Trump warns he will supply Tomahawk missiles to Kyiv unless Putin settles Ukraine conflict

Washington DC [US], October 13 : United States President Donald Trump is mulling sending the US-made Tomahawk long-range cruise missiles to Kyiv before making a final decision to supply these weapons to Ukraine, as per reports in several local media.

"I might have to speak to Russia, to be honest with you, about Tomahawks," the US leader told reporters on Sunday on board Air Force One enroute to West Asia. He added that he's going to send Kyiv Tomahawks if the Ukraine conflict "is not going to get settled," Russian news agency TASS reported.

Meanwhile, the foreign minister of NATO ally Estonia, Margus Tsahkna, told ABC News that the US supply of the Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine could help "push Russia back," and would send "a very strong message" to Moscow.

According to the Missile Defence Project at the Washington, D.C.-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies, as cited by ABC News, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has confirmed that Kyiv is seeking access to the long-range missile, variants of which have ranges of up to 1,550 miles.

Zelenskyy on Sunday said he has spoken with Trump for the second time in two days, calling their conversations about the war with Russia, Ukraine's military capabilities and energy sector "very productive."

Talking to X, the Ukrainian President said that his talks with Trump "covered all the aspects of the situation," including Ukraine's defence of life in the country and strengthening its air defence, resilience and long-range capabilities. Zelenskyy added that they also discussed "many details" about the energy sector, though he did not elaborate on any of the topics.

Zelenskyy told Fox News in an exclusive interview that aired on Sunday that he holds hope that Trump's success with the Israel-Hamas ceasefire is a sign that a similar outcome can be reached with Russia and the war in Ukraine.

The Russian state media reported that earlier this month, on October 2, Russian President Vladimir Putin, in his address at the plenary session of the Valdai International Discussion Club said that Tomahawk missiles "cannot be used" without the direct involvement of US military personnel and that this would mean a qualitatively new stage of escalation in relations between Russia and the United States.

On October 5, the Russian leader warned that a potential US decision to supply Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine may ruin the positive trend in relations between Russia and the United States, TASS reported.

The BGM-109 Tomahawk Land Attack Missile, manufactured by RTX Corporation, is a precision-guided, jet-powered, subsonic cruise missile that has been in service since the early 1980s

The US-made missiles are typically launched from warships, submarines, or special ground systems.

According to the Institute for the Study of War, at least 1,945 Russian military objects lie within range of the 1,550-mile variant Tomahawk and at least 1,655 could be reached by the 1,000-mile variant. "Ukraine likely can significantly degrade Russia's frontline battlefield performance by targeting a vulnerable subset of rear support areas that sustain and support Russia's frontline operations," the group said in its update on October 5.

Ukraine's ability to launch missile strikes deep into Russia's rear with larger payloads would allow Ukraine to significantly damage key military assets in Russia, such as the Shahed drone factory in Yelabuga, Republic of Tatarstan, or the Engels-2 Air Base in Saratov Oblast, from which Russia sorties strategic bombers that fire air-launch cruise missiles at Ukraine, as per the ISW.

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