Satellite photos show Russia's final troop deployments around Ukraine before Putin launched an invasion

• Satellite imagery seems to show Russian troops being deployed near the Ukrainian border Wednesday.
• The images were captured less than 24 hours before Russia launched an attack on Ukraine early Thursday.

Satellite imagery captured Wednesday shows Russian troops seemingly being deployed within miles of the Ukrainian border just hours before President Vladimir Putin ordered a "full scale invasion" of the country.

Russian forces, under orders from Putin, launched widespread attacks on Ukraine early on Thursday morning.

Blasts from missile strikes have been heard in the capital Kyiv, per the Ukrainian interior ministry. There have also been reports of outgoing artillery fire from Russian forces across the border.

Ukraine's foreign ministry said Russia was "launching attacks on peaceful Ukrainian cities from different directions, including from the territory of the temporary occupied Donbas and Crimea, as well as from South-East region."

Pictures captured Wednesday by Maxar Technologies satellites showed artillery, armored personnel carriers, and military convoys seemingly on the move on the Russian side of the border. The images appear to show Russian troops making their final preparations before moving into Ukraine.

The images show vehicles in four locations within Russia, all within 20 miles of the Ukrainian border — Golovchino, Malakeevo, Krasnaya Yaruga, and Kupino.

The map below shows the approximate location of the vehicle deployments captured by Maxar.

The pictures show a large number of military vehicles massing in farm land, which is marked with what appear to be fresh tire tracks.

The image below shows vehicles in the Golovchino locality.

Similar scenes unfolded Malakeevo, roughly 20 miles to the north-east of the Russian border.

Other pictures show more military vehicles moving along roads and tracks near Krasnaya Yaruga.

Putin announced Russian forces were launching an offensive against Ukraine in a video that aired early Thursday morning in local time.

Ukrainian border guard video cameras captured imagery of military vehicles, including tanks, crossing the border to Ukraine from the southern Crimea region and Belarus, to the north of Ukraine, the Telegraph reported.

One camera captured tanks crossing Ukraine's northern border with Belarus at the Senkivka crossing at 6:48 a.m. local time Thursday, per CNN. It was not immediately clear when the other videos were captured.

US President Joe Biden said that the attack amounts to a "premeditated war" that will bring "catastrophic loss of life and human suffering."

The conflict, which has been escalating for months, has already led the US, UK, and the European Union to issue sanctions against Russia.

The sanctions came Tuesday, after Putin decided to move troops in what he called a "peacekeeping" mission to the border with Donetsk and Luhansk — two separatist territories that are loyal to Moscow — on Monday.

Putin on Monday said that Moscow would formally recognize the independence of the two breakaway regions.