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Donald Trump has claimed Russian warships fled the scene as US forces swooped in to seize a rogue oil tanker tied to Vladimir Putin’s inner circle. Speaking to Fox News, the US president was asked whether Putin personally spoke to him over the tanker Marinera— and dropped a bombshell.
“I don’t want to say that, but the fact is that the Russian ships — it was a submarine and a destroyer — they both left very quickly when we arrived,” Trump said. “And we took over the ship, and the oil is being unloaded right now.”
The remark appears to confirm reports that Moscow backed down during the dramatic high-seas seizure — despite earlier claims that the tanker was under Kremlin “protection”. The ship, formerly known as Bella 1, is accused by the US of hauling sanction-busting Venezuelan oil as part of Russia’s shadow tanker fleet.
Close Putin henchman Dmitry Medvedev directly linked the Oreshnik strike to the seizure of the Marinera tanker - labelling Donald Trump a madman.
It was an “undeniable fact that the actions of the outraged Americans are a criminal seizure of a civilian vessel,” said the ex-Russian president, now deputy head of the Kremlin's security council.
“And the response to it should not be within the framework of the Convention on the Law of the Sea. Since the beginning of the year, current international relations have turned into outright Bedlam. And we must behave accordingly: there are too many violent madmen around.
“With the understanding that such patients are never calmed by the exhortations of kind psychiatrists. Only by orderlies with huge fists and impassive faces.
“Because dangerous lunatics require either a straitjacket or a saving injection of haloperidol - as happened last night in the west of [Ukraine].”
But new revelations link it to close Putin cronies, which may explain Russia’s fury over the seizure.
Ukrainian sources today allege the tanker grab is the real reason Putin today unleashed his nuclear-capable Oreshnik missile system in a demonstrative strike on Lviv - just 40 miles from the NATO and EU frontier in Poland.
Investigators say the Marinera is linked to Viktor Baransky, a pro-Kremlin ex-Ukrainian politician, and Ilan Shor, a fugitive oligarch branded Putin’s fixer, seen as seeking to disrupt Moldova at Moscow’s behest.
Shor is also seen as behind a new Russian cryptocurrency designed to circumvent sanctions.
For Putin, the tanker wasn’t just a ship — it was money, influence and proof his sanctions-evasion network still worked, it is alleged.
The revelations of the Putin link to the tanker come from investigative project System and Radio Liberty.
Trump’s claim that a Russian submarine and destroyer withdrew when US forces supported by Britain arrived has been seized on by critics as evidence that the Kremlin blinked.
Ukrainian commentators say the episode left Putin furious — and embarrassed.
And within hours, Russia launched a fresh wave of missile and drone attacks on Ukraine, including a brutal Oreshnik ballistic strike on Lviv, evidently aiming at Europe’s largest gas storage facility near NATO territory, as well as killings in Kyiv.
Ukrainian analysts say the timing is no coincidence.
Journalist Denis Kazansky wrote that Russia responded to the tanker humiliation by attacking civilians: “To ease the humiliation of the seizure of their tankers, the Russians, as usual, began targeting civilians.
“These killings won’t have any military effect. Russia has been engaging in this kind of terrorism for four years now — and it still hasn’t helped them defeat us.”
Meanwhile, open-source intelligence group InformNapalm said the Oreshnik strike was pure theatre, aimed at Washington, not the battlefield.
They dismissed Russian claims that the attack was retaliation for a supposed drone strike on Putin’s residence — calling that story a hoax, even though the Russian defence ministry today used this as the pretext for the Oreshnik strike and hits on Kyiv and Kryvyi Rih.
Instead, they argued: “There is a more logical explanation — this was the only response Moscow can afford after US special forces seized Russian shadow-fleet tankers.
Russia can do absolutely nothing to protect these ships. So it launches demonstrative Oreshnik missiles — without warheads — to look tough.”
Oreshnik missiles — hyped by the Kremlin as a fearsome new weapon — are believed to have been used without explosive payloads, as in a 2024 strike on Dnipro.
Military analysts say that suggests the attack was designed to terrorise, not destroy — and to send a political message rather than win ground.
InformNapalm added that the seizure of the tanker showed something far more worrying for Moscow: “The US has shown it can seize tankers ‘guarded’ by Russian ships and submarines — and Russia can do nothing about it.”
With Russian missiles landing near NATO borders, US warships boarding Russian-flagged tankers, and Trump openly mocking Moscow’s retreat, the episode marks a sharp escalation.
For Putin, the loss of Marinera wasn’t just financial — it was symbolic.
And Ukraine says the price of that humiliation was paid, as ever, by civilians.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said: “A clear response from the world is needed. First of all, from the United States, which Russia really counts on.
“Russia must receive signals that it is its duty to focus on diplomacy, and feel the consequences every time it focuses on killings and destroying infrastructure again.
“Also, today's strike reminds all our partners as loudly as possible that air defence support for Ukraine is a constant priority.
“We cannot lose a single day.”
English (US) · 