Russia launched a devastating bombardment against cities across Ukraine, killing at least five people and casting hundreds of thousands more into sporadic blackouts with a new mix of weapons that mostly evaded air defenses.
The strike was unusual in the number of expensive, high-end missiles used, raising the difficult to answer the question of why Russian planners decided to deploy them in such numbers now.
Ukraine said it shot down 34 of the 81 missiles fired, a lower than usual proportion because the barrage included three classes of weapon against which it has no defense.
