A little over a month after receiving the green light from France, Germany and the United States to use allied munitions against Russian territory, but always close to the border with Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky has embarked on his umpteenth diplomatic ascension to overcome a new red line from the West, especially Washington. The Ukrainian leader has reiterated in recent days, in messages through social networks, that “decisions must be made” to be able to reach, no matter how far away, the point of origin of the Russian projectiles. “Our cities and communities suffer these attacks daily,” said the president last Saturday after a bombing that caused seven deaths in the Zaporizhia region, “but there are ways to overcome it: destroy the terrorists wherever they are, destroy the Russian missile launchers, attack at really long distances and increase the number of modern air defense systems.” This new venture by Zelensky would have the support of several Democrats and Republicans in the US Congress for the moment.
The political perseverance demonstrated by the Ukrainian president’s cabinet since Russia launched a large-scale invasion in February 2022 is working. Open messages to the public and private messages to allied governments have succeeded in forcing Western foreign ministries to shore up Ukraine’s defence. And it is working: since a month ago, when Paris, Berlin – which provides the Franco-British Scalp/Storm Shadow missiles – and, shortly after, Washington – which sends the Himars and ATACMS – endorsed attacks on Russian territory to stop the offensive launched on 10 May against Kharkiv, the number of bombs and civilian deaths in this province has fallen.
Whether it was the deterrence of this new room for manoeuvre on the front – Ukraine has been able to hit S-300 and S-400 batteries in the Russian region of Belgorod – or the good work of the head of the army, Oleksandr Sirski, Kiev has contained Moscow’s onslaught. “The attacks in the Russian border areas have helped to protect lives,” Zelensky said last Sunday in a recorded message. “So will other bold decisions that must be taken, which we need and which we are discussing with our partners.” In other words, what we have is not enough. Despite the progress, last Saturday, a new attack with guided bombs caused the death of seven people in Vilniansk, a small town in the province of Zaporizhia, in the southeast of the country. Three of the victims were minors.
The main target of kyiv’s latest request is Washington. Although President Joe Biden has approved the use of its munitions against Russian territory along the border, he has not included the ATACMS missiles, which have a longer range, in this new list. The executive director of the Center for Cooperation and Security of Ukraine, Dmitro Zhmailo, explains in an exchange of emails the importance of these projectiles: “They have a range of up to 300 kilometers. This zone of destruction includes more than 100 military units and, most importantly, about 18 air bases from which Russian planes bomb Ukraine.”
The exact limit imposed by the US on the use of its missiles against Russian territory is unknown. On June 21, the newspaper The Washington Post The newspaper claimed from Ukrainian sources that this range would be less than 100 kilometers from the Ukrainian border. The same newspaper quoted the words, very open to interpretation, of the national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, in an interview with the PBS channel: “It’s not about geography. It’s about common sense. If Russia is attacking or is about to attack Ukraine from its territory, the only thing that makes sense is to allow it to attack Ukraine from its territory.” [Kiev] respond to the forces attacking it from across the border.”
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Russia launched around 800 guided missiles – like the Vilniusk bombs – in the last week of June. Ukrainian Defence Minister Rustem Umerov recently reported that 10,000 such missiles had fallen on Ukrainian soil since the beginning of this year until May. These short-range weapons, cheaper than other munitions, are a real nightmare for the military and civilians of the border provinces of Donetsk, Kharkiv and Sumi – according to UN data, 174 civilians died in May, and 690 were injured, the highest number recorded since June 2023. They can be launched from Russian territory, but at a distance that, for the moment, is not within the reach of Ukrainian artillery.
The other nightmare for Ukrainians is gliding bombs, which are notoriously elusive to air defense systems because they do not carry the propulsion and heat that radars usually pick up before triggering interceptor rockets. According to Ukrainian government data, more than 3,000 of these projectiles hit targets in March alone. Like guided missiles, gliding bombs can be launched from points far outside the range of Ukrainian missiles. Even if a Russian fighter launches them near the border, their port of departure is usually farther away.
This is where kyiv wants to go now. “Strikes on military air bases,” says Zhmailo, a military and political expert, “will force the Russian command to withdraw aircraft from the potential damage zone to points further away from the Ukrainian border. This will affect the effectiveness of the use of Russian combat aircraft: the time it takes for them to fly to the bomb drop site will increase.” The defence’s reaction time will be greater, as will the security of cities.

On Wednesday, a new Russian missile and drone attack killed eight people in Dnipro, a city in the centre of the country. The bombing also damaged a shopping centre, schools and kindergartens. Zelensky repeated his message: more ammunition for anti-aircraft defence – Germany announced on Friday through its ambassador to Ukraine, Martin Jaeger, the arrival of its third shipment of Patriot systems – and more long-range attacks against Russian bases. “We are actively communicating all this to our partners,” the Ukrainian president reported through his Telegram profile, “at all levels.”
On Monday, a delegation of Democrats and Republicans from the US Congress traveled to kyiv to meet with Zelensky. Republican Mike Turner, chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said after the meeting that Ukraine should be allowed to strike “valid military targets” on Russian territory. Sometimes the messages in kyiv, on Ukrainian soil, are far from what is said at home. On this occasion, Turner insisted on something that had already been discussed in Washington. On June 26, during the meeting of the House Committee on International Relations, both Republican Congressman Joe Wilson and Democrat Gregory Meeks showed their support for lifting the restrictions imposed on Ukraine to attack Russian territory.
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