Yana Grybovska, BBC News Ukraine
In a major investigation by The Guardian, journalists reconstruct how Western intelligence agencies received detailed information in advance about the Kremlin’s plans to attack Ukraine, why many allies and Kyiv itself did not believe these warnings for a long time, and what conclusions the world drew from this story.
The material is based on interviews with more than a hundred intelligence officials, military personnel, diplomats, and politicians from Ukraine, Russia, the U.S., and Europe, and describes not only one of the greatest intelligence successes of modern times but also a series of serious mistakes.
The narrative begins in November 2021, when then-CIA Director William Burns arrived in Moscow on behalf of President Joe Biden. U.S. intelligence agencies were already detecting signs of preparations for a large-scale invasion, and Biden wanted to warn the Kremlin about the catastrophic consequences.
However, due to the pandemic and the increasing isolation of Russian President Vladimir Putin, an in-person meeting did not take place: the conversation occurred over a secure phone line. During this conversation, Burns presented the American perspective on the preparation for war, but Putin dismissed the warnings and spoke about Russia’s strategic vulnerability, notably mentioning an alleged American ship with missiles near the Black Sea.
After several tense meetings with Russian security officials, Burns left Moscow convinced that war was almost inevitable. Upon returning to Washington, when Biden asked if he believed Putin would indeed proceed with the invasion, he answered “Yes.”
Journalists emphasize that Western services still do not know exactly when Putin finally decided to start the war. Some CIA analysts believe it happened in the first half of 2020, when he secured the possibility of staying in power after 2024, experienced isolation during the pandemic, and began increasingly thinking in historical terms.
Meanwhile, in Belarus, after the protests, Alexander Lukashenko’s regime became more dependent on the Kremlin, opening the way for using its territory for an attack. During the same period, there was an attempted poisoning of opposition leader Alexei Navalny. In retrospect, these events began to appear as preparation for a more extensive plan.
In the spring of 2021, Russian troops were massed on the Ukrainian borders for the first time. The U.S. obtained data that Putin could use his annual address to justify military actions. Biden even personally called him to demand de-escalation. According to then-Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines, the Americans then believed that diplomacy might work. However, it later became apparent that Putin had already chosen a forceful scenario.
In the fall of 2021, the situation changed dramatically. New intelligence showed that the Kremlin planned not only a limited operation in Donbas or a land corridor to Crimea but a full-scale offensive aimed at capturing Kyiv. This caused concern in Washington.
Haines recalled, “There was enough information to understand: this was no longer a remote possibility.”
In November, Haines presented these assessments to NATO allies. The head of British intelligence MI6, Richard Moore, supported her. However, most partners, including France and Germany, were skeptical about the prospect of an invasion.
According to Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, there was enough evidence, but allies believed the scenario simply didn’t make sense: “They were convinced it just didn’t make sense.” Meanwhile, some feared that a tough response would only provoke Russia.
During this period, Washington began an unprecedented campaign to declassify part of the intelligence to convince allies and prepare public opinion. As Haines explained, this was difficult because it was necessary not to reveal sources. European officials even joked that they received secret briefings and then read the same data in newspapers a few hours later.
A separate part of the material is devoted to how Kyiv responded to the warnings. Volodymyr Zelensky perceived them as exaggerations for a long time.
In his belief, the Kremlin’s actions were a bluff aimed at pressuring Ukraine, and if he listened to American and British warnings and openly began to prepare for war, it could cause panic, economic crisis, and effectively help the Kremlin.
In November 2021, he even sent a secret mission to European capitals with the message that “war intimidation is fake.” And although British Defense Minister Ben Wallace warned him that the invasion was a matter of time, Zelensky remained of his opinion.
Meanwhile, although there was indeed disbelief in a full-scale war in Kyiv, Ukrainian intelligence services recorded the activation of Russian agents.
The then-head of the SBU, Ivan Bakanov, recalled: “When you see every day how they try to kill and recruit people, you realize they have another plan.” But even this didn’t change the overall skepticism.
Journalists explain in detail how precisely the US and the UK reached their conclusions. It wasn’t a single “mole” in the Kremlin. Satellite images, interception of military communications, analysis of logistics, and reserve preparations played a significant role.
Particular attention was drawn to the actions of units subordinated to Russian General Staff planner Sergey Rudskoy. Although the existence of sources among the Russian elite was not excluded, most key data came from signals and technical intelligence.
By December 2021, the US and the UK already saw the contours of the plan: a multi-vector offensive, capture of Kyiv, change of power. Washington created a special interagency group.
However, France, Germany, and other countries remained convinced that Putin was simply blackmailing Ukraine. The French ambassador to Kyiv, Etienne de Poncins, acknowledged: “We had the same information about troops on the border, but we analyzed differently what was in Putin’s head.”
Poland was also not convinced of the invasion, even though its intelligence had good sources in Belarus. Polish service head Piotr Kravczyk said the troops gathered there appeared weak and unsuitable for a large occupation.
The Americans saw plans for the political structure after capturing Ukraine. Sullivan noted: “He [Putin] was very focused on capturing Kyiv.”
At the same time, the US and the UK believed that Russia would win quickly.
The then Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov recalled his visit to the Pentagon shortly after taking office in November 2021. He was skeptical of the invasion panic but saw that the Americans were convinced, so he asked if they would consider sending more weapons to help protect his country from the horrors they predicted. He received a firm refusal.
“Imagine that you have a neighbor who comes home with a cancer diagnosis and says they will die in three days,” the publication quotes Reznikov. “You will pity them, but you will not give them expensive medicine.”
In January 2022, more detailed data emerged: a landing in Hostomel, a plan to kill Zelensky, and arrest lists. However, the President of Ukraine, in an address, urged citizens not to panic and promised that there would be no war this year, and in the spring they would be barbecuing.
European leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, also believed in the possibility of convincing Putin to abandon an invasion through diplomacy.
In February 2022, the alarm grew.
After the last phone conversation between Biden and Putin on February 12, the American president told his aides that it was time to prepare for the worst. War was inevitable, and an invasion could happen any day.
Conversations between Biden and Zelensky became tense, as the US president openly stated that the Russians planned an assault on Kyiv. Frustrated that Zelensky and his team did not want to hear them, Sullivan decided that the main focus should be on Ukrainian intelligence services and the military, hoping they would raise the alarm from the ground up.
“At every meeting, I was told that it would definitely happen,” Guardian quotes a Ukrainian intelligence officer who worked in Washington and recounted numerous meetings with CIA colleagues. “When I looked into their eyes, I saw there was no doubt. And every time they asked me: ‘Where are you going to take the president? What is plan B?’”
He told them there was no plan B.
Meanwhile, a small group of GUR officers began quiet emergency planning in January, prompted by US warnings and the agency’s own information.
Under the guise of month-long exercises, they rented several safe houses around Kyiv and moved large reserves of cash. A month later, in mid-February, the war had not yet started, so the “exercises” were extended for another month.
Army Commander Valeriy Zaluzhny was frustrated that Zelensky did not want to impose martial law, which would allow him to redeploy troops and prepare combat plans.
“You are going to fight Mike Tyson, and the only fight you have had before was a pillow fight with your younger brother. It’s a one-in-a-million chance, and you need to be ready,” he said.
On February 21, Putin held a Security Council meeting, effectively forcing the elite to support his invasion plans. According to sources, only Dmitry Kozak tried to argue against him, but his position was not heard.
Two days before the invasion, Ukrainian authorities were still delaying martial law. However, after reports of an attempted assassination plan against him, Zelensky began to realize the threat.
Meanwhile, the Polish Ambassador to Ukraine Bartosz Cichocki received a telegram about the attack beginning that night.
Over the past two weeks, Poles have reconsidered their skepticism about the invasion, partly based on new intelligence about Russian troops stationed in Belarus. Now there is final confirmation that the attack will happen.
However, even on the eve of the invasion, some European services remained skeptical. The head of German intelligence, Bruno Kahl, arrived in Kyiv on February 23, when the decision to attack had already been made.
On the night before the invasion, Zelensky recorded an address to the Russians, urging them to prevent their leadership from starting a war. He also told them, “If you attack, you will see our faces. Not our backs, but our faces.” This was a fundamental change in tone compared to his previous messages.
Meanwhile, among the Ukrainian officials, there was one who knew what was about to happen — Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. On February 22, he went to Washington for meetings, and intelligence representatives showed him the exact locations where Russian tanks were warming up their engines and waiting to cross the border. After that, he was invited to an unscheduled meeting with Biden. He recalled that the grim conversation resembled “a doctor’s talk with a patient,” and the diagnosis was clearly fatal.
“When I left the Oval Office, I felt that Biden was saying goodbye to me as well as to the people of Ukraine,” Kuleba was quoted by the Guardian.
On the morning of February 24, 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion, culminating months of warnings and diplomatic efforts.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky almost instantly transformed from a political leader to a wartime leader of the state: he refused to leave Kyiv, began regularly addressing citizens and the international community, coordinating the defense, and forming a new model of communication with allies.
His public stance and demonstrative presence in the capital became an important psychological factor, which, according to many Western officials, significantly affected Ukraine’s ability to organize resistance in the first, most critical weeks of the war.
At the same time, Russian President Vladimir Putin, confident in a swift victory, displayed confidence in the correctness of his calculations. On the day the invasion began, he met with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan and, according to interlocutors, stated that his operation “would end in a few weeks.”
However, reality turned out to be the opposite. Four years after the invasion began, the war continues, turning into a protracted conflict that has fundamentally changed the European security system and global politics.
Western intelligence services, which were able to accurately predict the Kremlin’s intentions and warn allies, ultimately confirmed the correctness of their assessments regarding the very fact of the invasion.
At the same time, they underestimated a key factor — the scale of Ukrainian resistance. US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines later acknowledged that Washington expected a swift fall of Kyiv or, at the very least, the loss of control over a significant part of the country in the first weeks of the war.
European intelligence services, for their part, explained their skepticism before the invasion not only by distrust of American data but also by the belief that Moscow’s plan was too unrealistic.
Some officials openly stated that they could not believe in a scenario that defied basic logic: a large-scale attack on a major country in the center of Europe without adequate preparation, without guarantees of a swift victory, and with huge risks of sanctions and international isolation.
The Guardian’s investigation ultimately shows that even the most accurate intelligence does not guarantee correct political decisions or timely reactions.
The West had a significant amount of information about the preparation for the invasion, yet faced a number of psychological and political barriers: the legacy of the Iraq war, which undermined trust in intelligence data; different perceptions of Putin’s rationality; reluctance to accept the worst-case scenarios; and internal disagreements among allies.
For many, the key lesson regarding intelligence and the war in Ukraine was clear: do not exclude things just because they once seemed impossible, the article’s authors conclude.
