A leading military drone expert has rejected Russia’s growing claims that Ukraine attempted to strike a residence used by President Vladimir Putin with drones, describing the purported attack as “hard to fathom” and tactically unfeasible.
Cameron Chell’s remarks came as Moscow reaffirmed accusations that Kyiv has firmly denied—with the drone industry head noting the purported strike, announced Monday, conflicts with Ukraine’s typical drone tactics.
Chell, CEO and co-founder of , a drone manufacturer that supplies the U.S. Department of Defense and allied militaries (including Ukraine), said Russia’s claims lack credibility.
“What’s usually a hallmark of Ukraine’s operations is that they’re always extremely shrewd in how they ,” Chell told Digital.
“They’re resourceful from a cost standpoint—let’s frame it as an efficiency angle—but also highly tactical,” he added.
“I can’t wrap my head around this drone attack even occurring on or being orchestrated by Ukraine, for several reasons,” Chell stated.
“For one thing, to reach Putin’s residence, the drones couldn’t have been launched from extremely far away,” he added.
Chell’s comments arrived as Russia reaffirmed Tuesday its accusations that Ukraine tried to hit a presidential palace in the Novgorod region with drones, purportedly to derail peace efforts.
Kyiv rejected the claim, and the timing has also sparked questions—especially given the positive tone of a recent meeting between President Trump and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Florida.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov claimed late Monday that 91 drones were intercepted while heading to Putin’s residence on Lake Valdai’s shores.
His statement seemed to clash with earlier Defense Ministry counts, which reported 89 drones were downed across eight regions (18 over Novgorod) before later adding another 23.
Only after Lavrov’s remarks did the ministry claim that 49 drones intercepted over Bryansk (nearly 300 miles away) were also aimed at Valdai.
When asked about debris, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said it was “a matter for our military” while labeling and Western doubt as “completely insane.”
Peskov stated Russia would harden its diplomatic position, and State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin pledged there could be “no forgiveness” for Zelenskyy.
Chell noted the story just doesn’t make sense. “To target Putin’s residence, you need long-range, extremely fast drones,” he said.
He added that for such small drones to reach that location, they would have needed to be launched from a far closer spot—probably within Russia itself.
“They’d have to be within roughly 10 kilometers [6.2 miles]—or at most 30 kilometers—of Putin’s residence,” Chell stated.
“That facility where Putin resides is also extremely secure, so sending a group of lower-cost, slower drones to target it would be very uncharacteristic of Ukraine,” Chell said.
“Ukraine also never announces when they plan to strike,” he added.
Chell also pointed out that nighttime operations would eliminate GPS or AI-based navigation due to jamming and visibility issues—making the launch of dozens of drones even more unlikely.
“Apparently this happened at night, which makes it very hard for machine vision or AI mapping tools,” he said. “So, you know, it definitely didn’t use GPS—since it would have been jammed. There are just a lot of inconsistencies.”
Chell argued Ukraine has no political gain from this. “They’re bold, but right in the middle of peace talks—when they need Trump on their side—it makes no sense,” he said. ” too smart to have done that.”
Zelenskyy also on Monday, accusing Moscow of setting the stage for more attacks.
Lavrov warned of retaliation but stated Russia would keep talking with Washington.
Trump also said he learned of the purported attack directly from Putin and was “very angry about it.” When asked if there was evidence, Trump responded, “We’ll find out.”
Digital has contacted the Kremlin for comment.