‘Whole ‘Nother Ballgame’: CNN Military Analyst Warns Of ‘Very Bad Move’ If Ukraine Behind Moscow Drone Attacks

CNN anchor and chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto asked retired Air Force Colonel Cedric Leighton to weigh in on the recent drone attacks in Moscow and what it would mean for the war effort if Ukraine were in fact behind them.

“Let’s look at some of these attacks recently, because one phenomenon we’re seeing are multiple attacks in recent days and weeks. Inside, well, Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine down here, but also inside Russia itself. Kursk, Belgorod, close to the border, but also in Moscow,” Sciutto explained while pointing to a map of the region.

“We have that strike on the Kremlin recently, which the U.S. says low confidence assessment was probably the Ukrainians.
Now, we have these drones here. On the issue of civilian targets, if that was indeed the intentional target here, what does that mean for Ukraine’s war? I mean, certainly, Russia has come under enormous criticism for directly and repeatedly targeting civilians in Ukraine,” Sciutto then asked Leighton – a CNN military analyst.

“Well, certainly, Jim, if the Ukrainians are targeting civilians deliberately, that makes it a whole ‘nother ballgame, and that would be a very bad move on Ukraine’s part, because right now what they’re enjoying is a lot of support from the West because they are following basically or at least have until this point followed the rules of war, the rules of armed conflict,” Leighton replied.

“And that becomes really important for Ukraine’s war effort. They cannot afford to target civilians and they shouldn’t do so by mistake either,” he concluded.

“Let’s have a look. We know that the Ukrainians have been using drones prior in this conflict on military targets, including some pretty old ones here going back to the seventies. You know, a far cry from what we’re seeing now, smaller, more mobile kinds of things. Could that lead, if this was Ukraine and if the civilian areas were the deliberate target, could that lead to disagreements with the U.S. and NATO’s partners?” Sciutto followed up.

“So one of the key things that the Ukrainians have done is they’ve used weapons like this, like this to you, 141 drone, which is based, like you said, on a Soviet model that they’ve had for many, many years. I this the idea here is that they are using their own systems to target Russia. They are not using Western systems. They are not using U.S. systems. And they’re doing that deliberately because the US has very specifically told them not to use Western systems,” Leighton explained.

Watch the full clip above via CNN.

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