A US official told CNN that the Pentagon has a limited supply of ATACMS and cannot produce more quickly.
CNN reported on Saturday that Washington has made it clear it will not provide Ukraine with a significant number of MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) in the near future, citing an unnamed US official.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov met with US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin at the Pentagon this week to discuss additional military aid. He reportedly presented Austin with a list of “high-value” targets in Russia that Ukraine would like to strike using American weapons.
In a CNN interview after the meeting, Umerov said Ukraine is pushing to lift the ATACMS restrictions for “self-defense,” arguing that “airfields being used to attack our cities are within the range of deep strikes.”
However, a US defense official told CNN that many of the targets on Ukraine’s wishlist are actually outside the missile’s range, as Moscow has relocated its high-value assets away from the front.
CNN wrote, citing the source, that the US has also “made it clear that Kiev should not expect another significant delivery of ATACMS due to the limited number in US inventories and the long production time of the weapon.” The official noted that Ukraine has received a very “limited” supply of these missiles.
The current US government appears to be hesitant about deep strikes into Russia after one of its ATACMS rockets, armed with a cluster warhead, struck a Crimean beach in early June. Moscow accused Washington of enabling that and other acts of “terrorism” against civilians, and threatened to arm “states and entities” around the world that are hostile to the US in response.
Pentagon spokesman Major General Patrick Ryder clarified on Tuesday that Washington’s “policy has not changed,” meaning that Ukraine is allowed to use US-supplied weapons to defend against cross-border attacks but not for “deep strikes” into what the US recognizes as Russian territory. Although, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Monday that Washington “will keep the conversations with the Ukrainians going.”
Moscow has warned that any talk of using long-range missiles to strike Russian territory is very dangerous.
“This is blackmail, it is an attempt to create an impression that the West wants to avoid excessive escalation, but in fact this is a ruse,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a press conference on Tuesday. “The West does not want to avoid escalation. The West is asking for trouble, to put it bluntly. I reckon that this is already obvious to everyone.”