US may announce transfer of long-range smart bombs to Ukraine on 3 January – WSJ

A new package of US military assistance to Ukraine, which for the first time will contain long-range smart bombs, may be announced as early as Friday, 3 January.

Source: The Wall Street Journal; European pravda

These are the precision-guided Ground-Launched Small Diameter Bomb (GLSDB), whose range is 150 kilometres, more than any other weapon that the United States has transferred to Ukraine.

The GLSDB can be fired from rocket launchers like HIMARS, which Ukraine already has. The bomb is equipped with wings that allow it to glide on the way to the target and a rocket motor to increase the range of flight.

These weapons, according to the WSJ, will be delivered as part of the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, which finances the purchase or creation of new weapons and systems and not their withdrawal from American arsenals. Such weapons, as a rule, take longer to deliver. At the same time, Boeing, one of the GLSDB's manufacturers, has previously confirmed that it has stocks of these weapons. 

Reuters was the first to report on the possible transfer of long-range bombs to Ukraine. According to a media outlet, this will happen as part of a package of military assistance in the amount of approximately $US2.2 billion, one of the largest ever.

For a long time, Ukraine has been asking the United States for long-range missiles, in particular, ATACMS, capable of hitting targets at a distance of up to 300 kilometres, justifying this by saying that the existing weapons do not allow destroying the logistics hubs of the Russian occupation forces on Ukrainian territory. However, the US presidential administration has so far refused to take such a step, as they are afraid of escalation on the part of the Russian Federation.

At the same time, Washington recently signalled that it recognises Ukraine's need to defeat targets located further behind the contact lines than current systems can reach, and that it will engage in appropriate dialogue with the Ukrainian side. 

As a reminder, total US military aid to Kyiv since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022 has already exceeded $US26.7 billion.

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