Russian President Vladimir Putin warned today, in response to a reporter’s question, that if the U.S. and U.K. decide to authorize Ukrainian strikes on targets inside Russia with Western-supplied long-range weapons, that decision will mean that NATO is at war with Russia. The exchange, as rendered in the Kremlin transcript, was as follows:
”Question: Over the past few days, we have been hearing statements at a very high level in the U.K. and the United States that the Kiev regime will be allowed to strike targets deep inside Russia using Western long-range weapons. Apparently, this decision is either about to be made, or has already been made, as far as we can see. This is actually quite extraordinary. Could you comment on what is going on?
”President of Russia Vladimir Putin: What we are seeing is an attempt to substitute notions. Because this is not a question of whether the Kiev regime is allowed or not allowed to strike targets on Russian territory. It is already carrying out strikes using unmanned aerial vehicles and other means. But using Western-made long-range precision weapons is a completely different story.
“The fact is that—I have mentioned this, and any expert, both in our country and in the West, will confirm this—the Ukrainian army is not capable of using cutting-edge high-precision long-range systems supplied by the West. They cannot do that. These weapons are impossible to employ without intelligence data from satellites which Ukraine does not have. This can only be done using the European Union’s satellites, or U.S. satellites—in general, NATO satellites. This is the first point.
“The second point—perhaps the most important, the key point even—is that only NATO military personnel can assign flight missions to these missile systems. Ukrainian servicemen cannot do this.