Ukraine fired American-supplied missiles into Russian territory on the 1,000th day of its war against its invaders, officials said Tuesday, as Russian President Vladimir Putin formally lowered the threshold for his country’s use of nuclear weapons.
Days earlier, the Biden administration reportedly signed off on a policy change allowing Ukraine to strike targets deep inside Russian territory with the U.S.-supplied Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS.
The Kremlin said Tuesday that its air defense troops had shot down five Ukrainian missiles and damaged a sixth, using their S-400 and Pantsir air defense missile systems. Fragments from the damaged ATACMS missile caused a “fire that was quickly extinguished” at a military facility in the target area.
Ukraine had yet to confirm that it launched the attack inside Russian territory using the ATACMs, but the Ukrainian General Staff in Kyiv said in a statement that an attack had taken out a major ammunition arsenal near the Russian city of Krachev.
“The destruction of ammunition depots will continue for the army of the Russian occupiers in order to stop the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine,” the statement said.
Mr. Putin has said the use of American-supplied missiles to strike Russian targets could dramatically escalate the conflict between Ukraine and Russia and could draw NATO into the fight.
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The Russian doctrine says a nuclear response would be justified in the face of “aggression by any non-nuclear state, but with the participation or support of a nuclear country.” That scenario closely mirrors Ukraine’s situation, given the heavy support it has received from the U.S., Britain and France, all nuclear powers.
Mr. Putin would remain the “ultimate authority” on whether to launch a nuclear attack, the Kremlin said.
The Reuters news agency, citing a document posted on the official Russian government website, said the doctrine also notes that “a nuclear response from Russia is possible in the event of a critical threat to its sovereignty, even with conventional weapons; in the event of an attack on Belarus as a member of the Union State; [or] in the event of a massive launch of military aircraft, cruise missiles, drones, other aircraft and their crossing the Russian border.”
The U.S. and its allies called the doctrine the latest bit of dangerous nuclear saber-rattling by the Putin government as its bloody war in Ukraine surpassed the 1,000-day mark.
A Defense Department spokesperson would not comment on Ukraine’s use of ATACMS missiles against Russian military targets. The system has a range of about 190 miles, the longest of any munitions supplied to Ukraine.
The U.S. and its allies say Moscow is the one guilty of escalating the fight, most notably with the deployment this month of thousands of North Korean troops into the battle along the border with Ukraine.
“The fact is that Russia chose to escalate this war by introducing [North Korean] forces onto the battlefield and into the fight,” Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh told reporters. “So you’re going to see us continue to support Ukraine with different presidential drawdown packages that are going to support its short-term and long-term needs.”
State Department spokesman Matt Miller said the nuclear doctrine shift “just highlights Russia’s hypocrisy.”
“Russia is suggesting here that they would use or could use nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear state if they undertake the same kind of aggression that Russia itself is inflicting upon Ukraine and its people,” Mr. Miller said. “So … we will continue to call on Russia to stop its bellicose and irresponsible rhetoric.”
U.S. officials noted that the Russian nuclear changes had been in the works for months. The State Department and National Security Council said they saw no need to adjust U.S. policies on the use of nuclear weapons in a crisis.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov urged Western nations to study the new doctrine closely. He said it had been updated “to bring it into line with the current political landscape.”
Free hand
U.S. officials said that giving Ukraine a free hand in choosing targets for an ATACMS strike sends a message to the regime of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, which has supplied Russia with about 11,000 combat troops. They are expected to begin operating inside Russia’s Kursk region to help drive out a small Ukrainian invasion force.
In Kyiv, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was coy about the reported six-missile ATACM barrage, the first of its kind in the war.
“Without unnecessary details, Ukraine has long-range capabilities. There are many long-range drones in production. We have the long-range Neptune [missiles], and now we have ATACMS. We will use all of this,” Mr. Zelenskyy said during a joint press conference with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen.
Russian military officials said Ukraine fired six ATACMS ballistic missiles at a warehouse in Bryansk early Tuesday. Ukrainian military officials said they detected at least 12 secondary explosions after the ATACMS rockets hit their targets, indicating the presence of ammunition at the target.
‘Irresponsible rhetoric’
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer joined the U.S. in condemning the new Russian nuclear policies. He said London would continue to back Ukraine in its war despite Mr. Putin’s nuclear saber-rattling.
“There’s irresponsible rhetoric coming from Russia, and that is not going to deter our support for Ukraine,” Mr. Starmer told reporters while attending the Group of 20 summit with President Biden in Brazil. The G20 comprises industrialized and emerging-market nations.
Mr. Biden has not publicly addressed whether he authorized the policy change allowing Ukrainians to use the ATACMs more. Some advisers to President-elect Donald Trump have criticized it as a provocative move that would make Mr. Trump’s promised peace deal harder to achieve.
Ukraine’s use of long-range missiles against Russia could force Moscow to the bargaining table to seek a diplomatic end to the fighting, Brian Nichols, assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere, told the Brazilian publication O Globo.
“The weapons that President Biden has authorized Ukraine to use will give it greater ability to defend itself and hopefully allow the Russian Federation to understand that using force to seize Ukrainian territory will not be successful,” Mr. Nichols said. “Perhaps [Russia] will start negotiating peace or, better yet, simply withdraw from Ukrainian territory. They are the ones who have complete control over how long this conflict lasts or not.”
The Biden administration’s approval of ATACMS followed a massive Russian bombardment of Ukraine’s power grid on Sunday. Ukraine’s air defense array and F-16 fighters reportedly downed 144 incoming projectiles before they could hit their targets, but at least nine civilians were killed in the barrage.
The Biden administration has highlighted America’s national security interest in backing Ukraine and helping it defeat Mr. Putin’s unprovoked invasion of its smaller neighbor, said Bradley Bowman, senior director of the Center of Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank.
“But the White House has often hesitated to provide Kyiv with major weapons systems and the permission to use them appropriately. That has hurt Kyiv, cost Ukrainian lives and helped Putin,” Mr. Bowman said. “The stakes are incredibly serious, but too often, the White House’s policy has not reflected that fact.”
• Mike Glenn can be reached at mglenn@washingtontimes.com.
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