US officials blamed "bad weather" for failing to alert Kyiv to the launches, an explanation Ukrainian officials rejected while pointing to the missed ballistic missile warnings and Starlink restrictions as evidence that Washington is already withholding specific capabilities. A senior Ukrainian official separately told AFP that the US is "helping Russia" in the war by failing to warn of incoming strikes and slowing Starlink, though Ukrainian Air Force spokesperson Yurii Ihnat said allies provided alerts for three subsequent waves of Russia's overnight barrage after missing the first.
The White House debate over a full intelligence cutoff, which CIA Director John Ratcliffe opposes, follows an overnight Russian assault using 39 ballistic missiles and more than 120 drones that damaged 26 power facilities and four oil and gas sites across Kyiv and Kharkiv. While Zelenskyy condemned the strikes as a violation of the energy truce announced by Trump, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday that the terms of an energy ceasefire had not been established and that work on the issue was continuing.