< p>Although hints of Ukraine's imminent authorization to attack targets in Russia with US missiles have not been translated into official statements, the information is being made public by knowledgeable but anonymous sources, the BBC's Russian service commented.
The latest information suggests that the United States may allow the Ukrainian armed forces to use British and French-made Storm Shadow or SCALP cruise missiles. They contain US components and the US had the right to restrict their use.
However, the Ukrainians apparently hoped that they might be allowed to use ATACMS ballistic missiles, which the Ukrainian armed forces also already possess.
Storm Shadow are air-launched cruise missiles fired by the Ukrainians from old Soviet Su-24 bombers. These missiles in the export version have a halved range of 250 kilometers. They are equipped with a penetrating warhead that allows them to engage well-protected and fortified targets.
This, of course, is their advantage, but it also leads to the fact that such missiles are not very effective against large targets on the surface of the earth, such as personnel, warehouses, artillery and anti-aircraft positions, airfields with airplanes and helicopters.
ATACMS is a ground-launched ballistic missile with a range of 300 kilometers. Hits such poorly defended targets in open areas well.
Both rockets can be compared to a sniper rifle and a rifle - each weapon is useful in its own way.
Therefore, if the hopes of the Ukrainians turn out to be in vain and they only get cruise missiles, it will significantly reduce their capabilities compared to what they would get with ATACMS.
It is also important that the American missile arsenal is much larger than the British-French one, and therefore the intensity of the strikes will be much greater.
However, even if the Ukrainian Armed Forces get permission to use quite specific weapons with a limited range and in small quantities, this will still change the situation in the war quite significantly, since there will be quite a few targets within the range of the flight.
Until now, Russia has not considered that Ukraine will be able to strike important targets on its territory. And even in a 250 km zone there are plenty of them. The Storm Shadow is not easy to take down because its design uses stealth technology. In any case, this will force Russia to review the air defense situation in the border areas, which will lead to changes in other areas - after all, the number of anti-aircraft systems is limited.