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Just days after the United States and other European allies granted permission Ukraine shot Armas Its manufacturing is aimed at Russian territory, Kiev attacked a military facility on the border with a US-made artillery system.
Yehor Chernev, deputy chairman of the Ukrainian parliament’s National Security, Defense and Intelligence Committee, said on Tuesday that Ukrainian troops launch attack in Belgorod region, destroy Russian missile launchersabout 30 kilometers from Russia.
He reportedly said Ukrainian forces would use highly mobile artillery rocket systems, known as HIMARS. New York Times.
This was the first time a Ukrainian official publicly acknowledged that Ukraine had used American weapons to fire at Russia. Ever since President Joe Biden lifted a ban on such strikes to defend the Kharkiv region, which is under a continuing Russian siege, the ban had been a “red line” that the Biden administration would not cross for months, fearing increased tensions with a nuclear-armed country.
The Ukrainian military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The United States imposed restrictions when it granted the license last week, stressing that the weapons could only be used on Russian territory near northeastern Ukraine and for defensive purposes.
Chernev said in a text message: With these strikes, Ukraine destroyed S-300 and S-400 missile systems, but did not specify the exact number. Russia used these systems, originally designed to shoot down aircraft, to bomb Kharkiv, just 70 kilometers from Belgorod.
The Himal used by Ukraine is a US-made long-range rocket system capable of launching beyond the range of most non-Western weapons in Ukraine.
The report noted that Chernev’s account of the attack could not be independently confirmed. But on Monday, video footage emerged showing the aftermath of the attack on the S-300 and S-400 systems. Satellite images and social media posts show multiple attacks on Russian territory During the weekend.
Chernev is a former member of the Ukrainian military and head of Ukraine’s delegation to NATO’s Parliamentary Assembly, a position that involved him in discussions with Western partners on the supply and use of Western weapons.
A video on a Russian Telegram channel showed fire and gray smoke from Russian military hardware following the attack on Sunday. The video was verified New York Timeswas taken on the outskirts of Belgorod, where satellite images taken by Planet Labs showed smoke billowing from what appeared to be destroyed vehicles. At least one of the throwers was in a high position at the time of the attack.
Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and an expert on the Russian military and modern warfare, said: The range and accuracy of the attack on the missile launch system indicated that the weapon used was American.
“Given the range, the type of target, the availability of ammunition, and the change in policy from the Biden administration, I think it’s likely that this attack was conducted with Himals,” he commented.
Likewise, Russian bloggers, researchers analyzing satellite imagery and battlefield footage, and reports from the Russian Ministry of Defense There have been multiple US rocket attacks in Russia since Thursdaywhen the Biden administration approves its use.
On Saturday, Russian state television war correspondent Evgeny Poddubny shared photos of fragments of a U.S. guided rocket found on Russian territory. It was not possible to independently verify when and where the fragments were found.
Military analysts have been watching to see when and how Ukraine uses U.S. weapons on Russian territory.
Several weeks, Ukraine has been lobbying hard for its Western allies to allow it to use weapons to attack Russian territory. The government claims that Russian troops are massing on the border, preparing to attack Ukraine with impunity, and points to the urgent need to be able to hit aircraft that launch so-called glide bombs from Russian territory, which are also aimed at targets inside Ukraine, and to strike Russian military bases, command points and ammunition depots.
“We use every meeting and every opportunity of the day to provide more possibilities for our fighters,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on Telegram on Tuesday. “I am grateful to all partners who helped in the way we needed and on time,” he added.
Military analysts claim The Ukrainians’ new ability to strike at Russia would help deter Moscow from cross-border attacks.
“We can now carry out formation strikes against Russian troops, which reduces the possibility of them launching new offensives at other points along the border,” said Mihaylo Samus, director of the Center for the Study of Army, Reconstruction and Disarmament, a military research institute in Kyiv.
Russia has repeatedly warned Ukraine’s Western allies that allowing an attack on Russian territory would have serious consequences.
“We want to warn American officials against miscalculations that could have fatal consequences,” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Monday, according to Interfax news agency.
“For reasons that are unclear, they underestimate the severity of the response they’re going to get,” he said.
Russia did not specify what those consequences would be, but Last week Vladimir Putin issued a veiled threat to smaller European countriesnoting that they were “very densely populated.”
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said The United States will not reconsider its policy prohibiting deeper strikes against Russia in the coming weeks. The government also prohibits Ukraine from launching longer-range and more powerful ATACMS rockets into Russia. But Kiev is pushing to expand the scope of the license.
“All Russian troops in the border areas must be eliminated to prevent them from crossing the border,” Samus said, noting that it was unlikely that public disclosure would be made about exactly how the weapons were used. “Both Ukraine and the United States have official positions. Everything else is the fog of war,” he concluded.
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