Russian war hawks demand more devastating strikes on Ukraine

Some analysts suggested that Russian President Vladimir Putin is becoming a hostage of his own allies’ views on how the campaign in Ukraine should unfold.

A medical worker runs past a burning car after a Russian attack in Kyiv, Ukraine (Roman Hrytsyna/AP)

Moscow’s barrage of missile strikes on cities across Ukraine has elicited celebratory comments from Russian officials and pro-Kremlin pundits, who in recent weeks have actively criticised the Russian military for a series of embarrassing setbacks on the battlefield.

Russian nationalist commentators and state media’s war correspondents lauded Monday’s attack as an appropriate, and long-awaited, response to Ukraine’s successful counter-offensive in the north-east and the south and a weekend attack on a key bridge between Russia and Crimea, the prized Black Sea peninsula Russia annexed in 2014.