KYIV:Ukraine used US ATACMS missiles to strike Russian territory for the first time on Tuesday, Moscow said, in an attack regarded by Russia as a major escalation on the war’s 1,000th day.
Russia said its forces shot down five of six missiles fired at a military facility in the Bryansk region, while debris of one hit the facility, causing no casualties or damage.
Ukraine said it had struck a Russian arms depot around 110 km (70 miles) inside Russia and caused secondary explosions. It did not specify what weapons it had used.
President Joe Biden gave approval just this week for Ukraine to use the medium range US missiles for such attacks, which Moscow has described as an escalation that would make Washington a direct combatant in the war and prompt retaliation.
It came amid plans for vigils to mark 1,000 days of war, with weary troops at the front, Kyiv besieged by airstrikes, and doubts about the future of Western support as Donald Trump heads back to the White House.
Military experts say US missiles can help Ukraine defend a pocket it has captured as a bargaining chip inside Russia but are not likely to change the course of the 33-month-old war.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday lowered the threshold for a nuclear strike in response to a broader range of conventional attacks. Putin approved the change days after two Biden’s approval.
Russia had been warning the West for months that if Washington allowed Ukraine to fire US, British and French missiles deep into Russia, Moscow would consider those NATO members to be directly involved in the war in Ukraine.
The updated Russian nuclear doctrine, establishing a framework for conditions under which Putin could order a strike from the world’s biggest nuclear arsenal, was approved by him on Tuesday, according to a published decree.
Analysts said the biggest change was that Russia could consider a nuclear strike in response to a conventional attack on Russia or its ally Belarus that “created a critical threat to their sovereignty and (or) their territorial integrity”.