The Kharkiv Front

Russians no longer have sanctuary near Kharkiv:

The Biden administration has quietly given Ukraine permission to strike inside Russia — solely near the area of Kharkiv — using U.S.-provided weapons, three U.S. officials and two other people familiar with the move said Thursday, a major reversal that will help Ukraine to better defend its second-largest city.

“The president recently directed his team to ensure that Ukraine is able to use U.S. weapons for counter-fire purposes in Kharkiv so Ukraine can hit back at Russian forces hitting them or preparing to hit them,” one of the U.S. officials said, adding that the policy of not allowing long-range strikes inside Russia “has not changed.”

I think this is about right; Russians are taking advantage of border immunity for tactical and operational gain, and are unlikely to be shocked or alarmed that US policy changes based on the changing situation at the front. The Biden administration has been more sensitive to escalation concerns than I think is strictly necessary, but given that escalation could be REALLY BAD I find it difficult to fault them overmuch for the careful approach. This change allows Ukraine to improve the tactical situation, while still forbidding such measures as F-16 strikes on St. Petersburg.

By the way, this is good news:

Here, in the Pentagon’s first new major arms plant built since Russia invaded Ukraine, Turkish workers in orange hard hats are busy unpacking wood crates stenciled with the name Repkon, a defense company based in Istanbul, and assembling computer-controlled robots and lathes.

The factory will soon turn out about 30,000 steel shells every month for the 155-millimeter howitzers that have become crucial to Kyiv’s war effort.

Ukraine fired between 4,000 and 7,000 such shells daily for several months in 2023, according to NATO’s secretary-general, before infighting among House Republicans held up further funding for Pentagon arms shipments. Large shipments of American artillery ammunition resumed in April after Congress passed an aid package that included $61 billion to Ukraine.

I think that a lot of folks will be surprised to learn that the US defense industrial base (DIB; “military industrial complex” is the term you use if you want to let on that you’re a know-nothing amateur) actually gets a lot of things right with respect to innovation, technology integration, and production. One thing that it is not set up to do well, however, is producing huge amounts of low-tech, non-IP bearing equipment like 155mm shells. The European DIB also is not well-equipped for this, but it’s right in the wheelhouse of the Russian DIB (“make something simple and easy and in huge quantities? Da, comrade.”). Furthermore, this is the kind of project that can keep Ukraine in the war:

The German company [Rheinmetall] signed a memorandum of understanding at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday to build and jointly operate the new factory with a Ukrainian partner, whom it did not name.

The factory in Ukraine will produce a six-digit number of 155mm calibre bullets per year, Rheinmetall said, but did not say when production would begin or where the facility would be located.

Rheinmetall will own 51% of the new company, with the remaining 49% share held by the Ukrainian partner.