Bipartisan Calls Grow For Ukraine To Hit Russian Territory With US Arms

Officials in the US are growing more vocal in making the case for allowing Ukraine to use Washington-supplied weaponry to attack Russian territory.

On Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson came out with a full-throated statement expressing support for such a move which would certainly risk bringing NATO and Russian into more direct conflict. Biden’s Secretary of State Antony Blinken is also said to be on board with a policy change.

US Army image

Johnson was asked by Voice of America if he supported a scenario where Ukraine forces attack Russian soil utilizing American weapons. He responded by saying that the US needs „to allow Ukraine to prosecute the war in the way they see fit.”

„They [Ukraine] need[s] to be able to fight back. And I think us trying to micromanage the effort there is not a good policy for us,” he said.

Ukrainian parliament member Oleksandra Ustinova was among a delegation from Kiev that was in Washington days ago in order to lobby US lawmakers for a change in policy. The Biden administration has long communicated a strict ban on pro-Kiev forces attacking Russia with American arms.

Watch Johnson sign off on Ukraine using US weapons to attack inside Russian territory:

”I think we need to allow Ukraine to prosecute the war in the way they see fit. They need to be able to fight back and I think that us trying to micromanage the effort there is not good policy for us,” – US House Speaker Mike Johnson answering the question whether Ukraine… pic.twitter.com/88M6Km2XTS

— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) May 22, 2024

„Realizing that we do not have the right to use, for instance, HIMARS [rocket launchers] on the territory of Russia, the Russians display all their equipment along the border and use it to destroy the Kharkiv region,” Ustinova has been cited as saying. „And we simply cannot get to them, because there’s a ban on the usage of American weapons on the territory of Russia.”

In Kharkiv oblast in particular, Russia earlier this month launched a new major offensive to push the border 10km deep into Ukrainian territory, with the stated aim of establishing a buffer zone to make it harder for Ukrainian artillery to reach Russian settlements across the border.

The Biden White House has yet to give in to the intensified lobbying campaign to loosen restrictions on US weaponry, on a public level at least.

On Monday a group of House lawmakers from both parties issued a formal letter urging the lifting of any restrictions on Ukraine’s use of US weapons.

The lobbying push is in full-swing for what could be the biggest escalation of the entire Ukraine war: for the US to start openly coordinating strikes inside Russia. Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-NJ) urges Blinken to reverse the „dangerous policy” of not explicitly allowing these strikes pic.twitter.com/PebaJ0RXSZ

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) May 22, 2024

„It is essential the Biden administration allows Ukraine’s military leaders to conduct a full spectrum of operations necessary to respond to Russia’s unprovoked attack on their sovereign land,” the letter said.

At this point President Zelensky is going so far as to request that NATO directly intercept and shootdown Russian missiles sent against Ukrainian cities. Indeed the messaging and requests are growing more desperate, given Ukraine forces are being rapidly beaten back in places like Kharkiv.