Russia and Ukraine are reportedly firing new missiles at each other

According to Ukrainian information, Russia fired an intercontinental ballistic missile into Ukraine for the first time since the beginning of the war. The Ukrainian Air Force said the Russian army used such a missile (which was not equipped with a nuclear warhead) during attacks on the city of Dnipro on Thursday morning.

The Kremlin did not want to comment on Ukrainian information about the alleged use of the intercontinental ballistic missile. When asked whether Moscow had fired the rocket, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had “nothing to say on the matter.”

“An intercontinental ballistic missile was launched from the Astrakhan region of Russia,” the Ukrainian Air Force said. It was the first use of this weapon by Moscow since the Russian war of aggression began in February 2022, Ukrainian army circles said.

An intercontinental ballistic missile is literally the longest-range missile in its category. ICBMs can hit targets at a distance of more than 5,500 kilometers. The projectiles can be equipped with both conventional and nuclear warheads. Ballistic missiles differ from cruise missiles, which are powered by jet engines and can be guided manually.

On the other hand, the Russian air defense claims to have shot down two British Storm Shadow cruise missiles – which would also be a first since the beginning of the war. However, the Russian Defense Ministry did not provide any information about the time and place on Thursday. The day before, British media reported that Ukraine had fired the weapons at Russia for the first time. The British Storm Shadow is an air-launched cruise missile with a range of more than 250 kilometers for precision strikes on targets such as bunkers or critical infrastructure. They are identical in construction to the French Scalp missiles.

On Tuesday, the authority reported the first use of long-range missiles over Russian soil that had been supplied by the USA, so-called ATACMS missiles. Five of the six rockets were intercepted by the anti-aircraft defense. The sixth rocket was damaged, the ministry announced on its Telegram channel. Their debris fell on a military site in the Bryansk region near the border. A fire had been extinguished. “There are no casualties or destruction,” it was said at the time.

ATACMS and Storm Shadow are long-range weapons. The Kremlin has warned against their use over Russian territory. Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin claimed in October that these missiles could only be operated by Western military forces. Accordingly, any use of these weapons by Moscow would be viewed as direct participation of the relevant states in the war.

Following the arrival of North Korean troops in Russia to support Moscow in the fight against Ukraine, the US government has allowed Kiev to use longer-range US weapons against targets on Russian territory. Shortly afterwards, on Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed the Russian nuclear weapons doctrine, which had been changed weeks earlier and lowered the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons.