Ukraine's Oreshnyk cruise missile attack on the Dnipro caused a stir in the Kremlin. However, as noted by The New Yorker , representatives of the administration of the US president did not perceive Vladimir Putin's threats in response to this step as serious.
"People here were not so alarmed," said a representative of the Biden administration about Russia's launch of the "Lishchyna" missile. "We just shrugged our shoulders."
The newspaper believes that, "most likely", Putin will refuse further escalation, but instead will come to terms with the new reality (the use of Western missiles for strikes on the Russian Federation) and adapt to it.
However, as The New Yorker writes, another option is also possible ("this logic is true until it becomes false").
Tatyana Stanova, a senior researcher at the Carnegie Russian-Eurasian Center, also believes that this time "everything could be different." "It may seem that this decision (missile strikes on the Russian Federation - Ed.) is not so significant: there are not so many of these missiles in Ukraine - they do not significantly change the overall picture. But in Moscow, they don't see it that way. For Putin, this is really a strategic turning point. With this decision, Ukraine becomes a springboard for what Putin considers NATO strikes on Russian territory. In his opinion, today is Kursk, tomorrow is Moscow," Stanova believes.
The decision to authorize long-range strikes appears to have awakened Putin's fears of escalation. "If it doesn't stop now," said a source in the Russian Defense Ministry, "then why don't Western countries send military advisers to the battlefield? And after that, regular troops may be next in line."
Meanwhile, according to the publication, Biden and officials of his administration are looking at the calendar and trying to understand what else they can offer Ukraine. In addition to the policy change on long-range strikes, the administration will now supply anti-personnel mines.
Military expert Cofman says, "it appears that now is the time when the Biden administration will take a number of actions that it has previously resisted to try to avoid sending the war on a path of ultimate decline." Cofman likened the flurry of current White House activity to "a man pushing all the buttons in an elevator and then getting off on his floor."
At the same time, as the publication writes, Ukraine's use of ATACMS and other long-range missiles on the territory of Russia is unlikely to significantly change the current trajectory of the military conflict - Ukraine is steadily losing ground, and the morale and combat readiness of the troops are suffering.
"It may slow down the Russians, but not dramatically," a Ukrainian military source said of the missiles. The current problems of the Ukrainian military are mainly related to what Kofman called the "fundamentals": "mobilization, training, creation and management of new formations, command and control."
