Ukraine is in discussions with the UK about receiving longer-range missiles and is prepared to use them against Crimea, which would mark another major escalation of Western involvement in the war, The Times of London reported Thursday.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak promised more aid for Kyiv when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited London on Wednesday. The Times report said that discussions are now underway on whether future aid should include Harpoon anti-ship missiles or air-launched Storm Shadow missiles.
Ukrainian sources told The Times that they would plan to use these missiles to hit Crimea, strikes that would seriously risk provoking Moscow. But both the US and Britain are less concerned about escalating the war.
Ukraine has already received some Harpoon missiles from Denmark and launchers from the US. The anti-ship missiles have a range of about 70 miles, although other variants can hit targets over 100 miles away. The Harpoons have a longer range than artillery missiles the US has sent, but the Harpoons are designed for coastal defense.
It’s not clear if Ukraine could use Harpoons in its ground battle against Russia with the current launchers, but Ukrainian officials claimed they used them to sink a Russian military tug boat last June. The Times report said the Harpoons would be less accurate if they were used on the ground.
The Storm Shadow missiles could hit targets at a range between about 150 miles and 350 miles, depending on the variant. They are typically fired from aircraft, and the UK is also considering providing Kyiv with fighter jets and plans on training Ukrainian pilots starting this spring.
Moscow would view the provision of jets and longer-range missiles as a major provocation, and Russian officials have been warning strongly against the move. Recent reporting suggests the US and its allies are no longer concerned with the risk of Russian President Vladimir Putin using a nuclear weapon in response to attacks on Crimea based only on the fact that he hasn’t used one up to this point.
Am I mistaken or do I have this right. Putin said he , they the Russian government consider Crimea to ben sacred Russian homeland. He also said that any attacks on the homeland will or may get a kenetic nuclear answer…
You are correct.
Putin if full of it, he won’t do jack. If he shoots first, he is done.
If anyone shoots first, we are all done!
To quote a Chinese philosopher, in order to know your enemy, you must first fight them. Unfortunately for Ukraine, they will learn soon enough, it’s a bad idea to make your Russian neighbors your enemy.
You got Sun Tzu’s quote reversed. He actually said words to the effect that you need to know your enemy before you fight him. The actual quote you refer to is ““If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.”
This wasn’t Sun Tzu.
The point is Putin doesn’t know his enemy and hasn’t learned anything from a year of failure.
I presume you get your info from the Western Propaganda , the fact is Russia is winning and the US and it`s lackey Britain know it , NATO will give the Ukrainians weapons but they will never put boots on the ground , because NATO would not be able to justify the CASUALITIES to their respect populations , infact it would probably result in Governments falling.
NATO doesn’t need to put boots on the ground because Russia can’t win Putin’s war. The Ukrainians are doing very well with the weapons they have. Even if the Russians eventually defeat the Ukrainian Army, Russia would become an occupying power in a war they can’t win.
I think it is Russia who just learned that making Ukraine their enemy will have long term consequences. This is not even the beginning for Russia.
Without the support of NATO weapons this war would have been over months ago , the question to ask is why did Boris Johnson pressure Z into scraping peace talks with Putin ? .
If you don’t know the answer to that question, you have not paid attention to Ukraine.
Ukraine is not a country according to the Kremlin and Putin wants to turn Ukraine into another Belarus.
A monkey would know that that is not an option.
Ukrainians don’t want any of that. It’s that simple.
Last I checked Belarus still had heat, electricity, a running water in winter, not to mention better equipped and trained military than Ukraine.
You are one of those guys that when you lose in a game of chess, you’ll tell your friends, at least you came in 2nd place.
Question is what/who are they going to kill in Crimea?
“Ukraine Prepared to Strike Crimea With British Missiles”
“What British moron would give the insane Ukrainians longer range missiles.
If Ukraine hits Russia with these long range missiles how long will it be before London is a smoking hole on the Themes River?
Well then, Russia had better strike the UK. Since the UK is not worried about that, it won’t matter, right?
The competition between the UK and Poland is heating up and their people only seem even more enthusiastic. They’re forcing Putin to flip a coin to determine who wins the first nuclear bomb at the start of nuclear Armageddon. Sorry UK and Poland. I can’t seem to blink this morbid vision out of my mind only because you keep agitating for it 24/7. (Sarcasm alert)
Well, it would seem that the U.K. might be the winner since they are further away from Russian soil and could perhaps cause Poland to consider the consequences of who they are aligning themselves with but then again there’s a ton of history between Poland and Russia so the oddsmakers in Vegas might go -100 on Poland.
Russia doesn’t need to use nuclear ordnance. Their highly accurate precision missiles (as we have seen them using in Ukraine) can carry very powerful conventual explosives. A few of those missiles, not to forget the hypersonic ones,are enough to say for instance wipe out the ports of Rotterdam or Antwerp just to mention a few side streets.
You talk like your country is the only one with technology. BTW, change highly accurate precision missiles to just precision and by precision I mean within one kilometer of the target as shown over the last year.
Ukraine Prepared to Surrender to Russia
That will be an extremely dangerous escalation. For openers, the Russians will consider that to be a US-supported attack on Russian territory. For a second, it will not be done in the context of an offensive to take the Crimea but will be be a scare bombing like the one on Dresden. The Ukraine is far from ready to invade the Crimea and such an invasion will be a psychological blunder which will tend to unite the Russian people.
“a scare bombing like the one on Dresden”
It would be interesting to see e.g. Lavrov try to make that case. It would have to start with a guarantee, with some kind of inspection/verification provision, that the Russian regime will shut down the naval base at Sevastapol and all other bases in Crimea that are used or can be used as bases from which to launch attacks on Ukraine. Otherwise, there are a bunch of “legitimate military targets” there whether the Ukrainians are attempting to take the territory or not.
From what I understand, the Black Sea is Russia’s only warm water access. I can’t see them closing down the base as they have already gone to war to secure access to the Black See. Shutting down the base would put them in a compromised position so it’s unlikely that’s going to happen.
Neither can I. Which means, so long as both sides insist on fighting, neither side should whine about their military assets being targeted, regardless of where those assets happen to be located.
And on the Ukrainian side, that would include any facilities in other countries providing arms, munitions, intelligence, or training to Ukraine proper. Don’t want to be involved? Don’t be involved. Involved? Take your medicine.
While Russia attacking bases in NATO countries supplying Ukraine with weapons might be legal, it would not be wise. NATO would respond forcefully. A year of Putin’s war of aggression has demonstrated that Russia would be no match in a conventional war with NATO.
And then…
There are NON conventional wars.
Zzzzzzzzzzz SSDD
“Legitimate” is a word without any real meaning anymore. We can talk as if the planetary population follows some kind of rule-based order, but we’d be blowing hot air out of our behinds.
There has not been any rules-based order for decades. It’s all about raw power. It’s back to the simian state.
I guess the jackass in the WH really wants to play global nuclear war. Too bad that we only have one planet, and this pathetic excuse for a human is running any part of it.
Europeans better get ready to duck, because they’re on the front lines of the coming war.
Added: the poodle has taken up its old habits, hiding behind the natives whilst waging war.
The great reset involves devastating all major cities around the world.
Help reduce population.
Create new cities.
Bring in new players and leaders.
And change the order of things.
When you are billionaire and have so much time on your hands. You rather watch the whole world burn. It gives them a new twisted purpose.
“Ukrainian sources told The Times that they would plan to use these missiles to hit Crimea”
i thought ukraine wanted crimea back. i guess not.
I view taking out the Rada & perhaps a few other government buildings with conventional as one balanced reply available.
Putin must now destroy every feasible road, & rail into Ukraine, and employ a no fly zone. If these are breached, Zelensky, and his cult of mass murderers are snuffed out.
“Putin must now do the things he must always have done and has been trying for nearly a year to do but didn’t manage to get done and still doesn’t have the ability to do” doesn’t seem like very helpful advice.
Thomas, it’s suspect when you rehash this same answer which after all, is just attribution which has no hard evidence to back it up.
The truth is, we have no one here who has provided any proof of what Putin is trying or has tried to do. If the evidence backing such claims comes only from us, it’s not evidence of anything.
Zelensky is running around like an unsupervised wild kid, who is in charge of him anyway, is it the demented old man in the WH or who is responsible for this desaster? The kid and the old man are crazy, the old man would go to war against two nuclear powers and the crazy kid would destroy Europe with nuclear weapons if he gets his hands on any. We are in big trouble with such a deranged old man and a crazy kid.
Zelenski is an arrogant man, experienced only in the world of stage. He is constantly looking for a big, flashy effect to demonstrate his power. Problem is — he has found soulmates in UK and US.
Big bang efects have already been tried. Some Russia ignored. Some resulted in escallation.
For a comedy actor he must be aware that the main act has not started yet. Russia has secured four strategic regions populated by Russian speakers. It is cleaning up the remainingvUkrainiian troops on those territories.
Thecwar will go in for as long as the clique invpower has the means to wage war. Not the means to prerform stunts, but the means to field soldiers. Now he is recruiting sixteen year olds.
Law has been passed introducing draconian punishment for disobeying commanders, abandoning posts, and desertion of duty in general. There is a lits of outrage in Ukraine over commanders that are not in the field, but remotely instructing units to stay in trenches without ammunition, food and without wounded being evacuated. Soldiers recording these conditions are the target of new laws.
We can be guessing all we want on anyone’s intentions — but facts are facts. The inly territory Ukraine recovered is the territory Russia ceded in order to shorten tgecfrint. Thesre seems to be a cinsensus on that from real military observers.
This being the case, the inly thing remaining are some Hail Mary passes. This does not require to have a functional army.
It is amazing that US invested so much prestige on Zelenski. An actor, manhandled by genocidal extremists in power since 2014. In their ethnic reenginering zeal, Zelenski became a cinvenient front to ban all opposition parties, theit media. Fillowed by death squads and breakdown of law and order. This lawlessnes we saw, observed, and approved of.
Now we are doubling down in proplingvup Zelenski. He should have remained a disposable figure — as it was clear that his ratings dropped to single digits just before the war. He had no suportvthen, even less now. Why do we keep in digging deeper?
Kremlin BS propaganda.
Western BS response.