A Ukrainian soldier at a front line position in Krymsk, eastern Ukraine, on Saturday.

Tyler Hicks/The New York Times

MUNICH — As shelling hammered towns in eastern Ukraine on Saturday and civilians boarded buses to evacuate the region, Russia engaged in a dramatic display of military theater,
test-firing ballistic and cruise missiles in a reminder to the West that a conflict over Ukraine could quickly escalate.

In eastern Ukraine, where Russian-backed separatists have asserted, without evidence, that Ukraine was planning a large-scale attack, separatist leaders urged women and children to
evacuate and able-bodied men to prepare to fight.

While Western leaders have dismissed the notion that Ukraine would launch an attack while surrounded by Russian forces, the ginned-up panic was a disturbing sign of what the
United States has warned could be a pretext for a Russian invasion. President Biden declared Friday that President Vladimir V. Putin had already decided to invade Ukraine.

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, flew to Munich on Saturday to shore up Western support for his threatened nation. Some observers in Washington have expressed concern
that his leaving the country at this critical moment could provide an opening for Moscow, which the West believes is intent on toppling Mr. Zelensky’s government.