The General Staff of the Russian Army has begun preparations to conduct exercises with missile units “in the near future,” which includes “the use of non-strategic nuclear weapons,” according to the order. issued by the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin. The reason that justifies these maneuvers are the “threats” of the West, the Ministry of Defense announced yesterday.
This training aims to “maintain the readiness” of the army to protect the country “in response to the provocative statements and threats made by certain Western officials against Russia”, the department added. The exercises, which will take place on an unspecified date, will involve the air force, the navy and the forces of the Southern Military District, i.e. the troops with barracks closer to Ukraine and the Ukrainian regions which Russia considers its own and which it declared annexed in September 2022.
With the term “threats”, Russia refers to statements from the West that raise the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine. Then Dmitri Peskov, press chief of the Russian president, specifically alluded to the statements of French President Emmanuel Macron about the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine, and those of the head of diplomacy of the United Kingdom, David Cameron , about the fact that Ukrainian troops have the right to use British weapons to attack Russian territory.
“They have talked about the disposition and even the intention to send armed contingents to Ukraine, that is, to put NATO soldiers in front of the Russian army. This is another step in the escalation of tension. It is unprecedented and requires special attention and special measures,” the Kremlin spokesman added.
Yesterday Russia summoned the ambassadors of France and the United Kingdom. After Britain’s Nigel Casey visited Smolensk Square, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Cameron’s claims are an acknowledgment that London is now, in fact, part of the conflict. And he warned that, in response to attacks on Russian territory, British military installations could be targeted, both inside and outside Ukraine.
On the other hand, it is not the first time that Moscow wields the atomic weapon in its rhetoric. Since the conflict with Ukraine began in February 2022, ex-president Dmitri Medvedev, now deputy head of the Security Council, has regularly spoken about it. Putin has also hinted at it from time to time, although avoiding talking directly about nuclear weapons.
The United States and other Western countries have criticized these continued references to such destructive potential. “This rhetoric is irresponsible and inappropriate for a nuclear power. And it is inconsistent with the way any nuclear power should speak publicly about the use of such weapons,” said US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.
In the summer of 2023, Russia deployed tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of Belarus, its closest ally and, like Russia, a neighbor of the European Union and NATO countries.
Peskov has said that the use of nuclear weapons is a “strictly defensive” resource and that it is detailed in his nuclear doctrine. This doctrine indicates that they will be used in the event that Russia is attacked with weapons of mass destruction or in the event of an aggression with conventional weapons that “threatens the very existence of the Russian state”.
Russia already carried out nuclear exercises in October last year, after revoking the ratification of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).
