You come at the king, you best not miss
That conclusion is supported by a Central Intelligence Agency assessment that found no attempted attack against Putin had occurred, according to a U.S. official briefed on the intelligence. The CIA declined to comment.
The U.S. found that Ukraine had been seeking to strike a military target located in the same region as Putin's country residence but not close by, the official said.
President Trump on Wednesday appeared to play down the Russian claim of an attempted drone attack, posting a link to a New York Post editorial that asserted that the Ukraine strike likely didn't occur and sharing the headline: "Putin 'attack' bluster shows Russia is the one standing in the way of peace."
Trump told reporters on Monday that he was "very angry" after Putin told him in a phone conversation that Ukrainian drones had targeted his residence, known as Dolgiye Borody, or Long Beards, along a lake shore in the country's northwest.
Asked if the U.S. had evidence that such an attack had taken place, Trump replied: "You are saying, maybe the attack didn't take place — that is possible too, I guess, but President Putin told me this morning it did."
Ukraine has acknowledged its role in some assassinations and sabotage attacks deep inside Russian territory but has been adamant that it wasn't behind any attack on Putin's residence. Ukrainian officials say Putin is seeking a pretext to sour relations between Washington and Kyiv and to weaken its adversary's negotiating hand in U.S.-brokered talks on ending the war.
Trying to buttress the Kremlin's allegations, Russia's defense ministry said Wednesday that it had intercepted 91 Ukrainian drones that had been aimed at Putin's Novgorod residence. A video released by Russian Defense officials showed what they said was a downed Ukrainian drone that was equipped with explosives lying in the snow.
Comment: It's a bit more than just a drone lying in the snow. The Russians called in the US military attache in Moscow and presented him with the hardware and data from one of the drones, in which, they said, the Americans would see that the explosive-laden drone was indeed on course to 'take out' Putin:
The Russian MoD also published a map showing all 91 flight paths taken by the drones:
© RU MoD
The Russian allegation came after Trump's nearly three-hour meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday, a discussion the U.S. president praised as "excellent" and even raised the prospect that he might travel to Kyiv to press his case for peace.
Citing the alleged attack, Moscow has threatened to recalibrate its already hardline negotiating position in the peace talks and has launched drone attacks in the port region of Odessa.
Trump's Truth Social post Wednesday sharing a media report that called Russia an obstacle to peace was one of his most pointed recent criticisms of the Kremlin, which he has previously said is eager to halt the war with Ukraine.
Moscow appeared to be making inroads in Asia and the Middle East with its allegation that Ukraine had sought to target Putin. India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Tuesday that he was "deeply concerned" about the alleged operation, while Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif called it "a heinous act." The United Arab Emirates Foreign Ministry also expressed concern about the allegation.
Steve Witkoff, Trump's special envoy, said in a social-media post that he had spoken with the British, French and German national-security advisers on Wednesday to discuss the next steps in trying to secure peace. Rustem Umerov, a top Ukrainian national-security official and negotiator, participated in the call.
Witkoff wrote that the discussions had focused on possible security guarantees and "deconfliction mechanisms" to "help end the war and ensure it does not restart."
IMO, President Putin will continue on as planned and regard western antics as a sideshow. Soon he will have support of most of the countries on this planet. Nobody likes a bully with psychopathic friends.