By Joe Lauria, Consortium News, 12/7/24

A bill introduced into the U.S. House of Representatives by Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) would prohibit the U.S. from sending long-range ATACMS missiles to Ukraine to be fired into Russia.

As U.S. personnel and satellites are required to fire the missiles from Ukrainian territory, Moscow considers it a direct U.S. attack on Russia putting it in a state of war with the U.S. which could lead to nuclear conflict. 

To remove the potential of nuclear war, the proposed legislation seeks to end ATACMS launches into Russia. The bill reads:

(a) Prohibition.—For the period beginning on the date of the enactment of this Act and ending at the close of January 20, 2025, notwithstanding any other provision of law, during any period for which a state of conflict exists between Ukraine and the Russian Federation—

1) no Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) may be transferred to Ukraine; and

(2) U.S. Military Services or intelligence agencies may not provide support to Ukrainian units operating High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HMARS) platforms utilizing ATACMS munitions to strike outside of internationally recognized Ukrainian territorial borders—

(A) targeting intelligence support;

(B) mission planning support; and

(C) any other type of support.

Several members of Congress and their staff said they were taken off guard by President Joe Biden’s reversal of his previous decision not to allow the use of ATACMS to be fired into Russia from Ukraine.

The  members and their staff made these remarks during meetings on Thursday on Capitol Hill with former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter and activists of Code Pink, led by Medea Benjamin. 

Biden Breaks With Realists

ATACMS missile firing in May 2006. (U.S. Army/Wikimedia Commons)

Biden had twice before sided with the Pentagon to avoid direct war with Russia. In March 2022 he overruled his Secretary of State Antony Blinken to scotch plans for a NATO no-fly zone over Ukraine, which could have lead to direct conflict with Russia.

Biden opposed the no-fly zone, he said at the time, because “that’s called World War III, okay? Let’s get it straight here, guys. We will not fight the third world war in Ukraine.”

Then in September Biden deferred to the realists in the Pentagon to oppose long-range British Storm Shadow missiles from being fired by Ukraine deep into Russia out of fear it would also lead to a direct NATO-Russia military confrontation with all that that entails.

Putin warned at the time that because British soldiers on the ground in Ukraine would actually launch the British missiles into Russia with U.S. geostrategic support, it “will mean that NATO countries — the United States and European countries — are at war with Russia. And if this is the case, then, bearing in mind the change in the essence of the conflict, we will make appropriate decisions in response to the threats that will be posed to us.” 

That was a clear warning that British and U.S. targets could be hit. Biden thus wisely backed off. 

But after he was driven from the race and his party lost the White House last month, Biden suddenly switched gears allowing not only British, but also U.S. long-range ATACMS missiles to be fired into Russia. It’s not clear that the White House ever informed the Pentagon in advance.

Higgin’s bill was introduced as H.R. 10218 on Nov. 21, but none of the other House members that Ritter and Benjamin met with on Capitol Hill had heard of it. Nor was it reported in the mainstream media.

“We found that commonsense is actually alive and living here in the halls of Congress,” Ritter told Consortium News. “Members of Congress and their staffs understand the danger of nuclear war.  We found that there was a bill already written … that sought to achieve what we were trying to get them to do.”   

Benjamin said: “We are excited to push this bill, which we just found out about. … It will not pass, but the idea is to get momentum for it so that message is coming out there that there are members of Congress who want to see this reversed and that in the next Congress, they will introduce it again with a lot more momentum.”

“To stop a nuclear war comes down to one issue,” Ritter said:

“The United States has to stop attacking Russian soil with American-made ATACMS missiles. Even though we use a Ukrainian cutout, it’s American provided, American targets and American intelligence. It’s the Americans attacking Russia. From the Russian perspective, the United States is at war with Russia … which has triggered their nuclear doctrine.”

Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former U.N. correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, and other newspapers, including The Montreal Gazette, the London Daily Mail and The Star of Johannesburg. He was an investigative reporter for the Sunday Times of London, a financial reporter for Bloomberg News and began his professional work as a 19-year old stringer for The New York Times. He is the author of two books, A Political Odyssey, with Sen. Mike Gravel, foreword by Daniel Ellsberg; and How I Lost By Hillary Clinton, foreword by Julian Assange.