“Is it possible to strike the EU first with nuclear weapons?” – heated debate in Moscow
Russia could launch a preemptive nuclear strike on one of the EU countries in order to prevent a major war in Europe.
This was stated at a press conference in Moscow by the director of the Institute of Current International Problems of the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, retired ambassador Alexander Kramarenko, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“If Europe is offering us an arms race in the next 3-5 years in the hope that they can build up enough capabilities to pose a conventional threat to us, the question is, should we wait for that?
As for nuclear weapons, I think it has long become clear to everyone that these weapons are absolutely ineffective on the battlefield, and no one is going to use them for military purposes. When the Americans bombed Nagasaki and Hiroshima, nuclear weapons were used not for military purposes, but for geopolitical ones, to send a signal to the Soviet Union that these weapons existed - and how they worked.
Therefore, I do not rule out that in order to prevent a major war in Europe and the arms race itself, nuclear weapons can be used on our part precisely as a preventive measure. And measures, including in response to a total economic war against us.
Because the strategy of containment that the West is pursuing in relation to Russia is, first of all, a strategy of containing our development, and therefore all the measures of this sanctioned economic pressure speak for themselves,” Kramarenko noted.
The deputy president of the Russian Academy of Missile and Artillery Sciences for information policy, military expert Konstantin Sivkov, reacted sharply to these words.
He said he “categorically cannot support” the diplomat on the use of nuclear weapons for preventive, demonstrative purposes.
“I consider the very expression of these thoughts to be extremely dangerous, if not criminal,” the expert emphasized.
He added that he had been involved in practical nuclear planning and had to see what kind of destruction zones these weapons provide.
“So we have to talk about the possibility of using these nuclear weapons, we have to demonstrate determination in various ways. For example, a strike on territories that do not cause any damage to anyone - the North Pole or somewhere else.
But we must understand that a nuclear strike on any city in Europe, firstly, will lead to the mobilization of the population of Europe. The second is a retaliatory nuclear strike, possibly from the territory of the same France. An attack on Europe will affect France, the territories are small, and huge areas of radioactive fallout will form.
And we will also receive an answer. And then there will be an uncontrollable escalation, up to a full-blooded, full-fledged nuclear exchange between Russia and the United States.
Therefore, you can’t even mention such things,” Sivkov reasoned.
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