In a dramatic escalation against Russia, the United States has green-lit the use of an advanced, long-range surface-to-surface missile by Ukraine against Russia, with a four-weapon salvo of Ukraine-launched ATACMS, each carrying a half-ton warhead, striking targets around the Russian city of Voronezh on Tuesday.

Both Ukraine’s Army General Staff (AGS) and Russia’s Defense Ministry confirmed the advanced American missiles had been used in the attacks, hitting the western Russian region more than 200 km (124 miles) from Ukraine’s border.

Aside from reversing nine months of White House and Pentagon policy of starving Ukraine of advanced weaponry in hopes that would bring Russia to the negotiating table, the missiles used in the attack were a more capable version of ATACMS missiles than weapons of that type provided by the US to Ukraine in the past.

Among the targets hit at about 2:30 p.m. Moscow time, according to local news reports and military analysts, was a possible concentration of Russian troops and military equipment at the Pogonovo training area to the south of Voronezh. The modern Russian army facility south of Voronezh city is used for ground troops maneuver training and gunnery practice.

The independent Russian news agency Sota, in a Wednesday morning article, reported the Russian military airfield Baltimor, on the southern outskirts of Voronezh also had been targeted.

Russia’s Defense Ministry, in a Monday statement, said the four ATACMS missile strikes originated in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region and claimed air defense forces had shot them all down without military or civilian casualties.

The official Kremlin statement credited local crews operating S-400 anti-missile systems and Pantsir missile/gun systems for taking out the missiles, and stated falling debris damaged a Russian orphanage, a retirement home, and a private residence. There was no outside confirmation of that.

The Ukrainian AGS statement said the strikes “hit targets successfully” without giving details, citing the need to complete ongoing damage assessments. ATACMS strikes against targets in Russia “will continue,” the statement says.

The straight-flight distance from a probable launch site in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region to potential targets around the Russian city of Voronezh is 220-240 km (137-149 miles), depending on the target.

According to open sources, the US manufactured two versions of the ATAMCS missile, an older, now-retired version called the MGM-140A with a range of 165 km (103 miles), and more modern, still-in-inventory models with a range of 270-300 km (168-186 miles).

Since a Democratic-led White House reversed years of policy banning Ukrainian ATACMS missile strikes against targets inside the Russian Federation, confirmed uses by the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) against a target inside Russia include – a Bryansk ammunition depot, a Kursk military headquarters, a Kursk S-400 air defense emplacement, and air defense sites around Bryansk. The attacks, with less than 30 missiles, took place November 2024-January 2025 at ranges of 160 kilometers (99 miles) or less.

The Monday four-missile strike, cleared with a Republican-led White House and Pentagon, marked a confirmed first-use by Ukraine of a more modern ATACMS missile with a range up to 300 km (186 miles), effectively doubling the territory inside Russia that Ukraine might strike compared to the older weapon received in the past.

The long-range ATACMS strike also marked an effective reversal of nine months of Russia appeasement tactics promoted by US President Donald Trump, including a ban on Ukrainian long-range strikes inside Russia with US weapons.

Trump, during his successful election campaign and early months as president, said his close personal relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin would bring a quick end to the Russo-Ukrainian War.

The Kremlin, in repeated statements throughout the war, has warned it would consider Ukrainian operation of US-made surface-to-surface missiles a direct and serious threat to Russia, because those weapons might carry nuclear warheads or be used in a surprise strike to destroy Russian nuclear weapons. The Russian Defense Ministry statement on the ATAMCS strike on Voronezh made no reference to US escalation.

Popular (750,000+ followers) Russian military blogger and propagandist Aleksandr Sladkov, in a Tuesday write-up of the ATACMS strike, said the “fact” that “all the American missiles were shot down” proved the superiority of Russian air defense armed with S-400 interceptor missiles and the Pantsir missile-gun system.

The S-400 is an advanced air defense system, according to its manufacturer, able to shoot down ballistic missiles like the ATACMS and deadly to all manned aircraft and drones. Despite that advertising, Ukrainian drones strike units hit and destroy S-400 systems regularly, most recently as part of a combined strike package taking down Russian air defenses around the Black Sea port Novorossiysk on Sunday.

Russia’s Pantsir air defense system is a vehicle armed with autocannon and short-range missiles and designed to shoot down slow-flying drones. Until the Russian Defense Ministry made the claim on Monday, over the nearly four years of the Russo-Ukrainian War even a claimed shoot-down by Pantsir system of a ballistic missile typically flying five times the speed of sound, had been unheard of.

Images of ATACMS missile debris surfacing via Russian social media, and even Russian state media on Tuesday, undermined the Kremlin narrative that all the missiles aimed at Voronezh were shot down.

Video published by the Russian propaganda news platform RIA Novosti on Nov. 18 showed debris of a US-made ATACMS missile purportedly found in a forest near the Russian city Voronezh and advanced the narrative that the debris containing a mostly intact engine stage was clear evidence that Russian air defense shot down the American weapon.

However, an ATACMS missile, if armed with a cluster munition warhead – the standard munition for an attack on a troop concentration or an airfield – does not impact and explode but rather sets off a small disbursing charge several dozen meters over the target to scatter the cluster munitions. Normally, following dispersal of the cluster munitions, the intact engine stage flies onward along the missile’s trajectory until striking the ground.

Unconfirmed Russian social media reports said eyewitnesses in Voronezh observed circular clouds of smoke, similar to clouds when a large rocket or missile reaches a desired altitude above a target and disperses its cluster munitions. Russia’s independent Astra news agency on Tuesday published social media video showing four clouds in the sky above Voronezh, possibly similar to a cluster munition dispersal by a large missile, but that video was not conclusive.

Kyiv Post evaluated the RIA Novosti/Russian Defense Ministry claim that all the made-in-USA ATACMS were shot down without causing casualties or damage, and found it most likely inaccurate, and certainly intentionally misleading.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 to launch the bloodiest and largest-scale war in Europe since World War Two in a bid to destroy Ukraine as an independent, democratic state, Washington has cut off arms deliveries to Kyiv at least four times.

The longest embargo followed a Congressional deadlock over migration law and foreign support legislation, and pre-election political maneuvering by the out-of-power Republican party, cutting off practically all US military aid to Ukraine for close to five months, from late October 2023 through mid-April 2024.

The most recent halt to US arms deliveries to Ukraine took place in October-November 2025, because of US Congressional failure to pass national defense spending legislation.