Furious about the German and American announcements, Russia launched a rush-hour barrage of missiles toward Ukraine on Thursday, the day after Kyiv secured Western pledges of dozens of modern battlefield tanks.

The Ukrainian military said it had shot down all 24 drones sent overnight by Russia, including 15 around the capital, with no damage reported.

But soon afterward, air raid alarms sounded across Ukraine as people were heading to work, and senior officials said air defenses were shooting down incoming missiles.

The Kremlin said on Thursday that it saw the promised delivery of Western tanks to Ukraine as "direct involvement" of the U.S. and Europe in the 11-month conflict, something both deny.

In the capital, crowds of people took cover in underground metro stations. Mayor Vitali Klitschko said one person had been killed and two wounded when a missile hit non-residential buildings in the south of the city.

Kyiv's military administration said more than 15 missiles fired at Kyiv had been shot down, but urged people to remain in shelters.

DTEK, Ukraine's largest private energy producer, said it was conducting emergency power shutdowns in Kyiv, the surrounding region and also the regions of Odesa and Dnipropetrovsk because of the imminent danger.

Western analysts say the attacks on Ukraine's cities are more an attempt to break morale than a strategic campaign.

Ukraine seeking more arms assistance

Both sides are expected to mount new ground offensives come spring, and Ukraine has been seeking hundreds of modern tanks in the hope of using them to break Russia's defense lines and recapture territory in the south and east that have been controlled by Russia.

Both Ukraine and Russia have so far relied primarily on Soviet-era T-72 tanks.

"The key now is speed and volumes. Speed in training our forces, speed in supplying tanks to Ukraine. The numbers in tank support," President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address on Wednesday.

Maintaining Kyiv's drumbeat of requests, Zelenskyy said he had spoken to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and asked for long-range missiles and aircraft.

Ukraine's allies have already provided billions of dollars worth of military support, including sophisticated U.S. missile systems. The U.S. has been wary of deploying the difficult-to-maintain Abrams but had to change tack to persuade Germany to send its more easily operated German-built Leopards to Ukraine.

Germany will send an initial company of 14 tanks from its stock, which it said could be operational in three or four months, and approve shipments by allied European states with the aim of equipping two battalions – in the region of 100 tanks.

The Leopard is a system that any NATO member can service, and crews and mechanics can be trained together on a single model, Ukrainian military expert Viktor Kevlyuk told Espreso TV, adding if they get these vehicles, the "prospects look good."

U.S. President Joe Biden said the 31 M1 Abrams tanks Washington will provide posed "no offensive threat" to Russia. But Sergei Nechayev, Russia's ambassador to Germany, on Wednesday called Berlin's decision "extremely dangerous," saying that it "takes the conflict to a new level of confrontation."

Fighting in eastern Ukraine

Since the eruption of conflicts between Russia and Ukraine in February last year, Russia has shifted its publicly stated goals from "denazifying" and "demilitarizing" its neighbor to confronting a purportedly aggressive and expansionist U.S.-led NATO alliance.

The heaviest fighting, for now, is around Bakhmut, a town in eastern Ukraine with a pre-war population of 70,000 that has seen some of the most brutal combat of the war.

Ukraine's military said Russia was attacking "with the aim of capturing the entire Donetsk region and regardless of its own casualties."

On Wednesday, the Russian-installed governor of Donetsk said units of Russia's Wagner contract militia were moving forward inside Bakhmut, with fighting on the outskirts and in neighborhoods recently held by Ukraine.

(With input from Reuters)