Ukraine’s claim of missile strike on Russian cruiser credible -sources
Ukraine’s assertion that it performed a missile strike that sank the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea fleet is speculated to be true, two sources familiar with US and western intelligence divulged, although officials as yet have no decisive evidence.
According one source familiar with the latest intelligence, the US believes with “medium confidence” that Ukraine’s version of events — which Moscow disputes — is accurate.
However, even though US and western officials have no motive to doubt Ukraine in this instance, both sources caution that the US has not yet made an independent attribution.
“We’re not in a position to officially confirm independently what exactly led to the ship’s now sinking,” Pentagon press secretary John Kirby told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Thursday. “But we’re also not in any position to refute the Ukrainian side of this. It’s certainly plausible and possible that they did in fact hit this with a Neptune missile or maybe more.”
Nexus News learnt that the Moskva, the missile cruiser, , sank on Thursday after an explosion the day before “seriously damaged” the ship near the Ukrainian port city of Odessa, Russia said Thursday.
The governor of Odessa has alleged that the ship was struck by a Ukrainian anti-ship missile, while Russia has claimed that the damage was caused by an on-board fire that detonated on-board ammunition.
Nexus News gathered that analysts have mostly treated Ukraine’s version of events as the more credible possibility, but American officials have so far refused to publicly associate the ship’s destruction to a missile attack.
