Why won't Biden and NATO countries let Ukraine attack targets in Russia?

Under international Ukraine has every right to do so

Doctor of Juridical Science (SJD) in International Law, Harvard University

Note to readers

As a reader has pointed out, the following article repeats points already made in previous articles. I responded to him as follows:

Thanks for your comment, Michael.

Unfortunately, the defects in our strategy don't change much, though Biden and NATO countries have sent weapons they once feared crossed Putin's "red lines". It has, however, always been too little and two late.

The war looks like it's grinding to a stalemate. These delayed decisions have real consequences.

Repetitive arguments need to be made, until they are heard and lead to action.

This war is indeed like Groundhog Day.

See also, “Repetitive arguments and decision making in the Ukraine war,” Trenchant Observations, April 15, 2023.

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Ukraine needs long-range artillery rockets, the American ATACMS (with a 180-mile range) to defend itself against attacks launched from Russia, to hit command centers and munitions depots deeper behind Russian lines, and to attack Russian targets in the Crimea (illegally occupied by Russia since its invasion in 2014).

Germany is considering supplying Ukraine with long-range Taurus cruise missiles but is agonizing over whether it needs to limit their range so they can’t attack targets in Russia.¹

Why won’t U.S. President Joe Biden and leaders of other NATO countries let Ukraine use weapons they have supplied to attack targets in Russia?

Attacking targets in Russia would be fully justified as acts of lawful self-defense under international law and Article 51 of the U.N. Charter.

The origin of this prohibition was Biden’s fear of Putin and Putin’s nuclear threats.

In the sclerotic, calcified thinking of the U.S. president, this fear has been codified into an unquestioned “red line” which must not be breached, or even considered. Consequently, Putin’s “red line” has become Biden’s and NATO'‘s “red line”, and Biden and NATO have become Putin’s enforcers.

We simply don’t know whether Biden, through National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan’s secret back-channel conversations with Putin’s top national security aides, has reached some kind of agreement with Putin to enforce this “red line”.

In any event, the red line goes against all military logic. Its enforcement by Biden is a principal reason why Ukraine has not advanced further in its efforts to expel Russian troops from all Ukrainian territory.

Biden’s and NATO’s goals have been to avoid getting drawn into a direct military engagement with Russian forces, and to prevent Ukraine from losing the war.

So far, they have been successful in achieving their primary goal, to avoid direct military engagement with Russian troops, They have also, to date and with the horrendous loss of Ukrainian lives, buildings and infrastructure, been able to achieve their secondary goal, avoiding a Ukrainian defeat.

However, Biden and NATO have failed to articulate any strategy for winning the war.

There is simply no strategy for winning the war.

Instead, all we hear are earnest avowals of continued support for Ukraine for “as long as it takes”.

For “as long as it takes” to achieve what?

For Putin to give up? What are they smoking?

For Ukraine to improve its position on the battlefield so that negotiations can end the war? Who have they been talking to?

Neither Russia nor Ukraine sees any possibility of a negotiated settlement, given current positions.

Ukraine and NATO can’t agree to the “territorial concessions” Putin demands. Nor would they be possible, given peremptory norms of international law, without throwing out the basic norms which form the cornerstone of the U.N. Charter, and indeed its very raison d’être.

Biden and NATO need to come up with a strategy for winning the war.

Any such strategy will need to permit Ukraine to hit targets in Russia in full exercise of its right of self-defense under international law.

It will necessarily involve supplying Ukraine with long-range weapons such as the ATACMS artillery shells for the HIMARS artillery units, and long-range versions of cruise missiles such as the German Taurus missiles.

There are other components to the strategy that may be required, such as greatly tightening the sanctions regime through applying real pressure on the fence-sitters in the Global South, and moving towards a war economy to ensure the manufacture of sufficient munitions both to support Ukraine in a protracted conflict, and to quickly replenish NATO stocks which have been depleted by transfers to Ukraine.

Victory or growing risks of defeat? That is the strategic question.

Western leaders need to give fresh consideration to the consequences of defeat, or stalemate with Russian troops occupying Ukrainian territory indefinitely—which basically amounts to the same thing.

The U.S. and NATO need to update their thinking about Putin and his nuclear threats. All war involves enormous risks. They need to continually weigh the risks of Ukrainian defeat and its consequences—which may involve risks of nuclear confrontation further down the line—against the risks of Putin’s nuclear threats, about which we have learned a great deal since February 2024.

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See also “Why I care about the war in Ukraine,” Trenchant Observations, June 26, 2023.

1. See,

Jörg Luyken, “Olaf Scholz inches closer to sending long-range missiles to Ukraine; Germany is preparing to follow Britain, which was the first ally to send air-launched cruise missiles to Kyiv before the counter-offensive,” The Telegraph, August 12, 2023.(4:43 pm).