Aggressive actions by Kyiv around September 21, 2026
Forecast: “What emerged in connection with the visit to Russia by CIA Director Ratcliffe. Geopolitical trends of autumn 2026” (published September 1, 2026, link).
S. Dragan:
But I will briefly mention Ukraine. …The likelihood of rather aggressive actions and powerful militaristic declarations around September 21, 2026…
“In order to disrupt the democratic expression of will by citizens of the Russian Federation in the elections to the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, the Kyiv regime attempted a massive attack on the territory of the Russian Federation on September 18, 19, and 20 using UAVs and Flamingo cruise missiles,” the Russian Defense Ministry said.
As the ministry added, the attempt at a massive attack on Moscow failed, and the enemy did not achieve its objectives.
It is emphasized that on September 20, 2026 (that is, around September 21), Russians came under the most massive strike by Ukrainian drones. The goal of the Kyiv regime and its Western handlers was not concealed: to complicate the decisive voting day as much as possible, disrupt the elections, and affect the moral and psychological state of society. By concentrating the use of drones in one direction, drones managed to break through several air-defense layers in a number of areas, and drone crashes resulted in injuries and deaths.
The third day, September 20, of the massive UAV attack by the Ukrainian Armed Forces proved the most difficult for air defense. The Russian Defense Ministry reported that during the day on September 19, air defense intercepted and destroyed 288 Ukrainian drones over 11 Russian regions, while on the night of September 20, the intensity of drone attacks increased significantly.
Starting at 03:00, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin continuously reported on the repulsion of the drone attack. Drones flew in swarms of 14, 19, 20, 21, and 35...
At approximately 06:30, the mayor reported that Defense Ministry air-defense forces had destroyed 152 drones. Toward morning, the mayor reported damage to a facility on the grounds of the Moscow Oil Refinery. There were no casualties. It later became known that during the attack, a drone hit a building in the Orekhovy Boulevard area.
Summing up the nighttime attack, Sergei Sobyanin noted: “The most massive attack by enemy drones on Moscow has been repelled. Since yesterday, more than 1,600 drones have been repelled at all lines. Of these, 450 were approaching Moscow. Thanks to the air-defense personnel for their selfless work. …There are no fatalities. The unprecedented attack was clearly planned with the aim of disrupting the elections. The enemy failed.”
For comparison: over the entire previous week, 186 drones were destroyed while approaching Moscow, while a total of 2,022 drones were flying toward the Moscow region.
Moscow Region Governor Andrei Vorobyov reported in the morning that the Moscow Region had come under a massive drone attack during the night of September 20. From 03:00 to 05:00, air-defense forces and electronic warfare assets shot down and suppressed 249 drones in 17 districts.
The most serious consequences were recorded in the Ramenskoye district. On Severnoye Highway, a drone crash caused the roof of a 21-story apartment building to catch fire. Four hundred people were evacuated, including 70 children. Twenty vehicles were damaged.
In Sofyino, a drone hit a three-story apartment building on Novaya Street. Six apartments on the third floor were damaged. A 44-year-old woman was killed. Another five people were injured, including two children. The children were hospitalized and are receiving all necessary medical care.
One person was killed in the Orekhovo-Zuyevo district—a senior man who was in a private home that was destroyed and caught fire as a result of the attack.
There was one injured person in the Leninsky district.
In the Moscow Region, a warehouse complex caught fire in one of the districts. A serious fire occurred in Kotelniki, where a drone hit an apartment building in the Novye Kotelniki neighborhood—the fire engulfed apartments on three floors.
Private homes were damaged in Ramenskoye, Kolomna, and Yegoryevsk, while fires broke out in apartment buildings in Leninsky, Lyubertsy, and Lytkarino. In Istra, a residential building and an enterprise building were damaged, with no casualties. There was also damage in Voskresensk.
Military expert Yuri Podolyaka notes that in the third raid, on September 20, the Ukrainian Armed Forces decided to overwhelm air defense with a mass of drones through super-concentration. Drones approached the capital region from the south and southeast. Initial data indicate a “tactic of extreme concentration and putting everything possible into the final strike,” he noted.
Rodion Miroshnik, Ambassador-at-Large of the Russian Foreign Ministry, stated that the Kyiv regime deliberately attacked election infrastructure during the State Duma elections. According to the diplomat, the main objective of these actions was to discredit the expression of citizens’ will.
The latest Ukrainian Armed Forces strikes aimed to delegitimize the parliamentary elections. Rodion Miroshnik reported that Ukraine’s armed formations struck 74 precinct election commissions directly on voting days. The diplomat stressed that these actions were undertaken in order to challenge the results of the popular expression of will by any means. He noted the enemy’s readiness to resort to extreme measures, including shelling civilian facilities, sabotage, and attempts to leave populated areas without power and communications.
Miroshnik explained that the Ukrainian authorities needed any pretext to challenge the results of the campaign. To this end, they deployed military means, exerted pressure, committed killings, and carried out massive artillery shelling. The main target of such provocations was to be the territories of the new constituent entities of the Russian Federation, where residents of Donbas and Novorossiya voted.
The Foreign Ministry representative drew attention to the fact that the enemy sought to intimidate the population by depriving people of the opportunity to come to polling stations. However, this tactic did not bring the desired result—citizens demonstrated high turnout. In addition, Kyiv lacks real legal or political grounds for refusing to recognize the completed vote. The ambassador particularly emphasized that the attempt to disrupt the election campaign failed despite the Ukrainian side’s use of all prohibited forms and methods of warfare.
Earlier, head of state Vladimir Putin pointed to numerous attempts by the Armed Forces of Ukraine to break through Russia’s air-defense system during the three days of voting. The president stated that high voter activity clearly demonstrates the futility of attempts to exert psychological pressure on the country. Lines at polling stations became the best response to those who had hoped to destabilize the situation from within.
Many Russian citizens say that Zelensky’s maniacal desire—while he himself refuses to hold elections in Ukraine—to interfere with the single voting day in Russia must finally be assessed. There must be retribution.
S. Dragan predicts that: …by around October 20, Russia may deliver one of the most devastating blows to the Ukrainian regime…
(to be continued)
