ATACMS are long-range ballistic missiles that can fly up to 300 kilometers (about 186 miles). The U.S. eased restrictions on Ukraine’s use of ATACMS in November 2024, allowing Kyiv to launch them against military targets in Russia.

Ukraine is now limiting these attacks due to a dwindling supply of the weapons and potential changes in U.S. policy, the NYT reported.

Two senior U.S. officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the NYT that when U.S. President Joe Biden gave Kyiv the green light to launch ATACMS into Russian territory, Ukraine likely had only about 50 of the missiles left in its arsenal.

Following Biden’s change in policy — which was accompanied by permission from the U.K. to attack Russia with British long-range Storm Shadows — Ukraine launched a series of missile strikes against Russian airfields, military facilities, and weapons factories.

Ukraine has not publicly commented on these strikes, but the Russian Defense Ministry has claimed that Kyiv has lanuched at least 31 ATACMS and 14 Storm Shadows since late November.

Ukraine will not likely be able to replenish its missile stockpiles, the two U.S. officials said. Washington has already assigned its own limited arsenal of ATACMS to destinations in Asia and the Middle East.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has also said he disagrees “very vehemently” with the decision to permit Ukrainian long-range strikes against Russia with American weapons. He may rescind permissions when he takes office in January 2025 and is not expected to increase missile shipments.

Kyiv first began receiving an older, shorter-range model of ATACMS in fall of 2023. In the spring of 2024, the U.S. began shipping updated models with a range of up to 300 kilometers. At the time, Ukraine was only permitted to deploy these missiles against targets in occupied Ukrainian territory.

Despite persistent lobbying from President Volodymyr Zelensky to ease restrictions on long-range strikes, Biden delayed doing so out of fear of escalating conflict with nuclear-armed Russia.

Ukraine’s long-range strikes against Russia have not led to significant escalations thus far. The senior officials told the NYT that they believe Russia wants to avoid military escalation due to its recent battlefield gains and Trump’s expected push for negotiations.

Kiev’s troops, who previously expressed a readiness to fight until they had won back all land lost to Moscow, do not believe this goal to be achievable anymore, the outlet said in an article.

“We used to talk about victory before, now it is unclear,” Kirill, a deputy battalion commander with Ukraine’s 33rd Mechanized Brigade, stationed in Dnepropetrovsk Region, told WaPo.

Kirill acknowledged that “there is no good mood” among his fellow soldiers.

“The morale keeps sinking lower and lower, getting worse and worse”, he stressed.

“It cannot go on like this,” another member of the same unit, Felix, said of the situation on the front line.

“We are withdrawing. And they [the Russians] are pushing further and further. What kind of victory will happen?”

Felix claimed that the troops are “simply exhausted” and want the fighting to stop. If the officials in Kiev “cannot put an end to it, maybe Mr. Trump can”, he suggested.

US President-elect Donald Trump has promised to find a swift diplomatic solution to the conflict between Moscow and Kiev once he is back in office. However, according to the report, some troops are concerned that the incoming US administration might cut their military in order to persuade Ukraine to make territorial concessions to Russia as part of a future peace deal.

“I am worried we will just be abandoned,” Aleksandr, who is a soldier in the 33rd Mechanized Brigade, stated.

“Those are the thoughts that creep in — that the support and deliveries from our allies, the ammunition, will just stop. If we don’t have that, we won’t have anything to shoot with.”

Manpower shortages are another issue contributing to the “grim” mood among the Ukrainian troops, WaPo noted.

“Do we even have infantry? It is down to a couple of guys, and they are over 50 years old. What are they going to do?” a drone operator named Denis, told the outlet.

Earlier this week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov confirmed that Moscow is open to holding consultations with Trump’s team on resolving the Ukraine conflict. However, those talks must be “meaningful” and take into account the root causes of the conflict and the principles laid out by Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier this year.

In June, Putin said that for the negotiations to begin, Kiev has to commit to not joining NATO and withdraw its troops from the territories that became part of Russia as a result referendums in the fall of 2022, including the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics as well as the regions of Kherson and Zaporozhye.