Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Thursday that the US had agreed to supply Kiev with ATACMS long-range attack missiles “on a regular basis”. His statement came just two days after Kyiv confirmed it had used them for the first time, Reuters reports. .

The White House confirmed on Tuesday that it had supplied such missiles to Ukraine following reports in the US media, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi said the same day that they were already in use by his country’s armed forces.

“Today I am especially grateful to the United States. Our agreements with President Biden are being implemented. They are implemented very precisely – ATACMS showed themselves very well,” Zelenskyy said on Tuesday in an evening speech to his compatriots.

Kyiv has been asking for ATACAMS (Army Tactical Missile Systems) missiles for months to target airfields that Russia uses to attack its port infrastructure and cities, but until recently ran into reluctance from Washington.

Ukraine will be armed with 3 types of long-range missiles

Until this week, only two countries supplied long-range missiles to Ukraine: Great Britain, which sent the Storm Shadow model to Ukrainian forces, and France, which provided SCALP systems.

Responding on Thursday to a question about whether Ukraine can count on regular deliveries of ATACMS missiles from the USA, Dmytro Kuleba answered that indeed “it means”.

“And this is a direct result of the agreements between President Zelenskyi and President Biden, agreed in Washington during a personal meeting between them at the end of September,” he said.

Joe Biden’s administration has not specified how many ATACMS they have sent to Ukraine, but The New York Times journalists, citing two Western officials, write that it is currently about 20.

The US would like to surprise the Russians with ATACMS missiles

CNN reported on Tuesday that it was not known when the American missiles were delivered, but in recent weeks US officials decided to send them stealthily because they wanted to catch the Russians off guard, especially after months of public debate over whether President Joe Biden would agree to send the weapons.

The Russians know the range of the missiles, and the U.S. fears they will put equipment and weapons out of range before the missiles can be used, an official told CNN.

The US has secretly shipped weapons in the past. In August 2022, the Pentagon admitted that it had sent HARM anti-radar missiles to Ukraine without prior notification. But the US routinely announces significant arms packages to Ukraine, including when it sent Patriot air defense systems last year and cluster munitions this year.

Currently, the maximum range of US weapons deployed in Ukraine is approximately 150 km with a small-diameter ground bomb.

Storm Shadow missiles delivered by the British have a firing range of about 250 km. ATACMS missiles are launched from HIMARS rocket launchers, the same rockets that launch the GMLRS missiles already in use by Ukraine.

The range of ATACMS missiles can reach 300 kilometers depending on the model used. This week, Ukraine used them to attack Russian airfields in Berdyansk and Luhansk.

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