Nick Schifrin:
Now, the U.S. provides both offensive and defensive intelligence information to Ukraine. Let’s talk about the defense first.
The U.S. gives Ukraine radar and situational awareness of Russian launches inside of Russia and Belarus. Think Russian jets with bombs that hit Ukraine, Russian drones, Russian missiles. A U.S. official and a congressional official understand to me that this kind of — quote — “imminent force protection” will be exempted. And that means that the air defense cooperation, the air alert system cooperation will continue in Ukraine.
Here’s the offensive, though. Two congressional officials and a military official confirmed to me that the U.S. has paused assistance that allows Ukrainian strikes into Russia. Offensive strikes will be more precise. Ukraine can already launch these strikes by themselves into Russia, but without U.S. assistance, they will be much less precise.
Now, the U.S. also provides targeting assistance to Ukrainian soldiers on the front lines inside of Ukraine. It is not clear that assistance is being affected so far, Geoff. But, bottom line, the U.S. official tells me that, depending on the extent of this pause — quote — “It will cost Ukrainian lives” — unquote.
There’s also a strategic effect. European officials continue to tell me they feel that there is a genuine transatlantic break, and the most recent evidence of that came today. French President Emmanuel Macron said something that he really hasn’t said publicly before, that he will consider using French nuclear weapons to replace the protection of U.S. nuclear weapons that the U.S. has provided for the last few decades.
And he said this about a European plan for Ukraine.
