Fury in Russia over the missile launch but Putin has so far remained silent

President Biden's decision to allow Ukraine to strike inside Russia with US-supplied long-range missiles it has caused an angry reaction in Russia.

“Outgoing US president Joe Biden… has taken one of the most provocative, innumerable decisions of his administration, risking serious consequences,” the website of Russian state newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta said on Monday morning.

Russian MP Leonid Slutsky, head of the pro-Kremlin Liberal-Democratic Party, predicted that the decision “will lead to a major escalation, which threatens serious consequences”.

Russian Senator Vladimir Dzhabarov called it “an unprecedented step towards the Third World War”.

Anger, yes. But it's not really surprising.

Komsomolskaya Pravda, a pro-Kremlin tabloid, called it an “unexpected increase”.

Most important, however, is how Vladimir Putin calls it and how the Kremlin leader responds.

He said nothing on Sunday night.

But the Russian president has said as much before.

In recent months, the Kremlin has made its message to the West crystal clear: don't do this, don't remove restrictions on the use of your long-range weapons, don't allow Kyiv to attack deep into Russian territory with these missiles.

In September President Putin warned that if this was allowed to happen, Moscow would take it seriously “direct participation” of Nato countries in the war in Ukraine.

“This would mean that NATO countries … are at war with Russia,” he continued.

The following month, the Kremlin leader announced imminent changes to Russia's nuclear doctrine, a document that sets out the conditions under which Moscow may decide to use a nuclear weapon.

This was widely interpreted as another less-than-subtle signal to America and Europe not to allow Ukraine to strike Russian territory with long-range missiles.

Predicting Vladimir Putin's next moves is not easy.

But he threw away the advice.

Back in June, at a meeting with the heads of international media organizations, Putin was asked: how would Russia react if Ukraine was given the opportunity to stonewall Russian territory with weapons provided by Europe?

“First, we will improve our air defense systems. We will destroy their missiles,” answered President Putin.

Second, we believe that if someone thinks it is possible to provide such weapons in the war zone to attack our territory and cause problems, why can't we provide our weapons of the same class to those regions around the world where they will target the critical centers of countries that are doing this to Russia?”

In other words, arming Western enemies to strike Western enemies abroad is something that Moscow has been considering.

In my recent conversation with Alexander Lukashenko, the leader of Belarus, Putin's close confidant seemed to confirm that the Kremlin was thinking this way.

Mr Lukashenko told me that he had discussed the matter in a recent meeting with Western officials.

“I warned them. 'Guys, watch out for those long-range missiles,'” Mr Lukashenko said.

“The Houthis [rebels] he may come to Putin and ask for coastal weapon systems that can carry out devastating strikes on ships.

“And if he takes revenge on you by giving you long weapons [President] Zelensky for supplying the Houthis with the Bastion missile system? What happens when an airline is hit? British or American. What then?”

But some of the media reaction in Russia appeared designed to play things down.

“The Russian army was already there [previously] intercepted ATACMS missiles during an attack on the coast of Crimea,” a military expert told Izvestia newspaper, which went on to suggest that President-elect Trump might “review” the decision.

This is, to put it mildly, an unusual situation.

In two months, President Biden will be out of office and Donald Trump will be in the White House.

The Kremlin knows that President-elect Trump has been more skeptical than President Biden about military aid to Ukraine.

Will that affect Vladimir Putin's calculations as he makes Russia's response?