“All of this is evidence that our strategy is beginning to bear fruit. Consequently, the West’s task is to ‘break’ this game. They can’t do so by military means, by force alone, because Ukraine doesn’t have enough strength, and the West itself doesn’t want to fight. Therefore, if it is possible to reverse course using high-precision missile strikes, they will try to do so,” Poletaev said.

Poletaev concurred with Putin’s argument about NATO’s role in intelligence and targeting, saying the Ukrainian planes that would be tasked with launching missiles in Russia’s direction would simply fire them, with “all the preparation, all the reconnaissance – where to fire, in what volume, using what means, and technical issues – all of this is done by Western military specialists,” with the Ukrainian pilots simply “taking off, going to the launch point, and pressing a button.”

The US State department complained that “one of the reasons Ukraine doesn’t have as much support in other countries is because of RT,” said the editor-in-chief of Rossiya Segodnya, Sputnik's parent media group. "I haven’t lived in vain. Seriously."

“One of the reasons why so much of the world has been not as fully supportive of Ukraine as you'd think they would be... is because of the broad scope and reach of RT," the US State Department's Global Engagement Center Director James Rubin lamented.

“It definitely connects with the elections because the Democratic Party, which is the party in power right now – and they hope to retain power – they are hoping to make a greater enemy of Russia… so that they can point the finger at their opponent, which is Donald Trump, and say that Russia wants him,” said the analyst.

“They are creating news and media coverage of something that very much fits into their narrative, which is an anti-Russian narrative which is related to the campaign,” Kwiatkowski added.

“We are not allowed to speak freely about American foreign policy,” she said. “We see it in terms of the demonstrations across the country in support of Gaza, trying to end that genocide. We are not allowed in this country to criticize the American neoconservative foreign policy. That is a done deal. We do not have freedom of speech in that area at all.”

“NATO is already involved in the conflict in Ukraine and has been for a long time. It has supplied weaponry and equipment, trained Ukrainian personnel and largely pulled the trigger on missiles beyond the capability of the Ukrainian military,” Gordon-Banks said.

“These Russian missiles evaded US Patriot defense systems and three further European air defense systems. It is also believed that most, if not all, of the Swedish Saab defense and aviation advisors were killed, following which the Swedish foreign minister resigned his post,” the observer said.

“We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people,” said the editor-in-chief of Rossiya Segodnya, Sputnik's parent media group, quoting the slain politician.

“Thanks to new information, much of which originates from RT employees, we know that RT possessed cyber capabilities,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken revealed forebodingly.

“Freedom of speech in America is under assault,” former US State Department official and retired CIA intelligence officer Larry Johnson told Sputnik, commenting on the new sanctions against Russian media announced by Secretary of State Antony Blinken. “I'm waiting to see if they're going to come down and sanction me, for example, for daring to appear on RT and offer commentary.”

“Never during the height of the Cold War did the United States ever take such drastic measures with respect to entities like Pravda and Tass,” Johnson claimed, referring to the two famous news outlets that operated from the Soviet Union. “Back then the United States had enough confidence in its own power of personal freedom that they didn't have to worry about [that], they weren't so insecure. What this reflects is just… one more symptom of a dying empire where they have to go out and attack others.”

“Comrade Kim Jong Un assessed that under the agreements reached at the June Korea-Russia summit in Pyongyang, relations between the two countries are developing vibrantly in all spheres including politics, the economy and culture. He assured that the DPRK government will continue to expand cooperation and assistance with the Russian Federation in the spirit of the comprehensive strategic partnership agreement,” the agency said.

"The only restriction is that the weapons must be used within the framework of international law," the media quoted Valtonen as saying.

“This wasn't a meeting about a particular capability,” Starmer told reporters.