US Rebuffs Ukrainian Request to Strike Deep into Russian Territory

Facts

• US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Friday rebuffed Ukraine's appeal for permitting the country to use Western-provided long-range missiles to strike deep into Russia.^[1]
• Since the US lifted some restrictions on Ukraine's weapons use earlier in the year, including ATACMS strikes on Crimea and limited strikes on Russian regions bordering Ukraine, Ukrainian officials have repeatedly lobbied for further easing of the restrictions.^[2]
• At the Ramstein Air Base in Germany on Friday, sitting alongside US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Ukrainian Pres. Volodymyr Zelenskyy made the case again. 'We need to have this long-range capability, not only on the divided territory of Ukraine, but also on the Russian territory, so that Russia is motivated to seek peace,' Zelenskyy said.^[3]
• However, speaking to reporters after the meeting, Austin pushed back against the idea that allowing strikes deep into Russian territory would be a game-changer in the conflict.^[4]
• 'There's no one capability that will in and of itself be decisive in this campaign,' Austin said.^[4]
• 'There are a lot of targets in Russia — big country, obviously,' he added. 'And there's a lot of capability that Ukraine has in terms of UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles] and other things to address those targets.'^[4]

Sources: ^[1]Yahoo News, ^[2]CNN, ^[3]Associated Press and ^[4]Reuters.

Narratives

• Pro-establishment narrative, as provided by Reuters. It's wrong to think that a single capability is sufficient to suddenly turn the course of the war in Ukraine's favor. Russia is a big country, and Ukraine has other capabilities for reaching these targets that may be better suited than long-range US weapons.
• Pro-Russia narrative, as provided by TASS. The US needs to think long and hard about the decision on whether to allow Ukraine to strike Russia with long-range weapons. Ukraine knows the only way it can possibly win this conflict is by drawing the US and UK into the fight, and that's what it hopes to achieve by striking Russia with their weapons, even if it leads to the outbreak of World War III.

Predictions