Britain says it is supplying long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine, giving Kyiv the capability to hit Russian troops well behind front lines as it prepares for a long-expected counteroffensive against Russia’s occupying forces.
Defense Minister Ben Wallace on May 11 confirmed to British lawmakers that the U.K. will donate Storm Shadow missiles to Ukraine.
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"The use of Storm Shadow will allow Ukraine to push back Russian forces based within Ukrainian sovereign territory," he added without specifying how many are being delivered.
Storm Shadow missiles, which have a range of more than 250 kilometers, give Ukraine the capacity to strike well behind Russian front lines and as far as Moscow-occupied Crimea.
British media reports said Kyiv had promised not to use the missiles to strike inside Russia's territory.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov issued a tweet full of metaphors following Wallace's announcement.
"The weather forecast is predicting a cyclone moving from the U.K. towards Ukraine, bringing with it Storms," he said. "It is through the Shadow of the Storm that the sunshine of our liberty will break through and shed light on our Victory."
The Kremlin regarded the announcement on the Storm Shadow missiles "quite negatively," spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
"It will demand an appropriate response from our military that will definitely make the decisions required in military terms," Peskov said.
The announcement from London came shortly after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in an interview with European broadcasters that Kyiv is delaying the start of the counteroffensive because it lacks enough Western weapons to succeed without suffering too many casualties.
A Ukrainian counteroffensive has been expected since warmer weather improved battlefield conditions, and Zelenskiy said it's possible that "we can go forward and be successful,” the BBC reported.
“But we’d lose a lot of people. I think that’s unacceptable,” he was quoted as saying. “So we need to wait. We still need a bit more time.... In terms of equipment, not everything has arrived yet.”
The Kremlin regarded the announcement on the Storm Shadow missiles "quite negatively," spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
"It will demand an appropriate response from our military that will definitely make the decisions required in military terms," Peskov said.
Wagner mercenary group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin on May 11 claimed that Ukraine's counteroffensive was already under way, citing fighting around Bakhmut, the city in the eastern Donetsk region that has been an epicenter of heavy fighting for months.
In the area of Bakhmut, he said Ukrainian armed forces "are hitting our flanks and, unfortunately, in some places they are being successful."
Ukraine claimed a small but significant battlefield victory outside Bakhmut, reportedly inflicting major losses on a Russian brigade.
The Ukrainian ground commander overseeing the 10-month battle for Bakhmut claimed that Russian forces had been forced to retreat.
“We are effectively counterattacking,” Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskiy said in a post on Telegram.
“On some sections of the front, the enemy could not withstand pressure from Ukrainian defenders and had to retreat up to 2 kilometers.”
Prigozhin complained that territory captured over the course of many months was being "thrown away" by those who should be guarding the flanks. In his view this responsibility belongs to regular Russian troops.
The Russian Defense Ministry denied reports of Ukrainian military breakthroughs along parts of the front line, saying the "overall situation in the area of the special military operation is under control."