Sir Keir Starmer has told the Ukrainian president that British missiles can be used for defensive strikes against targets inside Russia.
The announcement came as the new British prime minister met Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the NATO summit in Washington DC on Wednesday.
The decision over the Storm Shadow missiles, which has been welcomed by Ukraine, represents a hawkish shift in policy from the stance taken by the former Conservative government.
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In a post on X after the meeting with Sir Keir, President Zelenskyy said: "This morning, I learned about the permission to use Storm Shadow missiles against military targets in Russian territory.
“Today we had the opportunity to discuss the practical implementation of this decision. I’m grateful to the UK for its unwavering support for Ukraine and our people.”
However, reacting to the news, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman said: “If this is so then, of course, this is another absolutely irresponsible step towards escalating tensions and seriously escalating the situation.”
Dimitry Peskov told Reuters: “We will be watching this very thoroughly and respond accordingly.”
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Regardless of how much or how little support one wants to give Ukraine (Slava Ukraini!) it always struck me as bizarre that people thought it reasonable to give them missiles and then expect them not to use those missiles against the country they’re at war with.
Do you not see the difference between striking targets that are inside your territory vs targets outside of your territory?
Once you decide to strike targets in russian territory, you expose yourself to much more scrutiny because you have to justify what makes something a valid target. Inside ukraine its easy, because almost any russian is a valid military target.
When the other territory is actively invading mine, no I don’t see how territory makes another otherwise valid target not valid.
100% of Russians invading Ukraine came from Russia.
So you think ukraine should just start a full blown war against all of russia? Thats how you make sure ukraine is wiped off the map.
So you think RUSSIA should just start a full blown war against all of ukraine? Thats how you make sure ukraine is wiped off the map.
Quit pretending Ukraine is not already under attach. All this dose is to force Russia to allocate resources to protect its own inferstructure.
Well i admit im no expert on military strategy but i assume neither is anyone else here. We will just have to see how the russian crackheads will react.
Imho the most realistic chance for russia to actually stop this war is for their populace to turn against the government. Otherwise its gonna drag on forever. That means russian civilian casualties would be a strategic nightmare from what i understand, because it would give the people a reason to fight in this pointless war.
Imho the most realistic chance for russia to actually stop this war is for their populace to turn against the government
So let’s continue this thought exercise. What do you think the best way would be to turn the populace against the government?
I’d argue that bringing the Russian populace a taste of what Ukraine is feeling every day would be a good start.
Agreed. As far as best option to stop it.
But here is where we differ. The possibility that Ukraine “may” do bad things. With absolutely no evidence of them wanting to do so. Is not reason to allow Russia to continue to do bad things. By preventing Ukraine from damaging the inferstructure they are using to do so.
The whole idea that one nation should b able to attack another on its borders. While 3rd party nations refuse to let that nation fight back. Basically means civilians in Ukraine are being sacrificed to save Russian ones. No war is free of civilian deaths. And stopping all wars would be preferable.
But even as little more than a layman. 2 things are obvious.
1 Ukraine currently must dedicate staff and resources to defending civilians and military assets from a huge nation that decided to invade them.
2 Russia faces very little risk to its own civilians or military assets. So is able to dedicate nearly all of them to attacking Ukraine.
- sunzu ( @sunzu@kbin.run ) 7•2 months ago
how old are you?
when you’re ukraine and there are ivans DEEP inside the wire, doesn’t matter what preconditions anyone puts on arms shipments, you’ll agree to them, and say thank you
- sunzu ( @sunzu@kbin.run ) 4•2 months ago
facts
A lot of the European countries are just very cautious about starting another war. Partly because of the obvious implications of that but also partly because they were never utterly convinced that their populations would be behind it.
As it has turned out mostly there is broad support for escalating the conflict as people are appalled by what Russia is doing. So governments are increasingly willing to allow the use of weapons. It also helps that Russia has demonstrated themselves to be completely useless. Rather ensuring that they won’t actually be any escalations because Russia wouldn’t be able to actually make good on their threats.
The USA gave the Afghan mujahideen stinger missiles expecting them to only be used against Russia, people have short memories.
The situation is a bit different though. Ukraine wants to maintain good relations with the West. In Afghanistan they didn’t care.
it’s wild how he’s so fully in support of helping ukraine but so against helping gaza when the two countries are literally in the same situation.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Signalling the move, but declining to get into “operational arrangements”, John Healey, the new defence secretary, told Sky News that Britain “will do all we can to help Ukraine in their fight to repel Putin’s invasion”.
Speaking in Washington, Mr Healey said: “We provide weapons equipment where we can for them to defend themselves, and as we do for ourselves and any other nation in conflict, we require, because it’s international law, that war is conducted within those rules of the Geneva Convention.”
In a post on X after the meeting with Sir Keir, President Zelenskyy said: "This morning, I learned about the permission to use Storm Shadow missiles against military targets in Russian territory.
In a lengthy declaration, the alliance’s members announced that Ukraine was on an “irreversible” path to NATO membership, with wording important to the Ukrainian government, but likely to agitate Moscow.
Privately, Washington-based European diplomats are more candid, saying that the existing but gradual rebalancing of NATO’s power could morph into a brutal shift away from US dominance of the alliance in a Trump second term.
Today, Senate Democrats will have lunch with top Biden advisers Mike Donilon and Steve Ricchetti, as well as the Biden-Harris campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon.
The original article contains 848 words, the summary contains 205 words. Saved 76%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!