U.S. warns of Russia's potential global ‘tyranny’

After a series of battlefield defeats, Russia is aiming punishing missile strikes at Ukraine's energy infrastructure that could leave millions of civilians exposed to the winter cold.

Pentagon officials said Moscow hopes to exhaust Ukraine's missile defenses, and buy time to reset its forces.

At a security forum in Canada Saturday, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Russia's invasion of Ukraine has offered a preview of "a possible world of tyranny and turmoil.”

Austin's remarks were some of his strongest to date on the importance to the international community of helping Kyiv prevail after nearly nine months of war, and they were delivered at what may be an inflection point in the conflict.