Russia warns of ‘consequences’ if U.S. sends Patriot missiles to Ukraine
KYIV, Ukraine — Russia’s Foreign Ministry warned Thursday that if the U.S. delivers sophisticated air-defense systems to Ukraine, those systems and any crews that accompany them would be a “legitimate target” for the Russian military, a blunt threat that was quickly rejected by Washington.
The exchange of statements reflected soaring Russia-U.S. tensions amid the fighting in Ukraine, which is now in its 10th month.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the U.S. had “effectively become a party” to the war by providing Ukraine with weapons and training its troops. She added that if reports about U.S. intentions to provide Kyiv with a Patriot surface-to-air missile system prove true, it would become “another provocative move by the U.S.” and broaden its involvement in the hostilities, “entailing possible consequences.”
“Any weapons systems supplied to Ukraine, including the Patriot, along with the personnel servicing them, have been and will remain legitimate priority targets for the Russian armed forces,” Zakharova declared.
U.S. Patriot missile systems have long been a hot-ticket item as a shield against incoming missiles, but can one change the course of the Ukraine war?
Asked about the Russian warning, Pentagon spokesman Air Force Gen. Patrick Ryder said that the U.S. was “not going to allow comments from Russia to dictate the security assistance that we provide to Ukraine.”
“I find it ironic and very telling that officials from a country that brutally attacked its neighbor — in an illegal and unprovoked invasion, through a campaign that is deliberately targeting and killing innocent civilians and destroying civilian infrastructure — would choose to use words like ‘provocative’ to describe defensive systems that are meant to save lives and protect civilians,” Ryder said.
U.S. officials said Tuesday that Washington was poised to approve sending a Patriot missile battery to Ukraine, finally agreeing to an urgent request from Ukrainian leaders desperate for more robust weapons to shoot down incoming Russian missiles that have crippled much of the country’s vital infrastructure. An official announcement is expected soon.
Operating and maintaining a Patriot battery requires as many as 90 troops, and for months the U.S. has been reluctant to provide the complex systems because sending American forces into Ukraine to run them is a nonstarter for the Biden administration.
Even without the presence of U.S. service members to train Ukrainians to use the system, concerns remain that deployment of the missiles could provoke Russia or create the risk of a projectile striking within Russia and further escalating the conflict.
In Ukraine, a bleak winter lies ahead for combatants and civilians alike, as its army strives to maintain battlefield momentum against Russian forces.
Russia has repeatedly claimed that its forces struck Western-supplied weapons in Ukraine, but those statements have been impossible to verify.
So far, Ukraine has been cautious in reacting to the reports.
Hanna Maliar, Ukraine’s deputy defense minister, told reporters Thursday in Kyiv that the delivery of such weaponry remains “sensitive not only for Ukraine, but for our partners,” and that only President Volodymyr Zelensky or Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov would make any official announcement on such an agreement.
White House and Pentagon leaders have said consistently that providing Ukraine with additional air defenses is a priority, and Patriot missiles have been under consideration for some time. As the winter weather closed in and the Russian bombardment of civilian infrastructure escalated, officials said, the idea became a higher priority.
Until now, the U.S. and other NATO allies have provided Ukraine with short- and medium-range air defense systems that can down Russian aircraft and drones but not ballistic and cruise missiles.
Kyiv has not confirmed a role in a drone strike that sparked a fire at an airport in southern Russia’s Kursk region, near the Ukrainian border.
Ukraine’s electricity provider said Thursday that the country’s energy system had a “significant deficit of electricity” and that emergency shutdowns had been applied in some areas as temperatures hover around or below freezing.
The state-owned grid operator Ukrenergo warned in a statement on Facebook that damage caused to energy infrastructure by Russian attacks is being compounded by harsh weather, including snow, ice and strong winds.
The southern Ukrainian city of Kherson was left completely without power after Russian shelling, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Ukrainian president’s office, wrote on the messaging app Telegram. He added that two people were killed in the attacks.
Heavy shelling of the city’s Korabelny district continued into the afternoon, and Russian projectiles hit 100 yards from the regional administration building, he said.
Amid the infrastructure attacks and power outages across the country, seven civilians were killed and 19 wounded on Wednesday and Thursday, according to a report issued by the Ukrainian president’s office.
The head of eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk province, Pavlo Kyrylenko, reported that Russian strikes on Wednesday had killed two civilians and wounded seven.
Kremlin-backed authorities in the region, which was illegally annexed by Moscow in September, announced that Russia had taken control of 80% of the city of Maryinka, seen as critical to Ukrainian hopes of retaking the Russian-held regional capital, Donetsk.
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The Moscow-installed mayor of Donetsk, Alexei Kulemzin, said Thursday that the city center had been hit by “the most massive strike” since the area came under the control of Russia-backed separatists in 2014.
Writing on Telegram, Kulemzin said 40 Ukrainian rockets struck Donetsk on Thursday morning, noting that multistory residential buildings were hit and that fires broke out at a hospital and university campus.
Elsewhere, Ukrainian forces shelled western Russia’s Kursk province, according to regional Gov. Roman Starovoyt. Six shells reportedly struck a farm in the province’s Belovsky district, which borders Ukraine’s Sumy province. There were no casualties, Starovoyt wrote on Telegram.
In other developments Thursday:
— The European Union said it approved a new package of sanctions aimed at ramping up pressure on Russia for the war. The package was approved after days of deliberations during a meeting of the 27-nation bloc’s ambassadors.
— Russia continued to build up its military presence in neighboring Belarus, a senior Ukrainian military official said. According to Brig. Gen. Oleksiy Hromov, Russian units “are undergoing training and combat coordination” in Belarus, with the Kremlin using Belarusian officers and training grounds to improve the combat capability of existing units, as well as to train newly created units.
Speaking at a news briefing, Hromov said the probability of a Russian offensive from Belarus “remains low,” but he pointed out that the transfer of Russian weapons to Belarus is ongoing, including three hypersonic missile-carrying aircraft, a set of tanks and a long-range radar-detection aircraft.
— Russia’s Foreign Ministry said the Vatican has apologized for a statement Pope Francis made in a recent interview in which he singled out two Russian ethnic minorities — the Chechens and the Buryats — as being “the most cruel” participants in the war in Ukraine.
At a briefing, Zakharova quoted from what she said was a message from the Vatican that “apologizes to the Russian side” for the pope’s comments. She praised the message, saying that it showed the Vatican’s “ability to conduct dialogue and listen to interlocutors.” A Vatican spokesman would say only that there had been diplomatic contacts on the matter.
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