KYIV, Ukraine \u2014 Ukraine won\u2019t sit passively by while Russia blockades and destroys its Black Sea ports and grain silos, Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov told me late last month in an interview in his office.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou threaten our ships or those of our friends and we will mirror what you do,\u201d he pledged to the Russians. He wasn\u2019t kidding.<\/p>\n
On Friday, Kyiv used sophisticated sea drones to damage a Russian warship outside the key Russian Black Sea naval base of Novorossiysk, the first time such a weapon had hit a Russian port. On the same day, Ukraine\u2019s maritime authority warned that any ships approaching six Russian Black Sea ports would be at \u201cwar risk\u201d \u2014 a response to Russia\u2019s threats against international ships carrying Ukrainian grain.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a good experience with the Moskva,\u201d Reznikov recalled, referring to the Russian flagship Ukraine sunk in April 2022 with a Ukrainian-designed Neptune missile. \u201cWe have the capacity to continue this story,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Indeed, Kyiv\u2019s skilled, crowdfunded tech sector, which has been working side-by-side with the military, has developed a new weapon \u2014 sophisticated sea drones \u2014 whose long-range capabilities have taken the Russian invaders by surprise.<\/p>\n
On Saturday, a drone attack hit a Russian oil tanker off the east coast of occupied Crimea. Reznikov warned that Ukraine will respond to Moscow\u2019s destruction of Ukrainian exports by imposing economic costs on Russian oil and other exports traversing Black Sea waters. He told me bluntly, \u201cThe price will rise for insurance for ships going into Russian ports via the Black Sea.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is not, as claimed by some shortsighted critics of U.S. aid to Ukraine, a dangerous tit-for-tat battle in a conflict that has deteriorated into an endless war of attrition and has nothing to do with the United States.<\/p>\n
This is Ukraine taking upon itself the heavy burden of fighting to preserve the principle of freedom of navigation in international waters that Russian warships are illegally attempting to dominate. Far better if NATO members would patrol these waters, given that three NATO nations border the Black Sea: Bulgaria, Romania and the militarily powerful, Turkey. But the White House has made clear it has no interest in such patrols taking place.<\/p>\n
Yet, if NATO permits Russia to illegally control much of the Black Sea, why should it not attempt to do the same in the Arctic, the Baltic Sea or off the Aleutian Islands near Alaska?<\/p>\n
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, jointly with the United Nations, had brokered a deal in July 2022 that enabled Ukraine to export some of its grain, which is critical to global food markets. But Russia thumbed its nose at Erdogan and NATO by quitting the deal last month and threatening international shipping.<\/p>\n
Kyiv still hopes Erdogan might persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to renew the deal, because, as Reznikov put it, the Turkish leader considers this \u201ca very important mission.\u201d The defense minister noted that Turkey \u201chas the military capacity\u201d to escort Ukrainian grain ships \u201cbut it is a political question.\u201d So far no sign that Erdogan will take up that challenge.<\/p>\n
Meantime, Russia\u2019s response to mediation efforts to restore the grain deal has been to punish Ukraine by raining missiles and Iranian-made drones on its Black Sea port in Odesa and its river ports on the Danube.<\/p>\n
Moscow has also continued its criminal attacks on civilian infrastructure in other cities, targeting a Kharkiv blood bank filled with donors on Saturday in apparent reprisal for the drone hits. A blood bank!<\/p>\n
So there is much more the United States and NATO allies should be doing to help the Ukrainian David\u2019s daring sea drone attacks by limiting the Russian Goliath\u2019s ability to hit back from the air.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe must continue to strengthen our air defenses,\u201d Reznikov told me. \u201cOur priority number one is to protect our major cities.\u201d<\/p>\n
After more than a year of hesitation, the Biden administration finally greenlit the delivery of two U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems to Kyiv in April, which now successfully defend Ukraine\u2019s capital city.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need more Patriots and NASAMS (another surface-to-air missile system),\u201d said Reznikov, \u201cto defend the port hub of Odesa, along with Lviv, Kharkiv, and the industrial region of Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia.\u201d Those air defense systems will also be vital if the fighting continues through winter so that Moscow cannot wholly destroy Ukraine\u2019s electric power generation systems and freeze the country.<\/p>\n
Listening to Reznikov, two things became clear: First, at this critical point in the war it is self-defeating for the West to slow-walk weapons systems that could speed a positive outcome of the counteroffensive. And second, Washington must expand its vision of how this war could end.<\/p>\n
The defense minister stressed that the arrival of U.S.-made F-16 warplanes (provided by NATO allies in Europe) will be a \u201cgame changer. F-16s or other modern fourth-generation-plus planes would strengthen our air defenses.\u201d<\/p>\n
Moreover, the arrival of modern aircraft would change the whole dynamic of the current ground battle, in which Kyiv has only limited numbers of old Soviet warplanes that are vastly outnumbered by modernized Russian fighter jets. Ukrainian infantry are essentially fighting without air cover, which flies in the face of NATO military doctrine which demands that an advancing army first take control of the skies.<\/p>\n
However, Washington delayed approval so long for permitting European allies to even begin training F-16 pilots that the warplanes won\u2019t arrive in time for the current counteroffensive. \u201cThe first of these birds will fly in the spring,\u201d Reznikov told me.<\/p>\n
Big opportunity missed.<\/p>\n
Which brings me to the second takeaway from my interview: If the administration wants this war to end soon and successfully, it must not be timid about aiding Ukraine\u2019s innovative efforts to halt Russian aggression from the Black Sea.<\/p>\n
The White House foot-dragging on F-16s, and on delivering the long-range missiles known as ATACMS, appears to reflect a fear that attacks on major Russian supply depots and bases in Crimea would cross a red line with Putin. However, the Crimean Peninsula has become a heavily armed fortress pushing into the belly of southern Ukraine from the Black Sea. Cutting it off from Russian supply lines is key to Ukraine winning this war.<\/p>\n
Kyiv is making clear it can\u2019t wait for the White House.<\/p>\n
With its sea drone attacks, including a new hit that damaged Putin\u2019s prized Kerch bridge linking Russia to Crimea, Kyiv is making clear it can\u2019t wait for the White House: neutralizing Crimea and the Black Sea fleet is a critical step toward forcing Russian troops to leave Ukraine.<\/p>\n
Reznikov believes the administration may be changing its thinking on Crimea. \u201cMaybe last year Crimea was a red line,\u201d he said. \u201cBut when we asked for Harpoon anti-ship missiles right after the Russian invasion,\u201d he recalled, \u201cwe were told it was \u2018impossible.\u2019 So we used the Ukrainian-made Neptune to sink the Moskva. After that we got the Harpoons.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast week it was very noisy in Crimea. That means we will use every moment to destroy their ammunition depots and their headquarters.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other words, Ukraine will move forward with its own technological innovations but hopes their success will spur Washington to deliver systems it is still delaying. The chances of overall success would be dramatically increased if F-16s could be delivered sooner (why not train the pilots at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, where there are more experienced trainers?).<\/p>\n
And there\u2019s no excuse for the White House to hold back ATACMS long-range missiles, which could amplify the drone attacks on Russian supply depots and Crimean bases.<\/p>\n
When I asked Reznikov how Ukraine could win, he quickly replied, \u201cAs we did it before. A lot of countries thought Kyiv would fall in three nights and we liberated our territory.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then I asked where he thought Ukraine would be in a year. \u201cI hope we will meet next year and I will not be minister of defense, meaning we won and you can fly into Boryspil airport\u201d in Kyiv, he retorted. \u201cWe will discuss internal reforms, and whether or not they are enough, and rebuilding the country. And also our new security architecture with our NATO partners.\u201d<\/p>\n
If Ukrainian determination and technological skill can be combined with swift delivery of key U.S. systems, Reznikov\u2019s hopes may not be a dream.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
(Trudy Rubin is a columnist and editorial-board member for the The Philadelphia Inquirer<\/a>. Readers may write to her at: Philadelphia Inquirer, P.O. Box 8263, Philadelphia, Pa. 19101, or by email at trubin@phillynews.com<\/a>.)<\/p>\n