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By Sonam Sheth
Evening Politics Editor
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Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon railed against Republican Senator Lindsey Graham over Graham's support for a flurry of drone strikes Ukraine launched over the weekend that battered Russia's strategic aviation capabilities.
Newsweek reached out to Graham's office for comment via email.
The Context
The scale and sophistication of Ukraine's strikes were unprecedented and could have far-reaching geopolitical consequences.
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The drones were transported to Russia and stored in trucks carrying cargo units with retractable roofs that were parked near the air bases and launched remotely.
Kyiv said its attack, which has been described as Russia's "Pearl Harbor," struck four bases and took out 41 (about one-third) of Russia's strategic bombers.
Moscow has said only several of its warplanes were struck.
What To Know
Graham, who visited Ukraine on Friday along with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, praised the strikes on Sunday, calling Kyiv "ever-resourceful."
"The ever-resourceful Ukraine used creative drone warfare tactics to successfully attack Russian bombers and military assets used to kill Ukrainian citizens and destroy their country," the South Carolina senator posted on X, formerly Twitter.
During Monday's episode of his War Room podcast, Bannon tore into Graham over his support for the drone attack and referenced a recent report from Axios which said that the White House was not notified about the strikes in advance.
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If the Trump administration was not told in advance about Ukraine's offensive—called "Operation Spider's Web"—then "the White House has to condemn this immediately and pull all support [for Ukraine] and tell Lindsey Graham to come home or we are going to put you under arrest when you come home," Bannon said.
"You're stirring it up," he added, referring to the South Carolina senator, who is one of Ukraine's staunchest supporters in Congress.
"Lindsey Graham's over there saying, 'Hey, forget Trump. I got the House and Senate. We're going to pass it. You're going to see something in a couple of days,'" Bannon said, referring to Graham's legislation pushing for sanctions on Russia.
"Remember that?" the former White House chief strategist, who has consistently advocated against U.S. intervention in overseas conflicts, said. "He's stirring it up over there."
Bannon went on to say that Ukraine is "dragging us into a kinetic third world war. As we said ... we're getting dragged in now, or the deep state is driving us in there. Either of these are not good."
Despite its public efforts to downplay the devastation Ukraine's strikes wrought on Russian military capabilities, Moscow appears to be girding to mount a potentially heavy response.
One Kremlin-backed newspaper cited Russian political analyst Sergei Markov as saying that Ukraine's assault is grounds for a nuclear response.
What People Are Saying
Keir Giles, a senior consulting fellow of the Russia and Eurasia Programme at London's Chatham House, told Newsweek: "We can expect a great deal of sound and fury from Moscow."
What Happens Next
Russia and Ukraine engaged in a second round of ceasefire talks, but the discussions yielded little of value outside of a prisoner swap. Ukrainian defense minister Rustem Umerov, who led his country's delegation, said Ukraine proposed another round of ceasefire talks at the end of the month.
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