KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian officials say they require coordinates provided or confirmed by the United States and its allies for the vast majority of strikes using its advanced U.S.-provided rocket systems, a previously undisclosed practice that reveals a deeper and more operationally active role for the Pentagon in the war.
[...] One senior Ukrainian official said Ukrainian forces almost never launch the advanced weapons without specific coordinates provided by U.S. military personnel from a base elsewhere in Europe.
[...] A senior U.S. official — who like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue — acknowledged the key American role in the campaign and said that the targeting assistance served to ensure accuracy and conserve limited stores of ammunition for maximum effectiveness. The official said that Ukraine does not seek approval from the United States on what to strike and routinely targets Russian forces on their own with other weapons. The U.S. provides coordinates and precise targeting information solely in an advisory role, the official said.
[...] The senior Ukrainian official described the targeting process, generally: Ukrainian military personnel identify targets they want to hit, and in which location, and that information is then sent up to senior commanders, who then relay the request to U.S. partners for more accurate coordinates. The Americans do not always provide the requested coordinates, the official said, in which case the Ukrainian troops do not fire.
Ukraine could carry out strikes without U.S. help but because Kyiv doesn’t want to waste valuable ammunition and miss, it usually chooses not to strike without U.S. confirmation, the official said, adding that there are no complaints about the process.
[...] The head of the Ukrainian military’s missile forces and artillery training, Maj. Gen. Andriy Malinovsky, told The Washington Post in an interview in October that Ukraine’s Western allies had confirmed coordinates for targets ahead of the Kharkiv counteroffensive.
The partners had worked out a process, he said, with Ukraine receiving precise coordinates to ensure they wouldn’t miss their mark with multiple-launch rocket artillery systems as the rapid counteroffensive caught Russian forces unprepared. The targeting information also provided a workaround for when Russian signal-jamming prevented aerial drone reconnaissance on the battlefield, Malinovsky said.
“According to our maps and software, a point will have one set of coordinates,” Malinovsky said. “But when we give this target to partners for analysis, the coordinates are different. Why? Because the Americans and NATO countries have access to military satellites.”
“We’re all basically always online,” he added. “They immediately get us the coordinates and we then fire the MLRS right away.”
A third Ukrainian official confirmed that targeting all goes through an American installation on NATO soil and described the process as “very fast.” The Washington Post is withholding the name of the base at the request of U.S. officials who cited security concerns.
