Nuclear war does not scare the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, who has insisted on warning that his country is technically prepared for an atomic confrontation if it were to occur. The Russian atomic arsenal also exceeds that of the United States, he stated in an interview with Russian media broadcast this Wednesday. The Kremlin chief has also accused Ukraine of trying to interfere with his attacks on Russian territory in this weekend’s presidential election, which the Russian leader will undoubtedly win. Kyiv has launched a widespread drone and missile attack since Monday night, days before Russian citizens vote on March 15, 16 and 17.
In an interview with state television Rossiya-1 and the Ría Nóvosti agency, Putin repeated the warning he issued to the West in his annual state of the nation address last month: Russia is technically prepared to wage a nuclear war, he assured. The Russian president linked this idea with the possibility that Western countries allied with Kyiv would send troops to Ukraine, as the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, suggested in controversial statements in February.
“From a military-technical point of view, we are ready,” Putin said. And he explained that the US, Ukraine’s main supporter, has understood that if it deploys troops to Ukraine, Russia will treat it as an intervention.
At one point in the interview, the journalist asks if Russia and the US are playing a “game of chicken” and, since neither of them is willing to back away, a collision will be inevitable. Putin responds with some optimism, saying that he does not believe he is heading towards the feared nuclear clash. In the US “there are enough specialists in Russian-American relations and in the field of strategic moderation. That’s why I don’t think (that crash) is coming, but we are prepared for it,” he stated.
In addition, the Russian leader boasted about Russian nuclear forces, which, according to him, are more advanced than American ones. “Our nuclear triad (atomic arsenal on land, sea and air) is more modern than any other triad. And only we and the Americans have a nuclear triad. “We have made a lot of progress, and ours is more modern,” he said.
On the other hand, Putin criticized the decision of Finland and Sweden to join NATO. According to him, “it is an absolutely meaningless step to secure their own national interests.” As a consequence, Russia will have to reinforce its border with Finland, with 1,340 kilometers, the longest with Russia of a NATO country. “We didn’t have troops there, but now we will. There were no destruction systems, and now they will appear,” he noted.
In the same interview, Putin assured that, after its failures on the battle front, Ukraine needs some success with this week’s attacks on Russian territory.
On Tuesday, the Russian Defense Ministry claimed to have shot down 25 drones over seven Russian regions. Two unmanned aircraft set fire to a major refinery near Nizhny Novgorod and a fuel depot in the Oryol region. Three anti-Putin Russian insurgent militias based in Ukraine attempted to penetrate Russian territory through Belgorod and Kursk. They maintain they succeeded, but Moscow says it rejected them and caused hundreds of casualties.
“The main objective, I have no doubt, is, if not to disrupt the presidential elections in Russia, then at least to interfere in some way,” the Russian leader said.
There is no shadow of a doubt that Vladimir Putin, 71, will win next weekend’s three-day presidential election. Re-election will allow him, thanks to the 2020 constitutional reform, to remain in power until 2030 and then run for another term until May 2036. Then he would be 83 years old and would have been in power longer than all other Russian leaders and Soviets, including Joseph Stalin.
Putin added that with its attacks Ukraine also seeks an “informational effect.” “And thirdly, if you get a result, have some argument, some letter, in a possible future negotiation process,” he concluded.
This Wednesday, Ukrainian drones continued searching for targets to destroy in Russian territory. The Ministry of Defense claimed to have shot down 65 drones in six regions.
A drone hit a Ryazan refinery. It caught fire, and several injured people had to be hospitalized, the Tass agency reported. In Leningrad, a drone was shot down when it was heading towards the Kinef refinery.
Putin also spoke about Poland and the possibility of this country sending troops to Ukraine. According to the head of the Kremlin, Warsaw’s objective would not be to defend the neighboring country, but to annex part of it, an idea already heard among publicists and allied officials of the Russian president.
“If Polish troops enter the territory of Ukraine to cover the Ukrainian-Belarusian border or in some other places to liberate Ukrainian military contingents (…), I think Polish troops would never leave there,” Putin said, adding who “want to reclaim the lands they consider historically theirs,” lost after World War II.
