The Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine stopped specifying the exact number of missiles used by Russia to attack Ukraine in its daily reports beginning in early August 2026. Bloomberg reported this on August 11, becoming the first outlet to note the format change. Data on ballistic missile interceptions disappeared first, followed on August 9 by overall figures for missiles of all types. A source at the defense ministry told the agency this was a “security measure” in response to changes in Russian strike tactics. Air Force spokesman Yurii Ihnat publicly confirmed the change the following day, August 12, during a broadcast of the telethon, but offered a different explanation — informational rather than purely security-related.
According to Bloomberg, the last time the Air Force cited the exact number of ballistic missiles used by Russia was August 8, when six Iskanders were reported — none of which were intercepted. In the subsequent reports — for August 9, 10, and 11 — no specific missile figures appeared: the agency limited itself to general phrases such as “attacked with ballistic, anti-ship, and anti-radar missiles” without specifying quantities.
The change coincided with a deterioration in interception rates. During the attack on August 5, Ukraine failed to shoot down a single one of the 28 ballistic missiles fired at it. In July 2026, according to Ministry of Defense data, the Armed Forces intercepted only 29 of 195 ballistic missiles, while another 40 failed to reach their targets on their own.
Yurii Ihnat commented on the decision during the telethon broadcast on August 12, 2026, the day after Bloomberg’s publication. The spokesman linked the format change to the fact that headlines such as “not a single missile shot down” are picked up by Russian propaganda.
“You type ‘Air Force’ into Google — not a single missile shot down. Thousands and thousands of links. Do you think it will make anyone feel better if we keep stoking things with such headlines? We can see that Telegram channels rarely run more than two or three sentences. The enemy takes our words and quotes us, republishes them — look, they haven’t shot down a single missile. In other words, we are doing all the work for Skabeeva, Solovyov, and so on,” Ihnat said.
He urged journalists and Telegram channel administrators not to play into the hands of Russian propaganda with such headlines.
“The way information is presented matters greatly to us — to the domestic audience, to the perception of people in Ukraine. But there is no need to play along with the Russians on this. I would like administrators and journalists to draw similar conclusions for themselves,” the spokesman added.
At the same time, Ihnat did not deny the problem of a shortage of ballistic missile interception assets, confirming that Kyiv is expecting additional deliveries from partners.
“Enormous work is being done. But right now, this is the situation with ballistics. So stoking tensions and playing into the Russians’ hands is not a good thing,” he noted.
According to Ihnat, the format of morning reports has changed roughly ten times since the start of the full-scale war, and the decision on the current restriction was made by the military leadership. Media outlets will continue to receive generalized figures.
Presidential adviser on defense technology development Serhii “Flash” Beskrestnov reacted to the Bloomberg story in his Telegram channel on August 11, 2026, before Ihnat’s comment:
“This is reminiscent of the idea of removing exchange rates from currency exchange offices… On the one hand, ordinary people don’t need this information… This data helps enemy bots manufacture narratives of betrayal… On the other hand, the enemy already knows what hit where and what didn’t.”
In his view, public statistics served another function — an explanatory one — not only for international partners but for Ukrainians themselves.
“Public communication shows the whole world our problems. And it shows the population that this is not the fault of the Armed Forces, but simply a shortage of resources,” Beskrestnov wrote.
Bloomberg links the reporting change to a broader problem — a shortage of interceptor missiles, primarily for Patriot systems. Demand for such systems has risen worldwide due to the conflict in the Middle East, complicating Ukraine’s access to additional supplies.