WASHINGTON, December 13. /TASS/. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky during a meeting with US House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson in Washington raised the issue of supplying Kiev with longer-range tactical ATACMS missiles, Politico reported, citing a source.
The news outlet did not specify the specific modification of missiles requested by the Kiev regime.
According to Reuters, in November a group of Republican lawmakers demanded that Ukraine be supplied with additional longer-range ATACMS missiles so that Kiev can strike targets in Russia’s Crimea region.
Earlier, Ukraine’s armed forces used US-made ATACMS missiles with cluster warheads against Russia for the first time. Zelensky confirmed their deployment while the White House said that Washington had supplied Kiev with such missiles with a range of 165 km.
Russian President Vladimir Putin noted that the US supplying ATACMS missiles to Ukraine is harmful and fraught with additional threats but that Russia is capable of repelling such attacks. In general, he branded the provision of ATACMS to Kiev as yet another mistake by Washington.
The surface-to-surface Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) is produced by Lockheed Martin and has a maximum range of 300 km. It can be fired from tracked M270 MLRS or wheeled M142 HIMARS.