Kremlin warns the West over 'dramatic' escalation moment in Ukraine war
October 13, 2025 00:00:00
People come to participate in the dedication ceremony of a monument to fallen soldiers in Moscow region on Sunday — AFP
MOSCOW, Oct 12 (Reuters): The Kremlin said on Sunday Russia was deeply concerned about the possibility of the U.S. supplying Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, warning that the war had reached a dramatic moment with escalation from all sides.
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday that before agreeing to provide Tomahawks, he would want to know what Ukraine planned to do with them because he did not want to escalate the war between Russia and Ukraine. He said, however, that he had "sort of made a decision" on the matter.
Tomahawk missiles have a range of 2,500 km (1,550 miles), meaning Ukraine would be able to use them for long-range strikes deep inside Russia, including Moscow. Some retired variants of Tomahawks can carry a nuclear warhead, according to the U.S. Congressional Research Service.
"The topic of Tomahawks is of extreme concern," Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told Russian state television reporter Pavel Zarubin in remarks published on Sunday. "Now is really a very dramatic moment in terms of the fact that tensions are escalating from all sides."
The war in Ukraine, Europe's deadliest since World War Two, has sparked the biggest confrontation between Russia and the West since the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, and Russian officials say they are now in a "hot" conflict with the West.
Peskov said that if Tomahawks were launched at Russia, Moscow would have to take into account that some versions of the missile can carry nuclear warheads.