Ukraine spent the last week defending its territory from sustained attack by the Russian military, including dozens of drone incursions overnight into Sunday, as fears that 1,000 days of war could escalate into World War III went mainstream.

According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukrainian civilians have lived through another week of near daily air raid alerts, and “just last night, our air defense forces managed to (shoot) down nearly 50 strike drones.”

“Over the past week, Russia has launched more than 800 guided aerial bombs, around 460 strike drones, and over 20 missiles of various types against Ukraine and our people,” the Ukrainian president wrote Sunday morning in social media posts.

Russia is using Ukraine as a “testing ground” for its weapons systems and is attempting to “destroy our people, sow fear and panic, and weaken us,” Zelenskyy said, and in the face of increased aggression, his country “needs more air defense systems, and we are actively working with our partners on this. Strengthening the protection of our skies is absolutely critical.”

“I thank everyone around the world who understands this and continues to stand with Ukraine,” he said.

Zelenskyy’s call for more air defense systems comes just days after Russian President Vladimir Putin’s military fired a conventionally armed but nuclear capable ballistic missile at the Dnipro region of Ukraine.

That escalation came following another, after the Biden Administration authorized the use of U.S.- and British-made long-range weapons against targets in Russia.

On Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Defense announced a 70th, $275 million military aid package for Ukraine, including “drones, ammunition for HIMARS and artillery, and—critically—essential mines to stop Russian assaults,” Zelenskyy said. On Thursday, the White House responded to Russia’s ballistic missile use by announcing a new round of sanctions against dozens of Russian financial institutions and “50 other persons and entities operating in the Russian financial sector.”

In a statement shared by the Biden Administration, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said the sanctions aim to “further degrade Russia’s ability to use the international financial system to fund and prosecute its brutal war against the people of Ukraine.”

Popular podcaster Joe Rogan, during a recent episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, spoke out against the steady stream of escalations in the nearly three-year-old war, and aired his frustration with Biden Administration for accelerating a conflict he’ll soon walk away from.

Rogan said there should be “some sort of pause for significant actions” employed against an outgoing U.S. Presidential Administration to prevent the exacerbation of an ongoing conflict. Former President Donald Trump’s reelection, Rogan said, was a sign that people do not want this war to escalate further. 

“How are you allowed to do that on your way out?” Rogan asked. “The people don’t want you there anymore.”

Rogan had some choice words for Zelenskyy, as well.

“Zelenskyy says Putin is terrified. (Expletive) you, man,” Rogan said. “you (expletive) people are about to start World War III.”

Rogan went on to comment on Russia firing a new type of hyper-sonic Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile, misidentifying the weapon as an “intercontinental” missile, noting that the rocket used this week was not nuclear armed but could have been. Rogan told his audience of 18 million subscribers that the entire situation has become “insane.”

“Come to the negotiations table, sit down, work this out. Stop killing everybody,” Rogan said.

Russia has been attacking its fellow former-Soviet state for more than a decade, going back at least as far as 2014, when Putin illegally annexed Crimea. The conflict, which continued in a pair of separatist regions during the following eight years, exploded into full-scale war in February of 2022, when the Russian military further invaded their democratic neighbor on three fronts.

The Kremlin had apparently planned for just days of military actions, but Russian forces have mostly been stalled in their advances by Ukrainian troops and civilian volunteers armed and trained by a global coalition of 50 nations.

According to the U.N., the war has displaced more than 10 million Ukrainian civilians and left half again as many in need of humanitarian assistance. A “confidential” estimate of war dead reported by the Wall Street Journal in mid-September estimated that more than one million people have died as a result of the war.

In the years that have followed Russia’s invasion, according to the Department of Defense the U.S. has “committed approximately $56.3 billion in security assistance to Ukraine through both presidential drawdown authority and the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative.”

Ukraine and NATO leaders are scheduled to hold emergency talks on Tuesday in response to Russia’s ballistic missile use, and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte met with Trump in Florida on Friday.

Joe Rogan (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images, file)
This image was made from a video posted by a Telegram channel affiliated with the Ukrainian military last week. The channel says it shows U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles being fired from an undisclosed location in Ukraine.(Lachen Pyshe Telegram via AP)