Biden authorizes Ukraine to use long-range US weapons against Russia, sources say

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MADRID 17 Nov. () –

The president of the United States, Joe Biden, would have authorized Ukraine to use long-range US weapons against Russia, according to several US media reports citing sources familiar with the matter.

Washington would have thus authorized limited attacks within Russian territory in response to the presence of thousands of North Korean soldiers on the front to reinforce the Russian offensive in eastern Ukraine, media outlets such as ‘The Washington Post’ and ‘The New York Times’ report.

The Ukrainian president has not confirmed this information, but he has referred to the news. “Today the media talks a lot about giving us permission for these actions, but the attacks are not carried out with words. These things are not announced. The missiles will speak for themselves. I am sure they will,” he stressed.

Firstly, Washington seeks with this change to deter North Korea so that it does not send more troops to Russia and perceives that its presence in the area is a “costly” mistake, according to one of the ‘Washington Post’ sources. Therefore, the attacks will initially focus on the Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces already control a small portion of Russian territory and precisely where North Korean soldiers have been deployed since October.

Specifically, kyiv will be able to use the Army Tactical Military System (ATACMS) against targets in Russian territory, which until now was prohibited for fear of escalation, and is especially relevant because this decision has been made less than two months before replacement in the White House after Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential elections on November 5. Trump has promised to end the war in Ukraine.

The authorization “is going to have a very specific and limited effect” on the battlefield to avoid a possible escalation, according to another source from ‘The Washington Post’.

Other sources have suggested that Biden intends with this gesture to strengthen Ukraine’s position with a view to a possible negotiation with Moscow once Trump comes to power in January.

The ATACMS is a supersonic guided missile system that can carry a cluster or conventional bomb warhead that has a maximum range of about 305 kilometers.