Russia launches deadly drone attacks on Ukraine hours after US confirms intel-sharing pause

SUMY, Ukraine — A Russian drone strike on a shipping facility here killed one civilian worker early Thursday, just 18 miles from where Ukrainian forces continue to hold territory in the Kremlin’s Kursk region — despite the US pausing military aid and intelligence-sharing with Kyiv.

It was the second attack by an Iranian-made Shahed drone against civilian infrastructure in Sumy after Russia hit a children’s hospital near the town’s center early Tuesday, local authorities told The Post.

Both Shaheds had been made in the past two months, officials said, a sign that Russia has largely run out of its own ammunition and is now relying heavily on other American adversaries for weapons.

In addition to the Sumy attack, another four people died and more than 30 were injured in a Shahed strike on a hotel about 325 miles south of Sumy in Kryvyi Rih, hometown of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Just before the attack, volunteers from a humanitarian organization — citizens of Ukraine, the United States, and the United Kingdom — had checked into the hotel,” Zelensky said in a post to X. “They survived because they managed to get down from their rooms in time.”

“There must be no pause in the pressure on Russia to stop this war and terror against life,” he added.

The shipping facility was torn open and still smoking when a Post reporter visited about 10 hours after the strike, and police were checking the rubble for additional casualties.

Pieces of the drone could be seen, including its internal electronics, wings bearing Cyrillic and a heavy, steel structure.

Bits of the Shahed that struck the children’s hospital — which did not explode, but caused damage to the building and started a fire — remained on the roof of that facility two days later.

Air raid alarms sounded intermittently, warning of ongoing threats from above.

This time last year, the Sumy region had largely been untouched by the three-year-old invasion by Russian forces.

That changed in August 2024, when Kyiv’s forces launched a successful surprise offensive across the border into Kursk, shocking the world. 

The incursion forced Moscow to redirect forces from its assault on the strategically important southeastern region of Ukraine, stretching the frontlines thousands of additional miles.

However, this week’s pauses of US intelligence sharing and already-paid-for military aid have shaken Kyiv’s strength, particularly its ability to strike into Russia, Ukrainian intelligence and military insiders said.

“After the cessation of US intelligence support, we will lose the ability to strike deep into enemy territory,” Ukrainian reconnaissance officer Denis Yaroslavsky said, though he added the pause “will not affect” the situation at the front.

But defense experts at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War say the pause will encourage Russians to use more powerful weapons because Moscow can now move their planes closer to Ukraine.

“Ukraine’s inability to conduct ATACMS and HIMARS strikes against Russian air defense systems within Russia and occupied Ukraine will likely impact how close to the frontline Russian pilots are willing to operate and expand Russia’s ability to effectively use glide bombs against both frontline areas and near rear Ukrainian cities,” the institute said on X late Wednesday.

“The suspension of US intelligence sharing with Ukraine will damage Ukraine’s ability to defend itself against ongoing Russian attacks against military and civilian targets.”

Officials in Moscow are now openly discussing using the intelligence-sharing pause to its advantage. On Wednesday, Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev said the Kremlin’s “main task” is “inflicting maximum damage on Ukraine” before US weapons deliveries “most likely resume.”

Most Ukrainians who spoke to The Post have expressed confusion rather than outrage at the seeming about-face.

“I don’t know what [Trump] is doing. I like him, but this doesn’t make sense,” one Sumy local said of the pause. “I can only hope he has a larger, secret plan he is using against Russia.”

Others, including Yaroslavsky, said the current tensions “could have been avoided if Zelensky’s team had conducted the negotiations properly” — instead of getting pulled into last week’s shocking Oval Office spat with Trump and Vice President JD Vance.

“Many mistakes were made, which led to Trump making this decision,” he said. “We foresaw this and suggested to President Zelensky that after Trump’s victory, he should replace the negotiating team with one that would be more mentally suited to the new administration.”