How far will Ukraine’s allies go against Russia?
Two and a half years after beginning his invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin was caught off guard. Ukrainian soldiers launched a sudden attack on southern Russia, marking Russia’s first invasion since World War II.
Their operation forces Ukraine’s Western allies to make a decision they have deliberately avoided since the war began. Should they give Ukraine the tools it needs not only to survive the Russian attack, but also to turn the tide of the war?
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Will Ukraine’s surprise advance into Russian territory convince the allies to lift their restrictions on the use of their military aid? And could it change the course of the war?
So far, they have not followed up their words with actions. The reason for this is their fear that a cornered Putin could dramatically escalate the situation, threaten other neighbors and draw NATO directly into the conflict.
But Ukraine has fallen behind militarily in recent months, and top-of-the-range British and American missiles could give Kiev a new boost, especially if the Ukrainians are allowed to use them against targets in Russia, something London and Washington currently prohibit.
If President Joe Biden reconsiders this policy, he will continue to keep his cards to himself.
“We are in direct, constant contact with the Ukrainians,” he said this week. “That’s all I will say about that.”
Nine hundred days after launching his unprovoked war to annex neighboring Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin suffered a rude awakening: a surprise cross-border attack by Ukrainian forces, which quickly seized control of some 1,000 square kilometers of southern Russia.
But Mr Putin was not the only one who was surprised.
This also applied to US President Joe Biden and Kyiv’s most important European NATO allies.
Why we wrote this
A story about
Will Ukraine’s surprise advance into Russian territory convince the allies to lift their restrictions on the use of their military aid? And could it change the course of the war?
They now face a potentially critical decision that they have deliberately avoided since the Russian invasion: Should they give Ukraine the resources it needs not only to survive the Russian onslaught but also to turn the tide in the war against the Kremlin?
So far, they have not followed up their words with actions. This is mainly due to the prevailing concern that a cornered Putin could dramatically escalate the situation, thereby threatening other neighbors and drawing NATO directly into the conflict.
This concern remains.
But recent changes in the war’s course have raised with new urgency the question of the extent to which support for Kyiv’s armed forces needs to be increased.
The immediate problem is not the supply of new weapons, although Ukraine is frustrated by the sporadic delivery of state-of-the-art missiles, F-16 fighter jets and air defense systems.
At issue is whether to ease allied restrictions on the use of equipment already received by the Ukrainians, particularly British and American long-range missiles capable of hitting supply routes, weapons depots and troops far behind the Russian front line.
They could be particularly effective now if they were deployed from the areas in Russia captured by the Ukrainians – and potentially destroy the bases from which the Russians launch their attacks with missiles, drones and glide bombs on villages, towns and cities throughout Ukraine.
The Allies’ hopes for a major spring offensive against Russian troops, which occupy one-fifth of Ukrainian territory, were dashed mainly because of the dense Russian minefields along the almost 960-kilometer-long front.
In recent months, Russia has deployed tens of thousands more troops. Under constant air strikes, they have succeeded in weakening Ukraine’s defenses and advancing slowly but surely.
Neither side seemed to be able to make a major breakthrough. But the Russians were increasingly gaining an advantage, and this was unmistakable.
Biden hopes that the Ukrainians’ surprise attack on Russia’s Kursk region has, at least for now, changed the situation in their favor. “This creates a real dilemma for Putin,” he told reporters this week.
American and European defense officials have pointed out that the attack used what Western planners call “combined forces” warfare – the seamless integration of air defenses, electronic warfare, tanks and ground forces that they had hoped would make the spring offensive a success.
The attack also appears to reflect a gradual loosening of at least one of the restrictions imposed by the Allies on the use of their military aid. The Ukrainian invading forces deployed American and German armored vehicles outside Ukraine’s borders, with no sign of objection from Washington or Berlin.
However, there is currently no comparable flexibility in the use of the weapons that the Ukrainians believe could most dramatically change the balance of power: the British Storm Shadow missiles with a range of around 240 kilometers and the even more powerful American ATACM missiles. London and Washington continue to prohibit their use against targets in Russia.
When President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced further Ukrainian advances this week, he stressed how important it could be to lift that restriction. “There are things you can’t do with drones alone,” he said. “For that you need another weapon: a missile.”
Not even the most optimistic supporters of Ukraine suggest that it will be possible to expel Putin from Ukraine in the near future.
Rather, the hope is to persuade him to withdraw his troops from their positions in Ukraine in order to fend off the first foreign military incursion onto Russian soil since the Second World War.
For the US and its allies, two considerations will probably be decisive in whether they give the green light to the deployment of their missiles.
The first is the well-known concern not to push Mr Putin too far.
The weight of this attack may be less now. The Ukrainian attack is the most spectacular breach of Russian “red lines” to date, and the Kremlin has repeatedly hinted that it could lead to an escalation, possibly to the use of tactical nuclear weapons. So far, however, Russia has not responded to such threats.
The other consideration goes beyond the immediate impact on the battlefield and focuses on the diplomatic endgame that all warring parties, even the Ukrainians, seem increasingly to accept must come at some point.
By demonstrating their ability to conquer Russian territory, the Ukrainians strengthen their position in such negotiations, even if Putin’s forces push the Ukrainians back.
Kyiv’s allies could strengthen Ukraine’s position even further by allowing the use of long-range missiles against Crimea, which Putin captured and unilaterally annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
Whether Washington will actually change its course will only become clear in the next few weeks. President Biden is still keeping a low profile.
“We are in direct, ongoing contact with the Ukrainians,” he told reporters this week. “That’s all I’m going to say about it as long as it’s active.”
