Speculation is mounting that Russia staged the drone attack on the Kremlin that it blamed on Ukraine, with political analysts saying there are a number of reasons why the alleged strike — which Russia called a “planned terrorist attack” — just doesn’t add up.

Russia accused Ukraine of attempting to attack the Kremlin Wednesday, saying the government in Kyiv had tried to strike at the heart of Russia’s government in Moscow using two unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones.

Russian President Vladimir Putin was not injured, the Kremlin said in a statement, in what it characterized as an assassination attempt (in fact, Putin had not been in the Kremlin at the time of the alleged incident) but did not provide any evidence that Ukraine had carried out the attack.

Ukraine denied any involvement in the incident, with officials saying it more likely signaled that Russia was planning a large-scale terrorist attack against Ukraine in the coming days.

Russia has often been accused of plotting “false flag” attacks that it can blame on Ukraine, and use to justify or escalate its own military aggression against the country as the war drags on into its 15th month.

“Of course, Ukraine has nothing to do with drone attacks on the Kremlin. We do not attack the Kremlin because, first of all, it does not resolve any military tasks,” Mykhailo Podolyak, an Ukrainian presidential advisor, noted.

The Kremlin went further in its accusations on Thursday, claiming that Washington had helped Ukraine to plot and orchestrate the drone attack. Again, it did not provide any evidence for its claim.

‘Staged’ attack?

Defense and political analysts and officials are also viewing the incident with skepticism, saying it’s highly possible that Russia carried out the “attack” itself for a number of reasons, including a possible need to prepare Russian society for a firmer war footing.

“Russia likely staged this attack in an attempt to bring the war home to a Russian domestic audience and set conditions for a wider societal mobilization,” analysts at the Institute for the Study of War think tank said in analysis Wednesday evening.

Several indicators suggest that the strike was internally conducted and purposefully staged, the ISW noted, not least of all because Russia has recently taken steps to increase Russian domestic air defense capabilities, including within Moscow itself.

A still image taken from video shows a flying object exploding in an intense burst of light near the dome of the Kremlin Senate building during the alleged Ukrainian drone attack in Moscow, Russia, in this image taken from video obtained by Reuters May 3, 2023.

As such, the ISW noted, it was therefore “extremely unlikely” that two drones could have “penetrated multiple layers of air defense and detonated or been shot down just over the heart of the Kremlin in a way that provided spectacular imagery caught nicely on camera.”

In addition, the Kremlin’s “immediate, coherent, and coordinated response” to the incident also raised suspicion, suggesting that the attack was “internally prepared in such a way that its intended political effects outweigh its embarrassment,” the think tank noted.

Had the attack been a surprise, the ISW believed, “it is very likely that the official Russian response would initially have been much more disorganized as Russian officials scrambled to generate a coherent narrative and offset the rhetorical implications of a clear informational embarrassment.”

CNBC contacted the Kremlin for a response to claims that it was likely behind the drone attack itself. It has not yet responded....