The United States of America continues to follow its strange policy towards Ukraine – they claim in front of the media that the country must defeat the Russian aggressor, while behind the scenes they forbid Ukrainian forces from attacking Vladimir Putin's army.
POLITICO reported that US policy has prevented Ukrainians from attacking Russian troops on their soil preparing for an offensive in the Kharkiv region. Kiev has been warning for months that Putin's army would launch a new offensive on Kharkiv, which began late last week.
Thousands of Russian troops crossed the border in an attack that Ukrainian intelligence officials had been anticipating for months. Ukrainian forces have watched for weeks as the Russian army massed near the border, preparing for an attack, but were unable to launch a pre-emptive strike. The reason is Washington's ban on the ZSU to attack positions of the aggressor on Russian territory.
Kiev is now pressuring Washington to lift this ban. At the moment, in practice, the hands of the ZSU are tied due to the hesitancy of the Joe Biden administration. A group of Ukrainian politicians are in the US capital to try to convince Americans that such a ban is illogical. For three years now, Russia has been waging a full-scale war against Ukraine, but Ukraine “has no right” to attack Russian territory with Western weapons.
The Biden administration, as a condition for sending long-range weapons to Ukraine, said they could not be used to strike Russian territory.
„The main problem right now is the White House's policy of limiting our ability to strike military targets in Russia,” said Ukrainian MP Davyd Arahamiya, leader of the Servant of the People faction. in the Verkhovna Rada.
Russia is aware of this limitation and has been able to mass at least 30,000 troops and equipment on the border without fear of being hit by US-supplied ATACMS missiles. Two US officials reached for comment confirmed that the Biden administration's policy had not changed.
The Russian military is taking advantage of Ukraine's manpower problems and lack of properly prepared defenses near Kharkiv, putting the city of 1 million at risk and potentially giving Russia a critical new foothold in the country. Vladimir Putin said in March he was considering creating a buffer zone near Kharkiv to make it harder for Ukraine to launch drones targeting Russian oil infrastructure, a tactic Kiev has used for months to hit Moscow's economy.