NEW YORK, October 15. /TASS/. Providing US-made Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine would pull the United States closer to direct confrontation with Russia, The New York Times warned.

"Providing the weapons would come with enormous challenges, not least the fact that Ukraine does not have the naval or ground-based launchers required to fire the missiles," the article reads. "Ukraine would need a US Army launcher called Typhon to fire the Tomahawks, a step that military officials say would pull the United States closer to direct confrontation with Russia," the newspaper argued.

Earlier, US President Donald Trump stated that he might speak with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, before making a final decision to send the Tomahawks to Kiev. On October 6, the US leader said he had "sort of made a decision" on the issue, without elaborating.

Putin has said that Tomahawk missiles "cannot be used" without the direct involvement of US military personnel as he warned that this would mean "a qualitatively new stage of escalation, including in relations between Russia and the United States." Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said that Russia will respond "appropriately" if Tomahawk missiles are delivered to Kiev.

Vladimir Zharikhin, deputy director of the Institute of CIS Countries, has told TASS in an interview that Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky hopes to ask Trump for Tomahawk missiles at the upcoming meeting on October 17 in order to involve the United States in a direct military conflict with Russia.