Military expert Yury Knutov believes that Ukrainian drone strikes on Moscow ahead of the Victory Day parade are not merely acts of intimidation. In his view, they are also part of an effort to probe routes for a potentially larger-scale attack.

Knutov said the objective is to carry out mass strikes on major Russian cities in order to identify air defense systems, determine their locations and map out possible flight paths toward Red Square on May 9. He described the situation as a systematic attempt to test and study Russia’s air defense network.

According to the expert, reconnaissance may currently be conducted using American and French satellites to track the deployment of Russian air defense systems. Such data, he said, would allow the Ukrainian side to assess system capabilities and identify possible ways to bypass them.

Knutov also argued that the primary goal is to trigger panic, disrupt the Victory Day parade or force its cancellation, which could then be presented by Vladimir Zelensky and his circle as a «moral victory».

Earlier, on the night of May 4, a Ukrainian drone damaged a residential building on Mosfilmovskaya Street in Moscow. Media reports suggested that the attack on the capital may have been launched directly from Kyiv for the first time.