by Viviana Mazza
The first delivery will take place in the next few weeks. The agreement came late due to fears that US supplies would run out and to avoid escalation with Russia
FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
NEW YORK – President Joe Biden told Zelensky, who visited the White House the day before yesterday, that the United States will provide Kyiv with a reduced number of long-range ATACMS missiles, NBC News announced yesterday. Secretary of State Antony Blinken did not confirm the news in a conversation with reporters in New York, but stressed that sending military aid was under constant discussion and that decisions were also based on training and coordination with weapons sent by allies. According to the Wall Street Journal, the first rockets will arrive in the next few weeks and another shipment could arrive later.
Ukraine has been demanding for months the Army Tactical Missile System, known by the acronym Atacms, which allows it to attack up to 300 kilometers away, targeting enemy supply lines, railways, command and control centers beyond the front line. Their importance has also increased because Kiev’s stocks of British and French long-range missiles are dwindling. The deployment of the Atacms could also encourage Germany, which, as with the tanks, has indicated that it would prefer to act in agreement with Washington, to send its own long-range Taurus missiles.
The delivery of the Atacms was examined by the heads of various security agencies. The uncertainties had two main reasons: first, the fact that the Pentagon did not have large stocks of them and feared that it would run out of missiles useful on other fronts from Asia to the Middle East; Second, some in Washington fear that long-range missile (and drone) attacks could lead to an escalation of the war with Russia. According to the Washington Post, a variant of the Atacm will be equipped with cluster munitions instead of a single warhead, of which the Pentagon has a larger quantity.
Given the slow pace of the counteroffensive and approaching winter, Kiev is striking beyond the front line: Crimea has been repeatedly attacked, including yesterday in the raid on the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. Over the course of these 19 months of war the United States has gradually delivered weapons that were initially refused, such as the Himars systems (which can fire shorter-range missiles, as well as the Atacms) and the Abrams tanks or the F16 ( supplied by the Allies with permission from the USA). . For the Atacms it will be like for the F16, Zelenskyy told journalists at the congress. After the meeting with Biden, the Ukrainian president hinted at an agreement that would strengthen Ukraine’s defense capabilities. Thank you so much. Further details will be announced shortly.
September 22, 2023 (changed September 22, 2023 | 10:46 p.m.)
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED