After U.S. President Joe Biden gave the go-ahead for Ukraine to wield long-range American missiles deep inside Russia, as a Newsweek map illustrates, questions remain over just how much of a difference this will make as Moscow gains in the east and a new U.S. presidential term approaches.
U.S. officials said on Sunday that the White House had approved the use of U.S.-supplied Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, missiles for use against targets far into Russia's territory.
The move marks a distinct shift in policy by the outgoing Biden administration. While it does lift a chafing restriction from Ukrainian officials, there are doubts swirling about how much of an impact the limited ATACMS stocks can have nearly 1,000 days into the full-scale war.
Newsweek's map shows the potential maximum range of the U.S.-supplied arms if fired from territory controlled by Ukraine's armed forces.
Moscow has been aware for months that the White House was weighing up approving use of its long-range ballistic missiles against targets on Russian soil, and has had time to prepare accordingly.
The U.S. had allowed Ukraine to use shorter-range American weapons, like the High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) Washington donated in the early months of the war, to hit Russian targets over the border from Ukraine's Kharkiv region after Moscow launched an offensive into the country's northeast in May. The range of the HIMARS rockets provided by the U.S. for these systems was around 50 miles, or 80 kilometers. ATACMS can reach around 190 miles, or roughly 300 kilometers.
A Game-Changer?
The U.S.-based think tank, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), said in late August that "hundreds" of Russian military targets across the border were in reach of Ukrainian-operated ATACMS.
But some analysts are underwhelmed. Defense Priorities, a U.S. foreign think tank that advocates broadly against American military involvement overseas, said the Biden administration's decision was "strategically unwise and operationally unnecessary."
"The move will not meaningfully improve Ukraine's military position, but it will intensify U.S. and NATO entanglement in the conflict and worsen the risk of Russian escalation—including possible retaliation on U.S. or European targets," said the think tank's director of military analysis, Jennifer Kavanagh.
Russian President Vladimir Putin did not immediately comment personally, but said in September that if Ukraine fired these missiles far over the border, this would mean NATO was directly involved in the war. The alliance has repeatedly said it is not party to the conflict.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Monday that the decision was an "escalation of tensions" and changed the level of U.S. involvement in the conflict.
Washington provided Ukraine with shorter-range versions of ATACMS more than a year ago, and has since sent missiles with a longer reach to Kyiv. But the U.S. had resisted calls from Ukrainian officials to green-light the use of these ground-launched ballistic missiles against key targets deep inside Russia, concerned about escalating the conflict.
Ukraine has received very few ATACMS from the U.S., which has only a limited number of the Lockheed Martin-made ballistic missiles in its own inventory.
"To really impose costs on Russia, Ukraine would need large stockpiles of ATACMS, which it doesn't have and won't receive because the United States' own supplies are limited," Kavanagh said.
The decision has been in the works for months, meaning Russia has had the opportunity to plan for its eventual approval.
An unnamed senior administration official told Politico in August that around 90 percent of the Russian jets launching lethal and highly destructive glide bombs at Ukraine from Russian airspace—out of the reach of Ukrainian air defenses—had "already moved out of range" of ATACMS.
With two months left in office, Biden's approval comes as Ukraine prepares for President-elect Donald Trump to step back into the White House, having pledged to end the nearly three years of full-scale war in a day and to slice military aid to Kyiv. Ukraine is heavily dependent on Western military aid, and the U.S. is its single largest donor.
Ukraine is likely to use ATACMS in Russia's western Kursk region, according to several media reports. U.S., Ukrainian and South Korean intelligence assessed that more than 10,000 North Korean troops have been deployed alongside Russian forces after Kyiv launched a surprise cross-border incursion into the region in early August.
Rather than focusing on Russia's troops in Kursk, Ukraine's military should home in on high-value military targets across Russia with these ballistic missiles, Ivan Stupak, who formerly served with Ukraine's SBU security service, told Newsweek.
Ukraine has been doggedly zeroing in on Russian ammunition dumps, airbases and other facilities with its domestically-developed explosive drones. These home-grown weapons have not been under the same restrictions as U.S. technology.
Seeing ATACMS used on Russian soil could make a dent in Moscow's morale, Stupak said.
Meanwhile, Pyongyang entering the fray has been widely condemned by countries aligned with Ukraine, including the U.S., as a dangerous escalation. North Korea could send as many as 100,000 troops to bolster Russia's war effort, Bloomberg reported on Sunday. This number of additional personnel could make a significant difference to the war, with Russia already making steady gains in eastern Ukraine throughout 2024.
Western governments providing aid to Ukraine have generally followed Washington's lead, meaning the U.K. and France are likely poised to approve the use of their Storm Shadow and SCALP air-launched cruise missiles deep into Russia. These Anglo-French missiles have a range of upward of 250 kilometers, or 155 miles.
"We welcome this decisive move from the U.S.," former British Armed Forces Minister, James Cartlidge, said in a post to X, formerly Twitter. The move "must now surely lead" to British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer agreeing to similar use of Storm Shadow missiles, said Cartlidge, of the opposition Conservative Party.
Starmer said that following the U.S. approval of ATACMS strikes in Russia that Ukraine was "top" of his agenda for the G20 summit getting underway in Brazil.
"We need to double down on shoring up our support for Ukraine," the British leader said.
James Rogers, director of research at the U.K.-based Council on Geostrategy think tank, said the British government "should now do everything in its power to enable Ukraine to fire British-supplied weapons to strike military and logistical targets deep inside Russia."
ATACMS cannot reach as far as missiles such as the U.S.-made Tomahawk, which Ukraine has requested from the U.S. The ranges differ slightly between the versions, but it can strike at distances of up to around 1,500 miles.
The New York Times reported at the end of October that Ukraine's President, Volodymyr Zelensky, had proposed to Washington as part of his "victory plan" that Kyiv would receive Tomahawk missiles. One unnamed senior U.S. official told the newspaper that the request for Tomahawks was completely unrealistic.
Zelensky confirmed to reporters that he had requested the Tomahawks from Washington, but described his appeal as "confidential information between Ukraine and the White House."
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