Joe Biden is under fresh pressure to give long-range missiles to Ukraine after Britain vowed to send potentially groundbreaking weapons to aid Kiev’s counter-offensive.
The British government said on Thursday it would send Storm Shadow missiles to Ukrainian forces so they could take out the Russian invaders.
Ukrainian officials have been calling for more advanced weapons for months to regain control of their country’s Russian-held territories.
The Biden administration has repeatedly refused to send the US military’s powerful Army Tactical Missile Systems, or ATACMS, for fear of provoking Vladimir Putin.
The US Army’s ATACMS, a long-range surface-to-surface missile unit, is used by a number of allies, including South Korea.
Senior officials told Politico in February that Ukraine could use the missiles with a range of 190 miles to strike deep within Russia’s internationally recognized borders.
They also said the US did not have sufficient stockpiles of missiles to grant the request.
Senior Republicans praised Britain for breaking with White House policy on arms deliveries, urging Joe Biden to follow suit.
Speaking to DailyMail.com, GOP Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said that “even before Putin’s escalation in 2022, the UK has helped take the lead in resisting Russian aggression.”
“I hope that President Biden will take swift action to provide critical capabilities such as cluster munitions and longer-range missiles to help Ukraine defend its sovereign territory,” he said.
Senator Jim Risch, a Republican representing Idaho, accused Joe Biden of pandering to the Kremlin.
“I applaud the UK for stepping forward again to provide the courage and leadership that the Biden administration does not want,” he said. “We need to send ATACMS to Ukraine as soon as possible.”
Ukrainian MP Lesia Vasylenko reiterated calls for the president to provide more military support to the country’s armed forces.
“The Biden administration should have donated F-16 fighter jets and such long-range missiles a long time ago,” she told DailyMail.com.
“Political conservative and wishful thinking led to the escalation of this war that Russia started against Ukraine in 2014,” the former lawyer added.
Brett Bruen, who served in the Obama White House from 2013 to 2015, said providing long-range missiles “makes perfect sense to any rational actor.”
“The Biden administration is trying to portray this as an example of restraint because of an unwarranted belief that this is going to escalate the situation,” the former commander-in-chief’s former foreign policy adviser said.
The British Storm Shadow cruise missiles being sent to the war-torn country have a range of more than 250 kilometers.
In contrast, the US-supplied Himars missiles used by Ukraine only have a range of 80 kilometers.
General John Allen, who led US and NATO forces in the war in Afghanistan, said the US should consider matching the British gift of long-range missiles.
“ATACMS won’t let the Russians hide anywhere in Ukraine,” the retired four-star general told DailyMail.com. “It may force their command and control back to Russia.”
But the White House ruled that departure earlier on Thursday despite Britain’s decision.
“Our policy on ATACMS has not changed,” an NSC spokesman told the Daily Mail.
British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace told the British Parliament that “we simply will not stand by and watch Russia kill civilians.”
“Russia must recognize that only its actions led to such systems being delivered to Ukraine,” he said.
An image showing how the Storm Shadow Missiles would work on the battlefield
The Storm Shadow missile has been used by both the British and French air forces and has previously been used in the Gulf, Iraq and Libya.
The missiles supplied by the British can only be fired from aircraft, but French missiles can be fired from ships and submarines.
But the United States is Ukraine’s biggest financier when it comes to military aid, having spent nearly $37 billion sending weapons since the invasion began.
The UK is the second largest donor, donating $2.8 billion last year and vowing to match that by 2023.
Kiev’s army is on the verge of launching another counter-attack after Russia’s latest failed attempt to seize a significant chunk of Ukrainian territory.
Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s chief propagandist, said the Kremlin viewed London’s decision to send long-range missiles to Ukraine as “quite negative.”
In a thinly veiled warning to Britain, the Russian tyrant’s long-serving press secretary said it would “demand an appropriate response from our military.”
Bakhmut, a city in the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine, was the main target of the Russian invaders during the winter months.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of Wagner’s Russian private army, led much of the fighting there.
Recruited largely from maximum-security Russian prisons, Wagner mercenaries have been filmed committing war crimes, including gruesome executions.
Once a secretive figure, Prigozhin has released a slew of obscenity-filled diatribes in recent weeks, bemoaning Russia’s failure to support its troops.
In his latest audio message, he said the situation in Bakhmut was the “worst of all expected scenarios,” with months of captured territory being “thrown away.”
On Tuesday, Prigozhin said a Russian brigade had fled the trenches and given up a piece of land southwest of Bakhmut.
The commander of the Ukrainian ground forces said on Wednesday that Russian troops have retreated more than 2.5 kilometers in places.
Ukraine has made little comparable progress since its last major offensive last November.