The alleged use of the military’s tactical missile systems, known by the acronym ATACMS, came as Russian President Vladimir Putin lowered the threshold for using nuclear weapons. It opened the door to a possible nuclear response by Moscow to even a conventional attack by any nation backed by a nuclear power, which could include U.S.-backed Ukrainian attacks.
These recent events marked a new worrying escalation in the conflict which has repeatedly raised international tensions. The United States recently expressed dismay over the deployment of North Korean troops to help Russia fight in Ukraine, while Moscow became angry when Washington eased restrictions on the use of long-range missiles American made.
The 1,000-day milestone has amplified scrutiny over how the war is playing out and how it might end, amid signs a turning point could come as the president-elect takes office American, Donald Trump, in about two months. Mr. Trump has pledged to quickly end the war and criticized the amount the United States spent to support Ukraine.
Neither Russia nor Ukraine can sustain the war for long, experts say, although Russia is capable of continuing for longer due to its greater resources.
Ukrainian forces are under severe battlefield pressure in some places on the roughly 1,000-kilometer front line, where its soldiers are exhausted. Ukrainian civilians, meanwhile, have been repeatedly struck by Russian drones and missiles.
On Tuesday, Ukraine claimed to have struck a military weapons depot in Bryansk in the middle of the night, but did not specify which weapons were used. The Ukrainian General Staff maintained that multiple explosions and detonations were heard in the targeted area, around Karachev.
In a statement carried by Russian news agencies, the Russian Defense Ministry said the army shot down five long-range missiles and damaged the sixth.
The fragments fell on the grounds of a military installation, the ministry said. The falling debris started a fire, but did not cause any damage or casualties, he added.
Both sides’ versions could not be independently verified by The Associated Press.
Karachev is approximately 115 kilometers from the Russian-Ukrainian border.
Over the course of the war, Ukraine was able to penetrate much deeper into the vast country, but with drones rather than missiles. For example, Russian officials have reported intercepting Ukrainian drones over Moscow, which is about 500 kilometers from the border.
Earlier Tuesday, Ukrainian officials reported that a third Russian strike in as many days on a residential area in Ukraine killed at least 12 people, including a child.
The strike, carried out using a Shahed drone in the Sumy region in northern Ukraine, hit a dormitory of a school in the town of Hlukhiv on Monday evening. In addition to the 12 victims, 11 other people were injured, including two children, said the authorities, who did not rule out the possibility that other victims were trapped under the rubble.
On Sunday, a Russian ballistic cluster munition struck a residential area of Sumy, killing 11 people and injuring 84 others. A barrage of Russian missiles ignited fires in the southern port of Odessa on Monday, killing at least 10 people and injuring 43 others.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the latest strikes prove that Vladimir Putin is not interested in ending the war.
“Every new attack by Russia only confirms Putin’s true intentions. He wants the war to continue. Talks about peace don’t interest him. We must force Russia into a just peace by force,” he insisted.
