London
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It’s a very harsh change and perhaps you could be allowed to have messaging garbled.
According to his vice president JD Vance, US President Donald Trump is considering supplying Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine.
“We’re having a conversation about that issue at this moment,” Vance tells Fox News Sunday, adding that Trump “makes the final resolve.”
Trump envoy to Ukraine Keith Kellogg said the same day he believed Ukraine had the authority to invade Russia deeply. “Use your ability to hit deep,” he said. “There’s nothing like a sanctuary,” Kellogg later revealed that he only referenced his statements to the official statements of Vance and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. But Trump’s team is seriously considering supplying the Tomahawks – by its nature means that they are really just for a long distance strike to Russia – or they want everyone to think they are.
43 days ago, Russian President Vladimir Putin was walking on the red carpet to an Alaskan beast. But now the Kremlin has to respond to the idea that America’s most effective long-range missiles are being supplied to enemies Trump said “has no card” just seven months ago. A few days after Trump’s truthful social post that Ukraine could reclaim all occupied territory, this is another policy 180, but one with long distance teeth.
First famous in the 1991 Gulf War, the Tomahawk is reserved for its closest allies in the US, including Britain and Japan. The four models range up to the latest version of Block IV, and feed back live information about the following targets to allow for changes in flight: Instead of supplying weapons, the US sells them to Europe and hand them over to Kiev instead. But, with no doubt, Moscow’s concerns do not ease the Trump administration is escalating and improving Ukraine’s capabilities here.
Ukrainian President Voldymir Zelensky has little to say about what he calls “a sensitive topic.” He knows that Ukraine is already using long-range drones to damage Russian oil refineries to places where domestic gas shortages are established. Clearly, Kiev was able to already deeply bump into parts of Russia, and the war was intended to be a distant thing that the poor fought. They show that pure power and technology can be replaced by using small drones hidden in container housings to attack Siberian airfields with the operating spider web. However, the Tomahawks will present a new challenge to Russia’s air defense. Moscow’s government buildings and the spectacular Ministry of Defense infrastructure could become open targets.
Is the plan ahead for what tacticians call “strategic ambiguity”? Allowing Ukraine’s growing long-range missile inventory to assert responsibility for the Tomahawk strike, or vice versa? The fragments from the missile probably refer to the true culprit. It is unlikely that US involvement will remain hidden, and Moscow is forced to try and respond kindly.
However, there have been two moments in the past, which perhaps helps us predict where the new threat of this escalation is heading. The first is the boost to Ukraine’s last major weapon from Washington. This is the Biden administration’s decision to allow Kiev to fire ATACM deep into Russia. Putin responded by firing new-looking Oleshnik missiles at Dnipros in a largely abandoned warehouse.
The device sounded horrifying – the IRBM, which has apparently new nuclear capabilities, was fired with multiple traditional warheads that the Kremlin boasted, allowing it to tear off European defenses. Ukrainian experts claimed that the device is a variation of the older model RS26, showing what appears to be an aging valve in the circuit at a storage facility in Kiev. In short, it didn’t look like it was a mild nuclear-neighboring Saberrat, not a huge technical leaps or a show of incredible power, but rather a mild nuclear-neighboring Saberrat in response to an undeniable US escalation. After three and a half years of war, a pure lack of Russian resources could lead to an equally ineffective response to the use of tomahawks.
The second precedent is not in favor of Ukraine. What the Trump administration threatened to escalate in ways that surpassed its predecessor was to implement secondary sanctions against India and China to buy Russian oil. Such a wide range of tariffs would have been more intense than Joe Biden thought. In fact, there is a 50% tariff on India. But Trump demanded that if Europe goes further, he would stop buying Russian hydrocarbons. He has been restrained so far.
This may be the fate of the Tomahawk debate. As for Trump’s “final resolve,” he follows his usual predisposition to suspending the most destructive measures and continues to live out the Enigma point: a relationship that appears to endure a friendship with Putin.
