An American official said that the US shared intelligence about the location of the Russian missile cruiser Moskva with Ukraine, US media reported on Thursday. The missile strike sank the warship in mid-April.
According to an unnamed official, Ukraine alone decided to attack and sink the flagship of the Russian Black Sea Fleet with its own Neptun anti-ship missiles.
The official also said the US was not aware that Ukraine planned to strike the Moskva until after they conducted the operation.
Speaking earlier Thursday after a New York Times report about the US role in supporting Ukraine's killing of Russian generals, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said American agencies "do not provide intelligence on the location of senior military leaders on the battlefield or participate in the targeting decisions of the Ukrainian military.''
"Ukraine combines information that we and other partners provide with the intel that they themselves are gathering and then they make their own decisions and they take their own actions," Kirby said.