UKRAINE – Ukraine has stabilized the northern Kherson front after Moscow launched an offensive a month ago, thanks to more weapons and permission to use them to target positions within Russia. But its forces are being stretched elsewhere along the 1,000km (620 miles) long front line and are defenseless against Russia’s deadly aerial glide bombs.

A senior officer in Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU), who goes by the call sign Bankir, and is currently fighting in the Kharkiv region, told CNN Saturday the ability to hit Russian targets across the border was already having a positive impact. “It is now possible to conduct local counter-attack operations and recapture the territories that, for example, were captured by the enemy a week ago,’ the SBU officer said. For much of the war, Ukraine has been constrained when it comes to using powerful Western weapons against Russia.

Kyiv’s allies have long been adamant that their fighting machines must not strike within Russian territory for fear of provoking Moscow, limiting their use to targets within Ukraine, including in occupied areas. But that changed in the wake of the Kharkiv offensive. First, European countries including France and Germany allowed Ukraine to strike targets within Russia, then, most significantly, the US gave the go ahead for Ukraine to use its weaponry around Kharkiv.

“Our policy using long-range strike weaponry to go into Russia hasn’t changed, but what we have done is provide Ukraine the ability to counterfire, to fire back at those Russian troops that are firing at them and to be able to take out their artillery batteries as they’re firing at the Ukrainians and I think that’s going to prove to be very, very helpful to Ukraine going forward,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer. (CNN)…[+]