Putin warns the West: Russia is ready for nuclear war
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[March 13, 2024]
By Guy Faulconbridge and Lidia Kelly
MOSCOW (Reuters) -President Vladimir Putin warned the West on Wednesday
Russia was technically ready for nuclear war and that if the U.S. sent
troops to Ukraine, it would be considered a significant escalation of
the conflict.
Putin, speaking just days before a March 15-17 election which is certain
to give him another six years in power, said the nuclear war scenario
was not "rushing" up and he saw no need for the use of nuclear weapons
in Ukraine.
"From a military-technical point of view, we are, of course, ready,"
Putin, 71, told Rossiya-1 television and news agency RIA in response to
a question whether the country was really ready for a nuclear war.
Putin said the U.S. understood that if it deployed American troops on
Russian territory - or to Ukraine - Russia would treat the move as an
intervention.
"(In the U.S.) there are enough specialists in the field of
Russian-American relations and in the field of strategic restraint,"
said Putin, the ultimate decision maker in the world's biggest nuclear
power.
"Therefore, I don't think that here everything is rushing to it (nuclear
confrontation), but we are ready for this."
Putin's nuclear warning came alongside another offer for talks on
Ukraine as part of a new post-Cold War demarcation of European security.
The U.S. says Putin is not ready for serious talks over Ukraine.
The war in Ukraine has triggered the deepest crisis in Russia's
relations with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis and Putin
has warned several times the West risks provoking a nuclear war if it
sends troops to fight in Ukraine.
Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in February 2022,
triggering full-scale war after eight years of conflict in eastern
Ukraine between Ukrainian forces on one side and pro-Russian Ukrainians
and Russian proxies on the other.
NUCLEAR WAR?
In a U.S. election year, the West is grappling with how to support Kyiv
against Russia, which now controls almost one-fifth of Ukrainian
territory and is rearming much faster than the West and Ukraine.
Kyiv says it is defending itself against an imperial-style war of
conquest designed to erase its national identity. Russia says the areas
it controls in Ukraine are now Russia.
Putin has sent a series of public nuclear warnings to the U.S. aimed at
discouraging greater involvement in Ukraine - a move the Kremlin says
would mark a slide into world war.
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Putin attends a Kremlin meeting March 12, 2024. Sputnik/Sergei
Savostyanov/Pool via REUTERS
Washington says it has seen no major changes to Russia's nuclear
posture but Putin's public nuclear warnings - which break with the
extreme caution of the Soviet leadership over such remarks - have
sown concern in Washington.
Putin reiterated the use of nuclear weapons was spelled out in the
Kremlin's nuclear doctrine, which sets out the conditions under
which it would use such a weapon: broadly a response to an attack
using nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction, or the use of
conventional weapons against Russia "when the very existence of the
state is put under threat."
"Weapons exist in order to use them," Putin said. "We have our own
principles."
CNN reported on Saturday the administration of U.S. President Joe
Biden was specifically concerned in 2022 that Russia might use a
tactical or battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine.
Putin said he had never felt the need to use nuclear weapons in
Ukraine.
TALKS?
Putin said Russia was ready for serious talks on Ukraine.
"Russia is ready for negotiations on Ukraine, but they should be
based on reality - and not on cravings after the use of psychotropic
drugs," Putin said.
Reuters reported last month that Putin's suggestion of a ceasefire
in Ukraine to freeze the war was rejected by the U.S. after contacts
between intermediaries.
U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns warned
earlier this week that if the West did not provide proper support
for Ukraine, Kyiv would lose more territory to Russia which would
embolden Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Burns, a former U.S. ambassador to Russia, told the Senate
Intelligence Committee it was in U.S. interests to support Ukraine
to allow it to get into a stronger position before talks.
Putin said he trusted no one and Russia would need written security
guarantees in the event of a settlement.
"I don't trust anyone, but we need guarantees, and guarantees must
be spelled out, they must be such that we would be satisfied," Putin
said.
(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge in Moscow and Lidia Kelly in
Melbourne; Editing by Lincoln Feast.)
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