- First time, US to assist with strikes on energy targets in Russia: WSJ.
- US asking NATO to provide similar support to Ukraine. WSJ.
- Trump pressing European countries to stop purchases of Russian oil.
The United States has decided to give Ukraine intelligence that will help it strike Russia’s oil and power sites, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, as it weighs whether to send Kyiv weapons that could put more targets within range.
Officials said the move could make it easier for Kyiv to target refineries, pipelines and power plants, aiming to cut the Kremlin’s war funds.
The United States has long been sharing intelligence with Kyiv but Wednesday’s report said the new development will make it easier for Ukraine to hit refineries, pipelines, power stations and other infrastructure with the aim of depriving the Kremlin of revenue and oil.
US officials are also asking NATO allies to provide similar support, according to the newspaper.
US President Donald Trump has been pressing European countries to stop purchases of Russian oil in exchange for his agreement to impose tough sanctions on Moscow to try to dry up funding for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Neither the White House nor Ukraine nor Russia’s missions to the United Nations immediately responded to separate requests for comment from Reuters on Wednesday.
According to US officials cited by the Wall Street Journal, approval on additional intelligence came shortly before Trump posted on social media last week suggesting that Ukraine could retake all its land occupied by Russia, in a striking rhetorical shift in Kyiv’s favour.
“After seeing the Economic trouble (the war) is causing Russia, I think Ukraine, with the support of the European Union, is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form,” Trump wrote on Truth Social last Tuesday, shortly after meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
In terms of additional military assistance, the United States is considering a Ukrainian request to obtain Tomahawks, which have a range of 2,500 km (1,550 miles) – easily enough to hit Moscow and most of European Russia if fired from Ukraine.
Ukraine has also developed its own long-range missile named the Flamingo. Quantities are unknown as the missile is in early production.
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, calling it a “special military operation” to halt Kyiv’s Westward geopolitical drift and what it considers to be a dangerous NATO expansion to the east.
Kyiv and European allies consider the invasion to be an imperial-style land grab.
Oil
This is the first time the United States will provide assistance with Ukrainian long-range strikes deep into Russian territory on energy targets, officials told the Wall Street Journal.
Energy revenue remains the Kremlin’s single most important source of cash to finance the war effort, making oil and gas exports a central target of Western sanctions.
Trump has taken steps to impose an additional tariff on imports from India to pressure New Delhi to halt its purchases of discounted Russian crude oil, and lobbied the likes of Turkey to stop buying oil from Moscow too.
In response, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said last week: “It is a sovereign state that decides for itself in which areas to cooperate with us. And if certain types of trade in certain goods are deemed advantageous to the Turkish side, then the Turkish side will continue to do so.”
Earlier on Wednesday, the Group of Seven nations’ finance ministers said they will take joint steps to increase pressure on Russia by targeting those who are continuing to increase their purchases of Russian oil and those that are facilitating circumvention.
