PRAGUE (AP) — The head of NATO’s military committee said Saturday that Ukraine has a solid legal and military right to strike deep into Russia to gain a combat advantage — echoing the beliefs of several U.S. allies — even as the Biden administration opposes allowing it. Kiiv uses American weapons.
“Any nation that is attacked has the right to defend itself. And that right doesn’t stop at your own nation’s border,” said Adm. Rob Bauer, speaking at the end of the committee’s annual meeting, which was also attended by U.S. Gen. CQ Brown, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Bauer from the Netherlands also added that states have a sovereign right to limit the weapons they send to Ukraine. But standing next to him at the press conference, Lt. Gen. Karel Řehka, chief of the Czech Armed Forces General Staff, made it clear that his nation would not impose such weapons restrictions on Kiev.
“We believe that Ukrainians should decide for themselves how to use it,” Řehka said.
Their comments came as US President Joe Biden pondered whether to allow Ukraine to use American-supplied long-range weapons to strike deep into Russia. And they hint at disagreements on the matter.
Biden met with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Friday after their top diplomats visited Kiev this week, and they came under renewed pressure to loosen arms restrictions. U.S. officials familiar with the discussions said they believed Starmer was seeking Biden’s approval to allow Ukraine to use British Storm Shadow missiles for extended strikes in Russia.
Biden’s approval may be needed because Storm Shadow components are manufactured in the United States. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to share the status of private discussions, said they believed Biden was amenable, but a decision has not yet been announced.
Providing more support and training to Ukraine was a key topic at the meeting of NATO chiefs, but it was not clear on Saturday whether the discussion on US restrictions was discussed.
Many European nations have strongly supported Ukraine in part because they fear they will be the next victim of a proxy Russia.
At the opening of the meeting, the President of the Czech Republic, Petr Pavel, urged the military commanders gathered in the large hall to be “courageous and open in expressing assessments and recommendations. The more rounded and softer they are, the less they will be understood at the political level.”
He said allies must “take the right steps and the right decisions to protect our lands and our way of life.”
Military leaders routinely draft plans and recommendations, which are then sent to NATO’s civilian defense ministers for discussion and then to the leaders of the alliance’s nations.
The US allows Ukraine to use US-supplied weapons in cross-border attacks against attacks by Russian forces. But it does not allow Kiev to fire long-range missiles like ATACMS deep into Russia. The U.S. has argued that Ukraine has aircraft capable of long-range strikes and that ATACMS should be used sparingly because there are only a limited number of them.
Ukraine has stepped up its appeals to Washington to lift the restrictions, especially as winter blooms and Kiev worries about Russian gains in the colder months.
“You want to weaken the enemy attacking you so that you’re not only fighting arrows coming your way, but also attacking the archer, which, as we see, is very often operating from Russia proper to Ukraine,” said Bauer. “So militarily, there is a good reason to do that, to weaken the enemy, to weaken its logistics lines, fuel, ammunition coming to the front. You want to stop that if at all possible.”
Brown, for his part, told reporters traveling with him to the meeting that the U.S. policy on long-range weapons would remain unchanged.
But he added that “in the same way, what we want to do – regardless of this policy – is that we want to continue to make Ukraine successful with the capabilities that the United States and other coalition nations have provided.” as well as the weapons that Kyiv has been able to build itself.
“They’ve proven to be quite effective in building unmanned aerial vehicles and drones,” Brown told reporters traveling with him to meetings in Europe.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has made similar points, arguing that a single weapon system does not determine success in war.
“There are a number of things in the overall equation that go into whether you know you want to offer one capability or another,” Austin said Friday. “There’s no silver bullet in things like this.”
He also noted that Ukraine has already been able to strike inside Russia with its own internally produced systems, including drones.
