As critics grapple with the impact of Donald Trump’s 34-count conviction in New York, the Biden administration has authorized a major Russian red line crossing: the use of U.S. (and other foreign) weapons to attack Russian targets. The New York Times ruling:
The Biden administration’s decision to allow Ukraine to attack Russian soil with American-made weapons fulfills a long-held desire of Kyiv authorities, who have argued it is essential for a level playing field.
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The policy shift comes after more than a dozen European countries and Canada said they could fire their own weapons at Russia.Freed from these constraints, Ukraine could attack Russia with French-made SCALP missiles and, soon, identical Storm Shadow missiles supplied by the UK. British Foreign Secretary David Cameron said on May 3 that Ukraine should be able to attack Russia with Western weapons, but London has not yet given full permission…
The SCALP and Storm Shadow missiles have a range of about 150 miles and are fired from Ukraine’s aging, Soviet-designed fighter jets.
Several countries, including the UK, Germany, Norway and the US, have provided Ukraine with ground-based missile launchers capable of firing longer-range missiles, known as HIMARS and MLRS launchers, including the US-made Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), which has a range of up to 190 miles.
But in announcing the new policy, U.S. officials said their policy does not allow for the use of ATACMS or longer-range missiles capable of striking deep into Russia. Germany has also so far refused to donate its 310-mile-range Taurus missiles, due to concerns they could be fired deep into Russia, escalating war. Raphael Roth, a weapons expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said in an interview Thursday that Germany is even less likely to donate.
In addition, Britain, Canada and the United States are supplying Ukraine with medium-range missiles and ground-based small diameter bombs capable of reaching Russia, 50 to 90 miles away.
But the new authorizations could have the biggest impact in a war for air superiority, especially if allies allow donated jets and drones to attack Russian airspace.The Dutch foreign minister said on Friday that Ukraine could use 24 F-16 fighter jets that the Netherlands has committed to flying combat missions into Russian territory.
And according to an exclusive from Politico: President Biden secretly gave Ukraine permission to attack Russian soil with US weapons (Note that the Times did not credit Politico, but oddly enough, Politico ran the story far below the fold):
The Biden administration has quietly authorized Ukraine to use U.S.-supplied weapons to launch attacks inside Russia but only near the Kharkiv region, three U.S. officials and two people familiar with the matter said Thursday, a major policy shift that could help Ukraine better defend its second-largest city.
If I were cynical, I would see this as a pretext for the same thing to happen elsewhere. Putin said Russia is not targeting Kharkiv anytime soon. Kharkiv is a huge city. It would take a lot of resources to take it. Still, Zelensky seems to be over-investing his dwindling resources into defending Kharkiv, but if Russia wants to push further into Ukraine and, say, cut off more supply lines, it would be better off bypassing Kharkiv for now. If Russia wants to intensify the war and accelerate attrition, a more obvious way would be to move forces to Sumy and extend the front further. Russia may have even planned to do so, but is now holding back to see how the latest episode of NATO debacle unfolds.
Keep in mind that the claim that these are somehow Ukrainian weapons because they are allocated to and used by Ukraine is a hoax. Ukraine relies on Western support for targeting information. Most experts believe that even the operation is conducted by a small number of, if not all, Western recruits. These are complex systems, and it is unlikely that Ukrainian soldiers would have been trained to the level of being able to deploy them independently. Putin addressed the issue at length in an interview earlier this week, suggesting that NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg must have developed dementia to claim otherwise. He also warned that the move could stoke a “global conflict” and that Russia could retaliate by attacking U.S. military assets in other theaters.
It is unclear what the US is trying to achieve in this semi-unpredictable game. Meanwhile, Russia has been able to shoot down most of the long-range missiles aimed at it. For example, Alexander Mercouris cited the latest Defense Ministry report yesterday that Ukraine fired eight ATACMS missiles at Crimea and Russia shot them all down. This does not mean that there was no collateral damage from missile falls or anti-aircraft missiles. And as Mercouris emphasizes, this is a game of probability, and missiles sometimes penetrate.
Meanwhile, the Times included Dutch F-16s in its weapons list. This is actually an empty threat to Russia, and should be reassuring. Scott Ritter says that pilots who fly F-16s against Russia have only a 20% chance of surviving. They will be detected and actively attacked immediately after takeoff. The F-16s have to take off from golf course runways. Ukraine does not have F-16s that are good enough, and Russia will attack any runway that Ukraine brings up to the required standard right away. Which leads to the next problem. Russia says that any country that launches an attack against Russia, and that includes launching fake Ukrainian F-16s from Polish or Romanian airbases, will be at war with Russia and will be hit back. It seems Romania and Poland have not yet decided to go there.
On the other hand, what would Russia do if a NATO member launched a significant attack on Russia under the guise of Ukraine, which seems likely? Some criticize Russia’s patience as a sign of weakness, but Russia and many of its allies would recognize that the United States is run by reckless incompetents who act as if nuclear war is no big deal. Indeed, Aurélien writes in his must-read book: NATO’s Phantom Army Auerlein has explained at length that NATO cannot systematically carry out any meaningful operations against Russia even if it could extricate itself (though he did not consider a less onerous “coalition of the willing”). But the West is still seriously short on men and weapons, and NATO, or the disparate weapons systems that are part of it, create a logistical nightmare.
So conventional military escalation, if attempted at all, is self-limiting. The risk is nuclear war, for example, if the US thinks it’s a great idea to move submarines to the east coast of Russia and drop tactical nukes on Siberia. These guys are crazy enough to do that.
I think Russia has no need to do anything unless one of these newly authorized weapons actually hurts Russia. A failed attempt, even if it irritates nerves, will work to Russia’s advantage. But if the West strikes a blow, the best thing for Russia to do would be to significantly accelerate the destruction of the Ukrainian power system, albeit with the satisfaction of a retaliatory response and attacking NATO targets. Russia would probably have come up with some variants by now. Destroying more power grids now would of course make many military operations more difficult and increase the movement of refugees to Europe, which is not very pleasant, especially for the Polish people.
Of course, at this point all we can do is speculate about another dangerous escalation that would not change the outcome of the war (assuming there is no nuclear war), so we’ll have to wait and see what happens.
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As for attacks, frankly, I don’t really understand what the NATO Secretary General is talking about. When he was the Prime Minister of Norway, we were able to discuss, address and generally agree on difficult issues regarding the Barents Sea and other issues. And I am sure he was not demented then. If he is talking about the possibility of attacking Russian territory with long-range precision weapons, then he, even if he is a civilian like me, as the head of a military-political organization, needs to be aware of the fact that long-range precision weapons cannot be used without reconnaissance from space. This is my first point.
The second point is that the final selection of targets and the so-called launch missions can only be performed by highly skilled specialists who rely on this reconnaissance data, technical reconnaissance data. For some offensive systems, such as Storm Shadow, these launch missions can be performed automatically, without the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Who does it? By the manufacturers and those who allegedly supply these offensive systems to Ukraine. This can and does happen without the involvement of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The launch of other systems, for example, ATACMS, also relies on space reconnaissance data, where targets are identified and communicated automatically to the relevant crews, who may not even understand what they are putting into them. Crews, in some cases Ukrainian crews, perform the corresponding launch missions. However, it is the representatives of NATO countries who put the missions together, not the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
So the NATO players, particularly those based in Europe, especially in the smaller European countries, should be very aware of what’s at stake. They should keep in mind that they are small, densely populated countries. This is a factor to take into account before you talk about an attack deep inside Russian territory. This is a serious issue, and certainly we’re watching this very closely.
The focus is on the situation outside Kharkov. But they are the ones who initiated these incidents. I think it was six months ago that I publicly stated that if they continue to target residential areas, we must create safe zones. Only recently have we started to implement what I said back then…
Do they want a global conflict? I think they wanted to agree on strategic weapons, but I don’t think they’re really keen to do that. They’re talking about it, but they’re not doing much to make it happen. We’ll have to wait and see what happens next.
