The moment it became clear the Lebanese group Hezbollah would be starting a large-scale drone and missile attack last week, Israel fired a pre-emptive strike that targeted dozens of launch sites within Lebanon. This was, to use sophisticated military parlance, a no-brainer, reducing stress on the air defense systems that the attack was designed to overwhelm. To the best of our knowledge, it also worked.
As controversial as the war in Gaza has become, this clear-cut act of Israeli self-defense against purely military assets in Lebanon was not. Even so, it is something that Ukraine is not being allowed to do against Russia with the most effective weapons in its arsenal.
There are many reasons, from moral to strategic, for lifting restrictions on Ukraine’s use of allied long-range strike capacity on Russian soil. However, the most compelling for Germany and the US — Kyiv’s most important and cautious arms suppliers — is that they cannot afford not to.
Between Sunday and Monday, Russia fired about 300 heavy drones and cruise, ballistic and hypersonic missiles at Ukraine, targeting its energy infrastructure. This, unlike Hezbollah’s effort, was not a one-off retaliation. It was part of a pre-winter strategy, and the rolling blackouts that ensued suggest the tactic is likely to succeed, so long as Ukraine’s forces are hamstrung.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz should be asking himself one hard question, as he prepares for the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party’s expected first-ever regional election win this weekend: Where does he think the millions of Ukrainians unable to cook or heat their homes in sub-zero winter temperatures would end up? He should know it is Germany.
From an embarrassing start, Scholz and his government have come a long way in defending Ukraine. However, they continue to balk at sending Taurus cruise missiles, for fear of provoking Russia into a nuclear response. This approach needs to change before the damage is done in Ukraine, rather than — as the pattern has been — after it is too late.
The Swedish-German-made Taurus is especially desirable for Ukraine’s struggle against this Russian air war. It has a maximum range of 500km, which is close to twice that of the Storm Shadow and Scalp-E equivalents from the UK and France, respectively. The Taurus also can carry a bigger payload and avoid radar detection by flying just 35m from the ground.
The question for US President Joe Biden and his staff is more of cost.
The price to the Pentagon of a Patriot missile battery is about US$1.27 billion and of the PAC-3 interceptor missiles it uses, US$4 million apiece, the Congressional Research Service said. On Monday alone, Ukraine’s armed forces said Russia fired 102 of the cruise and ballistic missiles the Patriot is designed to bring down.
Patriots would not have been used in all cases, but other systems for intercepting cruise missiles are expensive, too. Interceptors for the shorter-range National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems the US has sent to Ukraine cost about US$1 million a piece, for example. Far better to destroy the airfields and launch systems Russia is using to fire these volleys.
So when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a video address to the nation on Monday night that “this is the optimal counter-terrorism tactic, one that every partner of ours has the right to and would undoubtedly use to protect themselves,” he was of course correct.
He might have added that allowing that right to Ukraine would also be in the self-interest of his country’s allies.
The UK and France already say they want to grant Kyiv permission to use their cruise missiles against targets in Russia. This is a long-standing pattern. First the US or Germany declare a red line they are not willing to cross in terms of weapons they send to Ukraine. Then the UK, Poland or some other more forward-leaning ally presses, or even crosses the line themselves, and the US and Germany follow.
Just because Russia has not resorted to a nuclear attack does not, of course, mean it would not. However, the barriers to doing so are very high, and if the US Bradley and German Marder fighting vehicles Ukrainian troops are using in Russia’s Kursk region are not sufficient to trigger a nuclear escalation, it is hard to see why adding Western missiles to Ukrainian drone strikes already underway inside Russia would do so.
Nor, as French President Emmanuel Macron said earlier this year, must permissions be granted as blank checks; Ukraine could still be banned from using US Army Tactical Missile System surface-to-surface missiles, German Taurus or the F-16 jets that have begun to arrive against Russian civilian targets. There is no need to help Ukraine reciprocate the “terrorism” that Zelenskiy correctly accuses Russia of using against his country.
Among the lessons of this war is that Russia is not invincible and that the Ukrainians can defend themselves efficiently, when given the tools. The high cost of this conflict is due in part to the drip-feeding of capabilities to Kyiv’s armed forces. Russia and Ukraine are learning on the battlefield; it is time for Kyiv’s allies to do the same off it.
Marc Champion is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Europe, Russia and the Middle East. He was previously Istanbul bureau chief for the Wall Street Journal. This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
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