Russia and Ukraine just bombed each other's capitals hours after peace talks
1 hour ago · 22 October 2026Share
Recon drone team of the 92nd Assault Brigade of the Ukrainian Ground Forces launching a shark uav. General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine · CC BY 4.0
Ukraine just fired 630 drones at Moscow.
That's hours after Russia hit Kyiv with missiles and drones of its own.
So let's break down both sides of this, starting with Moscow.
The drones were tracked heading toward Moscow and the wider region overnight, a few hours ago. Sergei Sobyanin, the Mayor of Moscow, says air defences shot down 163 of them on the way into the city. Two people were hurt near the village of Voronovo, in the New Moscow area, he says.
Russia's Defence Ministry says something much bigger. It says it intercepted 808 Ukrainian drones across all of Russia and annexed Crimea overnight. Nobody else has confirmed that number. So for now, it's Russia's figure alone.
And here's the one everyone's watching.
An explosion and fire were reported at the 75th Arsenal military plant in Serpukhov, in the Moscow region. The independent Russian channel Astra says footage from the scene shows the plant was hit. But that hasn't been independently confirmed. And Ukraine hasn't said it carried out the strike at all.
Why does that plant matter? It makes and stores weapons and ammunition. It also repairs Russia's Buk and S-300V air defence systems.
Drones came down well beyond Moscow too. In the Tula region, the regional head, Dmitry Milyaev, says 70 drones were destroyed overnight, damaging homes in the Zaoksky district and buildings in Tula itself. In the Voronezh region, Governor Alexander Gusev says 44 drones were destroyed, damaging homes, an apartment building and power infrastructure. In the Lipetsk region, Governor Igor Artamonov says a man born in 2001 was wounded, and a drone hit a residential complex and a polyclinic.
Now, Kyiv. Because this started there.
The rest of this story is for members.
Contains modified US government KH-9 satellite imagery of Moscow from 1979. US gov · Public domain
Ukraine's Air Force says Russia fired Iskander-M ballistic missiles, S-400, Zircon and Onyx missiles, and 210 attack drones at the city overnight — 110 of them jet-powered. President Volodymyr Zelensky says Russia fired 21 ballistic missiles in three waves. Ukraine's Air Force says it shot down 181 of the drones Russia sent, including 87 jet-powered ones.
The toll kept rising through the morning. The city prosecutor's office first said one person was killed and 24 wounded, including four children. Zelensky later gave a higher count: two dead, 34 wounded, including five children, across Kyiv and the wider region. Russian strikes killed at least seven people across Ukraine as a whole — three in Zaporizhzhia, two in Donetsk, one in Sumy, one in Kharkiv region.
An ambulance station in Kyiv's Pecherskyi district was hit. Six ambulances were wrecked. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko says no medical staff were hurt. Ukraine's State Emergency Service says a monastery in the same district was damaged. Part of the metro infrastructure on Kyiv's Southern Bridge was also damaged, and traffic restrictions went in.
Now the timing.
All of this happened within a day of a meeting in St Petersburg between Vladimir Putin, Russia's President, and Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy working the Russia-Ukraine talks. On camera, Steve Witkoff told Vladimir Putin says quote "you are a humanitarian also, sir, and I salute that". Yuri Ushakov, a Kremlin foreign affairs adviser, says Vladimir Putin agreed in principle to resume three-way talks with Russia, the US and Ukraine — but not before 10 November.
Zelensky says that agreement means nothing yet. He wrote on Telegram that Russia launched a demonstrative strike almost immediately after the latest round of negotiations. Volodymyr Zelensky says quote "there has been no genuine shift in their attitude toward the unfolding events". He's calling for stronger air defences, faster missile deliveries, the ability to destroy Russian ballistic missile launchers, and tougher sanctions.
One more detail. A presidential adviser, Serhii Beskrestnov, says one of the Iskander missiles fired at Kyiv carried a K5 cluster warhead. That's a warhead built to cause maximum damage to people and equipment across an area 400 metres by 400 metres.
Russia's Defence Ministry has not responded to the Moscow attack at all so far.
So what don't we know? How much damage was really done at the 75th Arsenal plant. Whether Ukraine will ever confirm or deny hitting it. And whether both sides' wounded and dead counts climb again before the day is out.
Talks are meant to resume after 10 November. Both capitals got hit again before that date even arrived.
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