President Donald Trump called President Vladimir Putin of Russia “absolutely CRAZY!” in a Truth Social post Sunday evening after Russian forces launched a barrage of 367 drones and missiles impacting all Ukrainian regions, including the capital Kyiv, in the largest aerial attack of the war so far.
“I’ve always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia,” Trump wrote, “but something has happened to him. He has gone absolutely CRAZY! He is needlessly killing a lot of people, and I’m not just talking about soldiers.”
The weekend strikes killed at least 12 people, including three children in the northern region of Zhytomyr, according to Ukrainian officials.
Trump also criticized President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, saying he “is doing his Country no favors by talking the way he does” and that everything “out of his mouth causes problems, I don’t like it, and it better stop.” The president also referred to Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine as “Zelenskyy’s, Putin’s, and Biden’s War, not ‘Trump’s.’”
“I am only helping to put out the big and ugly fires,” he wrote,” that have been started through Gross Incompetence and Hatred.”
Earlier in the day, speaking with reporters at the airport in Morristown, New Jersey, Trump said of Putin: “I don’t know what’s wrong with him.”
“I don’t know what the hell happened to Putin. I’ve known him a long time. Always gotten along with him. But he’s sending rockets into cities and killing people, and I don’t like it at all. We’re in the middle of talking and he’s shooting rockets into Kyiv and other cities,” Trump told reporters.
“What the hell happened to him?” the president continued.“Right? He’s killing a lot of people. I’m not happy about that.”
Russia’s latest strikes in Ukraine “appeared to be another setback to U.S.-led peace efforts, as Putin looks determined to capture more Ukrainian territory and inflict more damage,” the Associated Press reports. The multi-day barrage came after Kyiv had accepted an unconditional 30-day ceasefire in March proposed by the United States—one that Moscow effectively rejected, according to Ukrainian officials. The New York Times writes of Russia’s weekend attack: “The overnight strikes underscored how months of diplomatic efforts to broker a cease-fire have failed to yield a breakthrough as President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia has dragged his feet on agreeing to any temporary truce, adding conditions that he knows Ukraine will not accept.”
Trump’s recent comments about Putin “sending rockets into cities and killing people” come after Russia’s war in Ukraine surpassed its third year in February. As of that month, over 12,654 civilian men, women, and children have been killed, and over 29,392 injured, according to the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission. The full amount of death and destruction is difficult to measure as Russia continues to ramp up its military offenses.
