sites to monitor the Ukrainian military’s activities, particularly Kyiv’s use of aerial weaponry, such as drones and missiles. The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive security matter, confirmed that Ukraine’s Military Intelligence Directorate, known by its initials as GUR, was responsible for the strikes.
Ukraine is facing a continuing threat to its existence from a Russian enemy force — which boasts the world’s largest nuclear arsenal — that has gained ground of late, in part due to its sophisticated radar and weapons-jamming technology, which has rendered virtually useless some U.S.-provided guided missiles and artillery shells. This capability has also enhanced Moscow’s ability to track British and U.S.-provided longer-range weaponry and drones, which have caused serious damage to Russia’s Black Sea fleet and military installations in Crimea, the southern peninsula illegally seized from Ukraine in 2014.
The Ukrainian official said the goal of the strikes was to diminish Russia’s ability to track the Ukrainian military’s activities in southern Ukraine. The drone that targeted the radar station near Orsk, in Russia’s Orenburg region along Kazakhstan’s northern border, traveled more than 1,100 miles, making it one of the deepest attempted strikes into Russian territory. The Ukrainian official declined to say whether the strike, on May 26, caused any damage....
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Finally, the source for the links above, Andrew Korybko's substack, May 31:
Is Ukraine Going Rogue Or Did It Attack Russia’s Early Warning Systems With American Approval?Russia’s answer to this question will determine its response to any conventional NATO intervention in Ukraine.
Russian-US relations deteriorated further than ever in late May as a result of three developments. First, the US set the ball rolling by more openly allowing Ukraine to use its arms to strike targets inside of Russia, then Poland said that the US will hit all of Russia’s forces in the special operation zone if Moscow uses nukes, and finally, President Putin signaled that he expects NATO to majorly escalate the conflict by sometime this summer. All of this is bad enough, but it’s made even worse by what Ukraine just did.
Russia confirmed that Ukraine hit at least one of its early nuclear warning systems, while Kiev claims to have targeted a second one deeper inside its opponent’s hinterland that hasn’t (yet?) been confirmed. These structures detect incoming intercontinental ballistic missiles of the sort that could be launched by the US in the scenario of a first strike, thus enabling Russia to prepare for an inevitable second strike. They have nothing to do with the Ukrainian Conflict and everything to do with strategic stability.
Both reportedly remain operable, but this nevertheless represents an unprecedented development since never before has any country ever targeted another’s such systems, which could partially blind them to a first strike in the worst-case scenario and thus give the attacking party a huge edge in that event. The further deterioration of Russian-US relations that occurred independently of this development raised tensions to their highest level since the Cuban Missile Crisis so this couldn’t have come at a worse time.
The most important question in the world right now is whether Ukraine is going rogue, perhaps to provoke a crisis like the aforesaid one in the expectation that it could force Russia to withdraw from at least some of the territory that Kiev claims as its own, or if this was done with American approval. The Washington Post’s report about how US officials are concerned about what Ukraine just did lends credence to the first view, but that might just be disinformation for plausible deniability purposes.
At the same time, however, it’s worth remembering how Ukraine defied the US’ public demands not to target Russian oil refineries. The Biden Administration doesn’t want that commodity’s price to spike ahead of the November elections, yet Zelensky still ordered his forces to hit refineries anyhow. That also came amidst the Congressional deadlock over more Ukraine aid that was resolved shortly after those strikes became problematic. It therefore wouldn’t be unprecedented for Ukraine to go rogue yet again....
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The Zelensky administration knows that doing so would cost them their power, their country and probably their lives. And the example of the strikes on the Russian oil refineries is quite possibly misdirection. It's likely that there are political or geo-political, strategic or grand-strategic reasons for wanting lower gasoline supplies.
Nobody I've heard or read commenting on the subjects is in a position to either: 1) know, or 2) if they do know, speak honestly on the matter.
*Unfortunately for me, when Alaska Governor and Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin published her memoir it was titled "Going Rogue: An American Life" which I misread as "Going Rouge...".
Then a few years later there were the memes of Vladimir Putin in make-up and even though the most famous one doesn't show the blusher on his cheeks, just some work on the eyes and lips, it's what comes to mind when I see 'going rouge' and from there it descends into into a philosophical unseriousness, not really suitable for a haute blog like Climateer Investing:
Here's one with
