What did the week before 25 November 2024 change?
A look back at the escalation of November 2024, from Washington's decisions on weapons to Moscow's nuclear decree and missile strike on Dnipro.
What had shifted in the war in the days before 25 November 2024? A run of decisions and strikes between 19 and 21 November made that period one of rapid escalation, with Kyiv's Western partners and Moscow each raising the stakes.
On 19 November, US President Joe Biden decided to allow deep strikes into Russian territory using American weapons. The United Kingdom and France responded by preparing new military packages that included long-range missiles for Ukraine. Also on 19 November, Biden approved sending non-persistent anti-personnel mines to Ukraine, with Ukraine committing not to use them in areas with civilians.
Moscow's response
The same day, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing Russia to use nuclear weapons in response to conventional attacks by a non-nuclear state supported by a nuclear power. The wording closely matched the new Western support for Ukraine, and the timing placed the decree alongside the decisions in Washington, London and Paris.
On 21 November, Russia struck Dnipro with a projectile that Putin stated was a new Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile. This confirmed earlier reports from the United States and other Western officials that Russia had used an intermediate-range missile. Initial reports had misidentified it as an RS-26 Rubezh intercontinental ballistic missile.
Wider reverberations
The war's effects were also visible beyond the battlefield. On 20 November, around 1,671 anti-war protesters in Belarus were arrested for showing solidarity with Ukraine, as part of a crackdown on the opposition under President Alexander Lukashenko.
Why it mattered
Taken together, these events show a sequence of action and reaction: expanded permission to use Western weapons, preparation of further long-range supplies, a revised Russian nuclear doctrine and the use of a new missile type. Nuclear risk had been widely discussed by commentators and in the media throughout the war. British historian Lawrence Freedman argued that the risk was low, since in Putin's mind nuclear use is best kept for the most extreme contingencies when the state faces an existential threat.
By 25 November 2024, then, the question for Ukraine's partners was how to continue supplying long-range capability while Moscow signalled readiness to respond with its most serious weapons.
