But the Russian leader will be fully aware of the scale of the threat of long-range missiles supplied from the West.
The Institute for the Study of War think tank has published a map of 225 Russian military facilities in the ATACMS range.
Former US representative to Ukraine Kurt Volker said that Biden’s decision would allow Ukraine to “seize airfields, ammunition depots and fuel supplies, logistics that are in Russia, that are now in a protected zone in Russia.”
Biden’s decision will force Russia to be more cautious, Volker told the BBC.
Rejecting Putin’s threats, he said that the Russian leader “should have foreseen that Ukraine would try to respond.”
Ukraine has had ATACMS missiles for some time, as well as British and French Storm Shadow missiles of a similar range, although their numbers are unknown. But it is not allowed to use them inside Russia.
France and Great Britain are expected to follow the example of the United States and issue the same permission to Ukraine. No comments have been made yet.
Representatives of the White House emphasize to the American media that Biden changed his opinion in response to Russia’s deployment of North Korean troops – a signal to Pyongyang not to send any more.
Gilmour, Trump’s ambassador to the OSCE, told the BBC that he believed “Putin has started a war” by deploying North Korean soldiers and that the US cannot “just stand by and let this dictator go ahead and conquer Ukraine”.
“I don’t like it and I take it very seriously, but the decision is not ours. The decision is imposed on us by Putin – the dictator,” he said.
The move also followed a flurry of Russian attacks on Ukraine in recent days.
As a result of one of the attacks on Odessa on Monday, 10 people were killed, including seven policemen, and 47 others were injured.
