Why US Intelligence Failed to Warn Ukraine of Russian Missile Strikes on Kyiv

A series of Russian missile attacks on Kyiv, its surrounding region, and Kharkiv left more than three people dead and 600,000 residents without electricity in mid-October 2026. The strikes, hitting on the night of October 13 to 14 and following an earlier assault on October 12, exposed a critical vulnerability in Ukraine’s early-warning architecture: air raid sirens sounded only after the explosions occurred.