MOSCOW, Russia
President of Russia, Vladimir Putin told the Western countries on Wednesday that 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 ahead of a
March 15-17 election which is certain to give him another six years in power,
added that 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 when asked whether Russia 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.
Moscow claims to have annexed
four regions of Ukraine and says they are now fully part of Russia.
"(In the U.S.) there are
enough specialists in the field of Russian-American relations and in the field
of strategic restraint," said Putin.
"Therefore, I don't think
that here everything is rushing to it (nuclear confrontation), but we are ready
for this."
The Biden administration has
said it has no plans to send troops to Ukraine but has stressed the need to
approve a stalled security aid bill that would ensure Ukrainian troops got the
weapons they need to continue the war, now in its third year.
It did not immediately respond
on Wednesday to a request for comment on Putin's remarks, but the White House
has said in the past it has seen no sign that Russia is preparing to use
nuclear weapons despite what it calls Putin's "nuclear saber-rattling".
Mykhailo Podolyak, a senior
Ukrainian presidential official, told Reuters in a statement he viewed Putin's
nuclear warning as propaganda designed to intimidate the West.
"Realising that things
are going the wrong way, Putin continues to use classic nuclear rhetoric. With
the old Soviet hope - 'be scared and retreat!'," said Podolyak, who said
he believed such talk showed Putin was afraid of losing the war.
The Ukraine war has triggered
the deepest crisis in Moscow's relations with the West since the 1962 Cuban
Missile Crisis. Putin has often warned of the risks of nuclear war but says he
has never felt the need to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine.
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.
Putin says he sent tens of
thousands of troops into Ukraine in Feb. 2022 to bolster Russia's own security
against a hostile West.
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.
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.
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 said this week that, without more Western
support, Ukraine 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 help Kyiv get into a stronger position before talks.
Putin said Russia would need
written security guarantees in the event of any 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.
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