SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
The war in Ukraine escalated again this week when Russia and Ukraine traded cross-border missile attacks. This came after Ukraine was granted permission from Western allies to use missiles with American-made components to strike inside Russia. Russia's counterattack, which took place Thursday in Eastern Ukraine, was carried out with an experimental missile that has nuclear capabilities, raising alarms about nuclear brinksmanship.
All this is playing out months ahead of a presidential transition in the U.S., one that everyone expects will lead to major shifts in Western support for Ukraine's war effort. I discussed this with Oliver Carroll, who covers Ukraine for The Economist. He told me about the situation on the ground in Dnipro, the city that was attacked.
OLIVER CARROLL: The situation is tense not only because of these missiles, but because of the situation on the front lines in general. But certainly what we saw on the 21st - it was actually Thursday in Dnipro - was a new level. Those who were there at the time told me the noise - it's a very sort of long, loud hum, which sort of represented the impacts of these various ammunitions of the missile.
DETROW: Can you just spell out for us why it matters so much, why it's such a big deal that this is a possibly nuclear-capable missile and one that, again, can deliver its payload so quickly?
CARROLL: Right. I mean, what makes this different is that it's a new level. It's a signal, perhaps. The range is a more longer range, a signal, perhaps, to Europe and perhaps even to America that, you know, we can hit you with these things as well. The context was, as well, a few days earlier, Ukraine had hit an arms dump and a command center in a presidential estate, which was sensitive for Putin. And he has responded to a conventional strike with a conventional strike. So I think it's really important that we keep perspective here.
DETROW: Yeah.
CARROLL: But at the same time, you know, this is a serious threat. It's just perhaps one that we need to be careful not to take literally the way Mr. Putin would like us to take it.
DETROW: So people you're talking to - people in the military and government in Ukraine - are not seeing it as an absolute given that that's it for American support for the war starting in January?
CARROLL: I mean, Ukraine hasn't had any representations yet. They don't, you know, know what Mr. Trump's plans are. Today, President Zelenskyy said, you know, we will see in January. We'll have an idea of the plan, and we'll have our own plan to give - you know, to respond to that.
But I think what I would say is, you know, there's still a very big question as to whether Ukraine can hold their ground because big issues about morale and manpower - I mean, just to give you a sort of anecdote from what I saw out there - we saw some new soldiers arriving at the front lines. These are the soldiers - just finished their training being introduced to their units, and none of them were below 50 years of age. One of the guys was 51 years of age...
DETROW: None of them were below 50, so these were men in their 50s and older.
CARROLL: Exactly.
DETROW: Wow.
CARROLL: I have to say, this was a unit which, you know, isn't an assault unit. It's a sort of - it's a mechanized brigade, which is more about holding ground. So obviously, the youngest recruits are being sent to the - you know, the assault forces, but still.
One guy named Gregory (ph) - he was 51 years of age. And he was there with, you know, plus-nine vision, half-blind. And he was saying, you know, I just went to the military office, and I really wasn't expecting them to enlist me, but they sent me. And I said, now, how are things, you know? Physically, it's very hard. Well, how about your shooting? He said, well, I can shoot. Anyone can shoot. But I'm having problems hitting the target. So, you know, just an idea of just how - you know, how difficult the Ukraines are feeling.
DETROW: Yeah.
CARROLL: And when they see these issues with manpower, and they see that, actually, you know, the will, perhaps, of the country is not quite what it was - I'm not saying it's completely disappeared, but there's big questions about it - then those front-line defenders - it's becoming very difficult.
And some of them - whereas six months before, they would have said, we're going to fight to the end - for some of these soldiers now, they're thinking, well, maybe a cease-fire by Trump isn't the worst option, even though it's obviously inherently very dangerous.
DETROW: That's Oliver Carroll, Kyiv correspondent for The Economist. Thank you so much for talking to us.
CARROLL: Absolute pleasure. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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