Assuming that Arkin’s sources reflect any kind of accurate picture of what’s being contemplated in Washington and by the US military (Scott Ritter has criticized Arkin’s sources in the past), this sounds unhinged – especially given the fact that Ukraine is thousands of miles away from the US and has zero value to the US in terms of our national security interests. Bolding for emphasis below is mine – Natylie
The United States would “respond forcefully” to any Russian nuclear strike, President Biden said—but there’s a divide between his administration and some of his military advisers over the role of American nuclear weapons and the most effective way to deter Vladimir Putin, knowledgeable sources tell Newsweek.
“It’s the closest we’ve been to the use of nuclear weapons in over 50 years,” says one civilian working at the Omaha, Nebraska-based Strategic Command. “But I’m not so sure that we are communicating the right thing to deter Putin.”
The nuclear planner and two other senior officers who spoke to Newsweek say that President Biden favors non-nuclear options over nuclear ones, should Russia cross the nuclear threshold. The officials don’t disagree with that view, and none of them advocate any use of nuclear weapons in a preemptive strike. But to deter Putin from using nuclear weapons in the first place, the officers say, the United States needs to talk the nuclear talk—and not be held back by the fear of having to walk the walk.
“We’re in uncharted territory,” says a senior intelligence officer. “Threatening to respond forcefully and creating catastrophic consequences for Russia [without] suggesting nuclear war: Is that strong enough to deter Putin? And is it really clear? I’m not so sure.”
Because Biden and his top national security advisers can’t conceive of pressing the nuclear button short of a full-scale attack on the United States, the White House is focusing too much—in its planning and its messaging—on what it considers to be “usable” capabilities, the military officers say. The non-nuclear options include military and non-military measures, including the total economic isolation of Russia.
“We have to ponder whether other [non-nuclear] threats are powerful enough to deter Putin,” says a former bomber pilot who is now a Washington-based Pentagon officer.
The officials and the STRATCOM civilian, all with experience in nuclear planning, were granted anonymity to speak about highly sensitive matters.
‘Not a bluff’
Vladimir Putin said last week that Russia would use nuclear weapons over the Ukraine conflict if the country was directly attacked, ominously adding that “this is not a bluff.”
“In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us,” he said in a special address aired on television to announce the country’s first military mobilization since World War II.
Other Russian officials followed Putin in amplifying his nuclear threat, stressing that Moscow’s official nuclear deterrence strategy, first unveiled in June 2020, before the invasion of Ukraine, stated clearly when the nuclear threshold might be crossed. This includes the first use of nuclear weapons in response to non-nuclear attacks that threaten the “existence of the state.”
Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation and the second most powerful man in Russia (Putin is the chair), said last Thursday that the county would defend itself, including with “strategic nuclear weapons,” suggesting a strike outside Ukraine and even on the United States.
“The IC doesn’t expect a nuclear strike in Ukraine itself,” the Pentagon officer tells Newsweek, referring to the intelligence community. “This is not about the use of a tactical nuclear weapon to turn the tide of the war. It is a signal, first to the United States and secondarily to NATO not to continue the war into Russia, nor to threaten Putin directly.”
On Sunday, President Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan appeared on all three major networks to emphasize the seriousness of the moment and publicly respond to Russia’s nuclear threat. Washington has “communicated directly, privately, to the Russians at very high levels that there will be catastrophic consequences for Russia if they use nuclear weapons in Ukraine,” he said on ABC News.
“If Russia crosses this line…the United States will respond decisively,” Sullivan said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” The Biden administration, he said, has “spelled out in greater detail exactly what that would mean” in its communications with the Kremlin.
Details about what “decisively” means have not been publicly revealed. The military sources tell Newsweek that there are subtle moves being made with regard to nuclear threats, including moving submarines and aircraft and drilling B-52 bombers. But they stress that non-nuclear military options—the use of conventional weapons and special operations, as well as cyber and space attack—are front and center, to include a decapitation strike to kill Putin in the heart of the Kremlin.
Asked to comment on whether Biden thinks a non-nuclear threat is a sufficient deterrent to Putin, and whether there is consensus on this issue between his administration and the military, the White House declined to respond specifically. Instead, a spokesperson pointed Newsweek to “Jake Sullivan’s comments on the Sunday shows this week on our messaging to Russia over nuclear weapons.”
Complicated calculation
Since the Ukraine war began in February, the number-one priority of U.S. intelligence has been to closely monitor Russian preparations for any use of nuclear weapons. At the highest level, the national security team has been contemplating what it would do if Putin escalated.
“We’ve been tabletopping different scenarios for months now,” says the Strategic Command planner. The various Russian scenarios range from a nuclear attack in Western Europe to the Russians detonating a high-altitude nuclear blast to create an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) that could lead to the complete collapse of the electric grid.
The latter scenario particularly concerns nuclear planners, the STRATCOM planner says, because such an attack, while crossing the nuclear threshold, would not be a physical attack on land and thus might not be equated with a traditional nuclear attack. That would complicate the calculation of whether or not the U.S. response should automatically be nuclear.
“Not all nuclear wars would be … catastrophic; some, perhaps involving electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attacks using only a few high-altitude detonations or demonstration strikes of various kinds, could result in few casualties,” James Scouras has written. (Scouras is a senior scholar at the government-funded Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and the former chief scientist in the Defense Threat Reduction Agency’s Advanced Systems and Concepts Office.) He says that not enough work has been done on EMP to understand the effects of such a strike or the role EMP might play in deterrence strategy.
This scenario—an enemy crossing the nuclear threshold does not unleash full scale nuclear war—has preoccupied nuclear decision-makers in the past few years. Not only is there the EMP option, available to both parties, but also smaller and smaller nuclear weapons, such as the new American low-yield Trident warhead on ballistic missile submarines, which many strategists think can be used in a limited response without provoking all-out nuclear war.
Because nuclear weapons have served as the singular element of deterrence throughout atomic history, the inclusion of non-nuclear options now worries senior officers who have to contend with a far more complex picture.
“Every operational plan in the DoD [Department of Defense], and every other capability we have, rests on the assumption that strategic deterrence, and in particular nuclear deterrence, will hold,” commander of U.S. Strategic Command Adm. Charles “Chas” Richard said in March at the Air & Space Forces Association’s 2022 conference. That suggests that Richard, the man responsible for building the plans to deter nuclear use, worries not only that the Cold War model of nuclear deterrence might no longer hold, but that it is no longer clear what would happen if enemy nuclear weapons were actually used.
“If strategic or nuclear deterrence fails … no other plan or capability in the DoD will work as designed,” Richard said.
‘Time for a blunt hammer’
“I can tell you that we don’t see any indication that we need to change our strategic deterrent posture at this point,” White House National Security Council spokesman retired Rear Admiral John Kirby said this week in response to Putin’s latest nuclear threats. In fact, at the same time the White House is conveying the message that nuclear weapons are secondary to non-nuclear options in deterring Putin, nuclear forces (and their supporting attack elements) are being readied.
“I don’t think this is insubordination on the part of the military,” the senior intelligence officer tells Newsweek. “It’s [government] schizophrenia.” The officer says that “nuclear messaging” is taking place, even if the White House thinks there are non-nuclear ways of deterring Russia.
Admiral Richard of Strategic Command said on Wednesday, the day Putin made his nuclear weapons threat, that America was “back in the business of [planning for a possible war] with a nuclear-capable peer,” referring most immediately to Russia. “This is no longer theoretical,” he said.
When Russia invaded Ukraine, the Navy “surged a bunch of ships” into the European theater, said chief of naval operations Admiral Mike Gilday at the Naval War College last month. “Many of them are still there,” he said, “including … submarines that we’ve extended.” Those submarines can fire sea-launched cruise missiles deep into Russia, either by themselves or as part of a broader nuclear and conventional campaign.
Ballistic missile submarines are on alert 24/7 and ready to strike. “Yes of course the SSBNs [ballistic missile submarines with Trident II missiles] are also on station as normal and could be employed,” a retired senior naval officer told Newsweek in August. “It’s obviously the most important serial number option that can be implemented instantly,” the officer said, using the current navy lingo to refer to large platforms and capabilities, that is, things with serial numbers.
Four North Dakota-based B-52 aircraft are also deployed forward in Europe at RAF Fairford base in the United Kingdom, though they are not carrying nuclear weapons. Two bombers operated around Norway over the last few weeks approaching Russia from the north while another pair flew over central Europe crossing into Romanian airspace, approaching Russia from the south, demonstrating the ability to attack.
To convey the nuclear threat that bombers pose, last Friday Strategic Command quietly completed a ten-day exercise at Minot air force base in North Dakota. During that exercise, called Prairie Vigilance 22, the B-52 bomber wing practiced its ability to quickly load nuclear-armed air-launched cruise missiles and conduct rapid take-offs, according to the Air Force.
“Threatening severe consequences without saying that the use of nuclear weapons is unacceptable under any circumstances, drawing a red-line … it isn’t clear that that is an adequate deterrent threat for Putin’s ears,” the Strategic Command civilian says.
“A general statement of deterrence didn’t prevent Russia’s invasion of Ukraine not only because Putin is reckless but also because ‘no matter what’ wasn’t the threat. It was the same as Sullivan’s threat today: ‘If you do it, we’ll respond.’ That’s not deterrence.”
“I believe in deterrence,” the senior intelligence officer tells Newsweek, “I’m just not so sure that the subtlety of our message is getting through. Now might be time for a blunt hammer approach.”
Dragana Trifković is the general director of the Center for Geostrategic Studies in Belgrade, Serbia.
On September 8, a session was held in the UN Security Council on the topic of arms delivery to Ukraine by the West.
In the introductory part of the session, Trifković spoke about the weapons that were delivered to the battlefield during the war in Yugoslavia, comparing it to the current situation in Ukraine.
In the following interview, Trifković elaborates on that point for Asia Times.
Adriel Kasonta: We’re being told by our politicians, pundits and mainstream press that pumping more weapons into Ukraine is money worth spending, as it will likely bring peace. Yet the same people don’t seem to be rushing to offer any non-military diplomatic solution to this conflict – something that could save European economies and their people and stop unnecessary bloodshed in the brotherly conflict between Ukraine and Russia. What is the reason for this warmongering masquerading as a sincere desire to secure peace?
Draganа Trifković: The arming of Ukraine by the West, more precisely by NATO, led to the escalation of the conflict in Ukraine.
For years, Russia has warned the West that it sees the expansion of NATO toward its borders as a threat to national security. Although the détente of relations after the Cold War should have led to the pacification of passions, NATO used this situation to launch an invasion in the east. In a short time, it expanded and integrated even the former republics of the Soviet Union.
Now the West is accusing Russia of aggressive behavior, but it is hard to blame the side that voluntarily retreated 2,000 kilometers to the east without firing a shot.
In my opinion, Russia has made enormous diplomatic efforts to cooperate with the West in recent decades. But it did not [see] any results because the West did not want to talk but ignored Russia and belittled the right of that country to have its own interests. That’s how we got to today’s situation.
The arming of Ukraine leads to further aggravation of relations and poses a danger of a direct conflict between NATO and Russia. The European Union is suffering huge losses due to the conflict with Russia, and the sanctions have a counter-effect. I think it will be especially pronounced during the winter.
Unfortunately, European political elites behave irresponsibly towards their own citizens, and such behavior leads to conflict between political elites and citizens whose interests they are supposed to represent. I think the reason is the lack of sovereignty of the EU and European countries.
AK: During your testimony at the United Nations Security Council session on September 8, you drew a parallel between the current conflict in Ukraine and the one that took place on the territory of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Would you be so kind as to expand on that?
DT: At the session of the UN Security Council, I spoke about the similarities between the war in Yugoslavia and the one happening now in Ukraine. Although almost 30 years have passed since the war in Yugoslavia, similar effects of external influence can be seen in Ukraine and should not be ignored.
Even before the beginning of the conflict on the territory of the former Yugoslavia, the West began to arm Croatia and then the Bosnian Muslims. Both sides were in conflict with the Serbs, but there was also mutual conflict. So everyone fought against everyone.
The West supplied Croats and Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina with vast quantities of weapons, even during an embargo, which was a direct violation of international law. However, that was not all. Western private military companies trained the Croatian and Muslim armies but also commanded operations, for example, the operations of ethnic cleansing of Serbs from Croatia called “Flash” and “Storm.”
Advisers from Croatia instructed Ukraine several times on how to cleanse the Russian population using the same recipe. Many volunteers from terrorist organizations in the Middle East also came to Bosnia and Herzegovina through the West.
For example, the El Mujahedin unit was formed, which fought as part of the army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and was made up of warriors from Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Turkey, Afghanistan, Syria and others. Some of those warriors later went to Iraq and Syria to fight in the Islamic State units.
It is also worth noteing here that Yugoslavia was under severe sanctions from the West, which affected the population the most. The concluded peace agreements led to the de-escalation of the conflict, but neither side was satisfied with them. Permanent solutions have not been achieved to date.
It is also necessary to mention Kosovo and Metohija, the southern Serbian province that seceded after the bombing of Serbia in 1999. NATO launched aggression against Serbia, without the approval of the UN Security Council, under the pretext of preventing violations of the human rights of Kosovo Albanians. However, the Kosovar Albanians had autonomy guaranteed by the constitution, the right to use their language and culture, schools with the Albanian language and guaranteed participation in the republic’s authorities.
Unfortunately, a similar arrangement was taken off the table for the Russian-speaking population in Ukraine. Still, NATO did not decide to bomb Kiev because of it but instead encouraged them in the violation of all human rights and violence against their own population.
The double standards applied by the West are visible here. The parallels are that the West was a critical actor in the Yugoslav conflict and the Ukrainian conflict, where it directly participated in the battle with the help of a hybrid way of warfare.
AK: What could be the consequences of a large influx of weapons to the conflict-affected territory of Ukraine, and how this possibly affects its neighbors?
DT: The large influx of weapons into Ukraine prolongs the conflict in that country but also threatens the danger of the conflict spreading to other areas. According to the Center for Geostrategic Studies, at least 20-30% of weapons sent to Ukraine end up in third countries. There are reports that some of the weapons from Ukraine ended up in the Balkans, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Metohija. In addition, some of the weapons ended up in other EU countries, most likely in the hands of terrorists.
As I have already mentioned, a fragile peace has been established in the Balkans, and there is a constant danger of a re-escalation of unresolved conflicts. This situation puts [all of] Europe in danger, especially if we consider the growing dissatisfaction of citizens, social unrest, the large number of migrants who have come to the EU in recent years, and the unpredictable economic and energy stability.
These facts can quickly escalate the conflict in other European countries, not only in the Balkans. For now, I do not see an initiative by the European Union to move from the issue of armaments to the problem of solving the numerous causes of possible conflicts.
AK: It is a well-known fact that under humanitarian law, combatants should not direct attacks against civilians or civilian infrastructure and take all necessary steps to avoid, or at least minimize, the loss of civilian life. Yet, according to a report published by Amnesty International last month, “Ukrainian fighting tactics endanger civilians.”
Would you agree that human rights and humanitarian law have been bastardized and weaponized by the US and its various propaganda groups portraying themselves as independent NGOs and think-tanks? What does it mean for the protection of human rights around the world?
DT: The big problem is that many NGOs do not work independently. These organizations rely on [significant] donations from the nation-states that give them orders. Plenty of precedents relating to the production of “evidence” (reports) were then used to demonize authorities unfriendly to the West.
Similarly, think-tanks also depend on taxpayers’ money. As a matter of fact, many of these are closely linked to the military-industrial complex. The latter is tasking think-tanks with the production of policy papers which are then distributed to lawmakers to orient foreign policy in favor of US intervention.
Think-tanks usually are composed of former senior security officials who practice the “revolving door.”
Notable examples include William Walker (Greater Albania lobbyist), Dick Cheney (Halliburton), Lloyd Austin (Lockheed Martin), Frank Carlucci (Carlyle group), but also former French chief of staff [Pierre] de Villiers, who immediately joined the Boston Group after resigning in July 2017.
Such was the case during the Yugoslav wars when reports against Serbia were fabricated. Let’s say a turn in the international community’s attitude regarding Kosovo and Metohija was caused by a report on the so-called massacre in the village of Račak, where the Serbian security forces fought against terrorists from the Kosovo Liberation Army.
The international forces on the ground, especially the OSCE [Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe] mission headed by the American agent William Walker, banned investigation into the case. They ordered that killed terrorists be stripped of their uniforms and dressed in civilian clothes, and then announced that Serbian security forces had killed civilians.
Although no investigation was conducted and no evidence was established, Western media accused Serbia of killing civilians, not mentioning that they were terrorists. Human Rights Watch, the OSCE and the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) confirmed such claims without any evidence, although appointed forensic experts claimed William Walker forced them to falsify reports.
AK: The Center for Geostrategic Studies, which you manage, recently sent a letter to the UN Human Rights Committee, the Council of Europe, the Red Cross and other institutions and organizations dealing with humanitarian law, where it has been highlighted that the Ukrainian army is using weapons prohibited by the Geneva Conventions. How did CGS obtain this information, and what are the weapons in question?
DT: Experts from the Center for Geostrategic Studies and I have visited war-torn areas in Ukraine several times. Our rule is not to write about military conflicts from secondary sources but to personally investigate and verify the facts on the ground. This need is also driven by the example of Yugoslavia, where all the mainstream media turned against Serbia.
The media campaign being waged against Russia today is identical to the one we went through. Many journalists who described the events of the war did not witness those events but took the information from other sources.
In Izyum, we had the opportunity to verify the use of various shells that hit civilian objects, including those with cluster munitions. The regional hospital in Izyum received wounded civilians almost every day from April to July, which was confirmed by the hospital’s chief doctor, Aleksandar Božkov. Some of the civilians have been evacuated to Russia for further treatment.
In July, several missile attacks … in the Donetsk region were carried out on the civilian population and infrastructure by the Ukrainian army in Elenovka and Aleksandrovka. The colony where prisoners of war from the Azov Battalion were housed was also attacked.
I had the opportunity to talk to some of those who survived. They confirmed that the attack was carried out at night, and 53 prisoners were killed and 75 wounded. Military experts showed us the remains of parts of the rocket.
Then, at the end of July, the Ukrainian army targeted the center of the densely populated city of Donetsk. On that occasion, the military used NATO-produced Uragan missiles equipped with cluster munitions. Each rocket contained a large quantity of banned PMF-1 Lepestok anti-personnel mines. It completely paralyzed the city and the residents’ supply of food and water for several days.
We concluded that the Ukrainian side perceives civilians, as well as prisoners of war, as legitimate targets and is acting to achieve as many victims as possible among them, which goes against all the rules of war and international humanitarian law.
AK: Was there any response to the mentioned letter?
DT: Unfortunately, we did not receive a single response to our letter, which was sent to more than 10 addresses, including the UN Human Rights Committee, the Council of Europe, and the Red Cross. It is an appeal directly related to humanitarian law, and the question arises as to why international institutions are not reacting. I must admit that this is not the first case.
We had previously addressed international institutions on other issues but were left without an answer. For example, the Center for Geostrategic Studies wrote several times to Ms Dunja Mijatović, the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, asking her to investigate the violation of the religious rights of the citizens of Montenegro, as well as the continuous violence against Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija by Kosovo Albanians. Apart from the notification that the letter had arrived, there were no other reactions.
Namely, we have not been informed that the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights has undertaken anything to protect vulnerable citizens or at least draw the public’s attention to the fact that this is happening. I think that it is necessary to reform international institutions so that they can perform their function again. Many non-governmental organizations should take responsibility for initiating these reforms.
AK: Is it fair to say that European governments are violating their “Common Position” rules that ban licensing of arms exports in a situation when they violate international humanitarian law? If so, then what is the reason for this violation?
DT: I think the answer lies in a total change of paradigm as it relates to the collective West’s own observance of its vaunted rule of law. The advanced decomposition through the takeover of state bureaucracy and organs by private interests has revealed the true nature of Western states today: corporate fascist techno entities.
Thus when these entities’ citizens become mere variables within the larger purpose of maintaining their positions against an emerging Eurasian bloc, respect for the rule of law (which used to be the West’s trademark self-characterization) is discarded.
The West has simply intensified the practice of exporting state violence on behalf of corporate interests. Therefore, the rule of law and democracy exist in the West today only on paper. Due to the abuse of humanitarian law and democracy by the West, we have reached a position where trust in fundamental human values is lost along with confidence in institutions.
Adriel Kasonta is a London-based political risk consultant and lawyer. He is an expert at the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) in Moscow and former chairman of the International Affairs Committee at the oldest conservative think tank in the UK, Bow Group.
A ceremony for signing the treaties on the accession of the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Lugansk People’s Republic, the Zaporozhye Region and the Kherson Region to the Russian Federation took place in of the Grand Kremlin Palace’s St George Hall.
President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Citizens of Russia, citizens of the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics, residents of the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, deputies of the State Duma, senators of the Russian Federation,
As you know, referendums have been held in the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions. The ballots have been counted and the results have been announced. The people have made their unequivocal choice.
Today we will sign treaties on the accession of the Donetsk People’s Republic, Lugansk People’s Republic, Zaporozhye Region and Kherson Region to the Russian Federation. I have no doubt that the Federal Assembly will support the constitutional laws on the accession to Russia and the establishment of four new regions, our new constituent entities of the Russian Federation, because this is the will of millions of people. (Applause.)
It is undoubtedly their right, an inherent right sealed in Article 1 of the UN Charter, which directly states the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples.
I repeat, it is an inherent right of the people. It is based on our historical affinity, and it is that right that led generations of our predecessors, those who built and defended Russia for centuries since the period of Ancient Rus, to victory.
Here in Novorossiya, [Pyotr] Rumyantsev, [Alexander] Suvorov and [Fyodor] Ushakov fought their battles, and Catherine the Great and [Grigory] Potyomkin founded new cities. Our grandfathers and great-grandfathers fought here to the bitter end during the Great Patriotic War.
We will always remember the heroes of the Russian Spring, those who refused to accept the neo-Nazi coup d’état in Ukraine in 2014, all those who died for the right to speak their native language, to preserve their culture, traditions and religion, and for the very right to live. We remember the soldiers of Donbass, the martyrs of the “Odessa Khatyn,” the victims of inhuman terrorist attacks carried out by the Kiev regime. We commemorate volunteers and militiamen, civilians, children, women, senior citizens, Russians, Ukrainians, people of various nationalities; popular leader of Donetsk Alexander Zakharchenko; military commanders Arsen Pavlov and Vladimir Zhoga, Olga Kochura and Alexei Mozgovoy; prosecutor of the Lugansk Republic Sergei Gorenko; paratrooper Nurmagomed Gadzhimagomedov and all our soldiers and officers who died a hero’s death during the special military operation. They are heroes. (Applause.) Heroes of great Russia. Please join me in a minute of silence to honour their memory.
(Minute of silence.)
Thank you.
Behind the choice of millions of residents in the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics, in the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, is our common destiny and thousand-year history. People have passed this spiritual connection on to their children and grandchildren. Despite all the trials they endured, they carried the love for Russia through the years. This is something no one can destroy. That is why both older generations and young people – those who were born after the tragic collapse of the Soviet Union – have voted for our unity, for our common future.
In 1991 in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, representatives of the party elite of that time made a decision to terminate the Soviet Union, without asking ordinary citizens what they wanted, and people suddenly found themselves cut off from their homeland. This tore apart and dismembered our national community and triggered a national catastrophe. Just like the government quietly demarcated the borders of Soviet republics, acting behind the scenes after the 1917 revolution, the last leaders of the Soviet Union, contrary to the direct expression of the will of the majority of people in the referendum of 1991, destroyed our great country, and simply made the people in the former republics face this as an accomplished fact.
I can admit that they didn’t even know what they were doing and what consequences their actions would have in the end. But it doesn’t matter now. There is no Soviet Union anymore; we cannot return to the past. Actually, Russia no longer needs it today; this isn’t our ambition. But there is nothing stronger than the determination of millions of people who, by their culture, religion, traditions, and language, consider themselves part of Russia, whose ancestors lived in a single country for centuries. There is nothing stronger than their determination to return to their true historical homeland.
For eight long years, people in Donbass were subjected to genocide, shelling and blockades; in Kherson and Zaporozhye, a criminal policy was pursued to cultivate hatred for Russia, for everything Russian. Now too, during the referendums, the Kiev regime threatened schoolteachers, women who worked in election commissions with reprisals and death. Kiev threatened millions of people who came to express their will with repression. But the people of Donbass, Zaporozhye and Kherson weren’t broken, and they had their say.
I want the Kiev authorities and their true handlers in the West to hear me now, and I want everyone to remember this: the people living in Lugansk and Donetsk, in Kherson and Zaporozhye have become our citizens, forever. (Applause.)
We call on the Kiev regime to immediately cease fire and all hostilities; to end the war it unleashed back in 2014 and return to the negotiating table. We are ready for this, as we have said more than once. But the choice of the people in Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye and Kherson will not be discussed. The decision has been made, and Russia will not betray it. (Applause.) Kiev’s current authorities should respect this free expression of the people’s will; there is no other way. This is the only way to peace.
We will defend our land with all the forces and resources we have, and we will do everything we can to ensure the safety of our people. This is the great liberating mission of our nation.
We will definitely rebuild the destroyed cities and towns, the residential buildings, schools, hospitals, theatres and museums. We will restore and develop industrial enterprises, factories, infrastructure, as well as the social security, pension, healthcare and education systems.
We will certainly work to improve the level of security. Together we will make sure that citizens in the new regions can feel the support of all the people of Russia, of the entire nation, all the republics, territories and regions of our vast Motherland. (Applause.)
Friends, colleagues,
Today I would like to address our soldiers and officers who are taking part in the special military operation, the fighters of Donbass and Novorossiya, those who went to military recruitment offices after receiving a call-up paper under the executive order on partial mobilisation, and those who did this voluntarily, answering the call of their hearts. I would like to address their parents, wives and children, to tell them what our people are fighting for, what kind of enemy we are up against, and who is pushing the world into new wars and crises and deriving blood-stained benefits from this tragedy.
Our compatriots, our brothers and sisters in Ukraine who are part of our united people have seen with their own eyes what the ruling class of the so-called West have prepared for humanity as a whole. They have dropped their masks and shown what they are really made of.
When the Soviet Union collapsed, the West decided that the world and all of us would permanently accede to its dictates. In 1991, the West thought that Russia would never rise after such shocks and would fall to pieces on its own. This almost happened. We remember the horrible 1990s, hungry, cold and hopeless. But Russia remained standing, came alive, grew stronger and occupied its rightful place in the world.
Meanwhile, the West continued and continues looking for another chance to strike a blow at us, to weaken and break up Russia, which they have always dreamed about, to divide our state and set our peoples against each other, and to condemn them to poverty and extinction. They cannot rest easy knowing that there is such a great country with this huge territory in the world, with its natural wealth, resources and people who cannot and will not do someone else’s bidding.
The West is ready to cross every line to preserve the neo-colonial system which allows it to live off the world, to plunder it thanks to the domination of the dollar and technology, to collect an actual tribute from humanity, to extract its primary source of unearned prosperity, the rent paid to the hegemon. The preservation of this annuity is their main, real and absolutely self-serving motivation. This is why total de-sovereignisation is in their interest. This explains their aggression towards independent states, traditional values and authentic cultures, their attempts to undermine international and integration processes, new global currencies and technological development centres they cannot control. It is critically important for them to force all countries to surrender their sovereignty to the United States.
In certain countries, the ruling elites voluntarily agree to do this, voluntarily agree to become vassals; others are bribed or intimidated. And if this does not work, they destroy entire states, leaving behind humanitarian disasters, devastation, ruins, millions of wrecked and mangled human lives, terrorist enclaves, social disaster zones, protectorates, colonies and semi-colonies. They don’t care. All they care about is their own benefit.
I want to underscore again that their insatiability and determination to preserve their unfettered dominance are the real causes of the hybrid war that the collective West is waging against Russia. They do not want us to be free; they want us to be a colony. They do not want equal cooperation; they want to loot. They do not want to see us a free society, but a mass of soulless slaves.
They see our thought and our philosophy as a direct threat. That is why they target our philosophers for assassination. Our culture and art present a danger to them, so they are trying to ban them. Our development and prosperity are also a threat to them because competition is growing. They do not want or need Russia, but we do. (Applause.)
I would like to remind you that in the past, ambitions of world domination have repeatedly shattered against the courage and resilience of our people. Russia will always be Russia. We will continue to defend our values and our Motherland.
The West is counting on impunity, on being able to get away with anything. As a matter of fact, this was actually the case until recently. Strategic security agreements have been trashed; agreements reached at the highest political level have been declared tall tales; firm promises not to expand NATO to the east gave way to dirty deception as soon as our former leaders bought into them; missile defence, intermediate-range and shorter-range missile treaties have been unilaterally dismantled under far-fetched pretexts.
And all we hear is, the West is insisting on a rules-based order. Where did that come from anyway? Who has ever seen these rules? Who agreed or approved them? Listen, this is just a lot of nonsense, utter deceit, double standards, or even triple standards! They must think we’re stupid.
Russia is a great thousand-year-old power, a whole civilisation, and it is not going to live by such makeshift, false rules. (Applause.)
It was the so-called West that trampled on the principle of the inviolability of borders, and now it is deciding, at its own discretion, who has the right to self-determination and who does not, who is unworthy of it. It is unclear what their decisions are based on or who gave them the right to decide in the first place. They just assumed it.
That is why the choice of the people in Crimea, Sevastopol, Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye and Kherson makes them so furiously angry. The West does not have any moral right to weigh in, or even utter a word about freedom of democracy. It does not and it never did.
Western elites not only deny national sovereignty and international law. Their hegemony has pronounced features of totalitarianism, despotism and apartheid. They brazenly divide the world into their vassals – the so-called civilised countries – and all the rest, who, according to the designs of today’s Western racists, should be added to the list of barbarians and savages. False labels like “rogue country” or “authoritarian regime” are already available, and are used to stigmatise entire nations and states, which is nothing new. There is nothing new in this: deep down, the Western elites have remained the same colonisers. They discriminate and divide peoples into the top tier and the rest.
We have never agreed to and will never agree to such political nationalism and racism. What else, if not racism, is the Russophobia being spread around the world? What, if not racism, is the West’s dogmatic conviction that its civilisation and neoliberal culture is an indisputable model for the entire world to follow? “You’re either with us or against us.” It even sounds strange.
Western elites are even shifting repentance for their own historical crimes on everyone else, demanding that the citizens of their countries and other peoples confess to things they have nothing to do with at all, for example, the period of colonial conquests.
It is worth reminding the West that it began its colonial policy back in the Middle Ages, followed by the worldwide slave trade, the genocide of Indian tribes in America, the plunder of India and Africa, the wars of England and France against China, as a result of which it was forced to open its ports to the opium trade. What they did was get entire nations hooked on drugs and purposefully exterminated entire ethnic groups for the sake of grabbing land and resources, hunting people like animals. This is contrary to human nature, truth, freedom and justice.
While we – we are proud that in the 20th century our country led the anti-colonial movement, which opened up opportunities for many peoples around the world to make progress, reduce poverty and inequality, and defeat hunger and disease.
To emphasise, one of the reasons for the centuries-old Russophobia, the Western elites’ unconcealed animosity toward Russia is precisely the fact that we did not allow them to rob us during the period of colonial conquests and forced the Europeans to trade with us on mutually beneficial terms. This was achieved by creating a strong centralised state in Russia, which grew and got stronger based on the great moral valuesof Orthodox Christianity, Islam, Judaism and Buddhism, as well as Russian culture and the Russian word that were open to all.
There were numerous plans to invade Russia. Such attempts were made during the Time of Troubles in the 17th century and in the period of ordeals after the 1917 revolution. All of them failed. The West managed to grab hold of Russia’s wealth only in the late 20th century, when the state had been destroyed. They called us friends and partners, but they treated us like a colony, using various schemes to pump trillions of dollars out of the country. We remember. We have not forgotten anything.
A few days ago, people in Donetsk and Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporozhye declared their support for restoring our historical unity. Thank you! (Applause.)
Western countries have been saying for centuries that they bring freedom and democracy to other nations. Nothing could be further from the truth. Instead of bringing democracy they suppressed and exploited, and instead of giving freedom they enslaved and oppressed. The unipolar world is inherently anti-democratic and unfree; it is false and hypocritical through and through.
The United States is the only country in the world that has used nuclear weapons twice, destroying the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. And they created a precedent.
Recall that during WWII the United States and Britain reduced Dresden, Hamburg, Cologne and many other German cities to rubble, without the least military necessity. It was done ostentatiously and, to repeat, without any military necessity. They had only one goal, as with the nuclear bombing of Japanese cities: to intimidate our country and the rest of the world.
The United States left a deep scar in the memory of the people of Korea and Vietnam with their carpet bombings and use of napalm and chemical weapons.
It actually continues to occupy Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea and other countries, which they cynically refer to as equals and allies. Look now, what kind of alliance is that? The whole world knows that the top officials in these countries are being spied on and that their offices and homes are bugged. It is a disgrace, a disgrace for those who do this and for those who, like slaves, silently and meekly swallow this arrogant behaviour.
They call the orders and threats they make to their vassals Euro-Atlantic solidarity, and the creation of biological weapons and the use of human test subjects, including in Ukraine, noble medical research.
It is their destructive policies, wars and plunder that have unleashed today’s massive wave of migrants. Millions of people endure hardships and humiliation or die by the thousands trying to reach Europe.
They are exporting grain from Ukraine now. Where are they taking it under the guise of ensuring the food security of the poorest countries? Where is it going? They are taking it to the self-same European countries. Only five percent has been delivered to the poorest countries. More cheating and naked deception again.
In effect, the American elite is using the tragedy of these people to weaken its rivals, to destroy nation states. This goes for Europe and for the identities of France, Italy, Spain and other countries with centuries-long histories.
Washington demands more and more sanctions against Russia and the majority of European politicians obediently go along with it. They clearly understand that by pressuring the EU to completely give up Russian energy and other resources, the United States is practically pushing Europe toward deindustrialisation in a bid to get its hands on the entire European market. These European elites understand everything – they do, but they prefer to serve the interests of others. This is no longer servility but direct betrayal of their own peoples. God bless, it is up to them.
But the Anglo-Saxons believe sanctions are no longer enough and now they have turned to subversion. It seems incredible but it is a fact – by causing explosions on Nord Stream’s international gas pipelines passing along the bottom of the Baltic Sea, they have actually embarked on the destruction of Europe’s entire energy infrastructure. It is clear to everyone who stands to gain. Those who benefit are responsible, of course.
The dictates of the US are backed up by crude force, on the law of the fist. Sometimes it is beautifully wrapped sometimes there is no wrapping at all but the gist is the same – the law of the fist. Hence, the deployment and maintenance of hundreds of military bases in all corners of the world, NATO expansion, and attempts to cobble together new military alliances, such as AUKUS and the like. Much is being done to create a Washington-Seoul-Tokyo military-political chain. All states that possess or aspire to genuine strategic sovereignty and are capable of challenging Western hegemony, are automatically declared enemies.
These are the principles that underlie US and NATO military doctrines that require total domination. Western elites are presenting their neocolonialist plans with the same hypocrisy, claiming peaceful intentions, talking about some kind of deterrence. This evasive word migrates from one strategy to another but really only means one thing – undermining any and all sovereign centres of power.
We have already heard about the deterrence of Russia, China and Iran. I believe next in line are other countries of Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, as well as current US partners and allies. After all, we know that when they are displeased, they introduce sanctions against their allies as well – against this or that bank or company. This is their practice and they will expand it. They have everything in their sights, including our next-door neighbours – the CIS countries.
At the same time, the West has clearly been engaged in wishful thinking for a long time. In launching the sanctions blitzkrieg against Russia, for example, they thought that they could once again line up the whole world at their command. As it turns out, however, such a bright prospect does not excite everyone – other than complete political masochists and admirers of other unconventional forms of international relations. Most states refuse to ”snap a salute“ and instead choose the sensible path of cooperation with Russia.
The West clearly did not expect such insubordination. They simply got used to acting according to a template, to grab whatever they please, by blackmail, bribery, intimidation, and convinced themselves that these methods would work forever, as if they had fossilised in the past.
Such self-confidence is a direct product not only of the notorious concept of exceptionalism – although it never ceases to amaze – but also of the real ”information hunger“ in the West. The truth has been drowned in an ocean of myths, illusions and fakes, using extremely aggressive propaganda, lying like Goebbels. The more unbelievable the lie, the quicker people will believe it – that is how they operate, according to this principle.
But people cannot be fed with printed dollars and euros. You can’t feed them with those pieces of paper, and the virtual, inflated capitalisation of western social media companies can’t heat their homes. Everything I am saying is important. And what I just said is no less so: you can’t feed anyone with paper – you need food; and you can’t heat anyone’s home with these inflated capitalisations – you need energy.
That is why politicians in Europe have to convince their fellow citizens to eat less, take a shower less often and dress warmer at home. And those who start asking fair questions like “Why is that, in fact?” are immediately declared enemies, extremists and radicals. They point back at Russia and say: that is the source of all your troubles. More lies.
I want to make special note of the fact that there is every reason to believe that the Western elites are not going to look for constructive ways out of the global food and energy crisis that they and they alone are to blame for, as a result of their long-term policy, dating back long before our special military operation in Ukraine, in Donbass. They have no intention of solving the problems of injustice and inequality. I am afraid they would rather use other formulas they are more comfortable with.
And here it is important to recall that the West bailed itself out of its early 20th century challenges with World War I. Profits from World War II helped the United States finally overcome the Great Depression and become the largest economy in the world, and to impose on the planet the power of the dollar as a global reserve currency. And the 1980s crisis – things came to a head in the 1980s again – the West emerged from it unscathed largely by appropriating the inheritance and resources of the collapsed and defunct Soviet Union. That’s a fact.
Now, in order to free itself from the latest web of challenges, they need to dismantle Russia as well as other states that choose a sovereign path of development, at all costs, to be able to further plunder other nations’ wealth and use it to patch their own holes. If this does not happen, I cannot rule out that they will try to trigger a collapse of the entire system, and blame everything on that, or, God forbid, decide to use the old formula of economic growth through war.
Russia is aware of its responsibility to the international community and will make every effort to ensure that cooler heads prevail.
The current neocolonial model is ultimately doomed; this much is obvious. But I repeat that its real masters will cling to it to the end. They simply have nothing to offer the world except to maintain the same system of plundering and racketeering.
They do not give a damn about the natural right of billions of people, the majority of humanity, to freedom and justice, the right to determine their own future. They have already moved on to the radical denial of moral, religious, and family values.
Let’s answer some very simple questions for ourselves. Now I would like to return to what I said and want to address also all citizens of the country – not just the colleagues that are in the hall – but all citizens of Russia: do we want to have here, in our country, in Russia, “parent number one, parent number two and parent number three” (they have completely lost it!) instead of mother and father? Do we want our schools to impose on our children, from their earliest days in school, perversions that lead to degradation and extinction? Do we want to drum into their heads the ideas that certain other genders exist along with women and men and to offer them gender reassignment surgery? Is that what we want for our country and our children? This is all unacceptable to us. We have a different future of our own.
Let me repeat that the dictatorship of the Western elites targets all societies, including the citizens of Western countries themselves. This is a challenge to all. This complete renunciation of what it means to be human, the overthrow of faith and traditional values, and the suppression of freedom are coming to resemble a “religion in reverse” – pure Satanism. Exposing false messiahs, Jesus Christ said in the Sermon on the Mount: “By their fruits ye shall know them.” These poisonous fruits are already obvious to people, and not only in our country but also in all countries, including many people in the West itself.
The world has entered a period of a fundamental, revolutionary transformation. New centres of power are emerging. They represent the majority – the majority! – of the international community. They are ready not only to declare their interests but also to protect them. They see in multipolarity an opportunity to strengthen their sovereignty, which means gaining genuine freedom, historical prospects, and the right to their own independent, creative and distinctive forms of development, to a harmonious process.
As I have already said, we have many like-minded people in Europe and the United States, and we feel and see their support. An essentially emancipatory, anti-colonial movement against unipolar hegemony is taking shape in the most diverse countries and societies. Its power will only grow with time. It is this force that will determine our future geopolitical reality.
Friends,
Today, we are fighting for a just and free path, first of all for ourselves, for Russia, in order to leave dictate and despotism in the past. I am convinced that countries and peoples understand that a policy based on the exceptionalism of whoever it may be and the suppression of other cultures and peoples is inherently criminal, and that we must close this shameful chapter. The ongoing collapse of Western hegemony is irreversible. And I repeat: things will never be the same.
The battlefield to which destiny and history have called us is a battlefield for our people, for the great historical Russia. (Applause.) For the great historical Russia, for future generations, our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. We must protect them against enslavement and monstrous experiments that are designed to cripple their minds and souls.
Today, we are fighting so that it would never occur to anyone that Russia, our people, our language, or our culture can be erased from history. Today, we need a consolidated society, and this consolidation can only be based on sovereignty, freedom, creation, and justice. Our values are humanity, mercy and compassion.
And I want to close with the words of a true patriot Ivan Ilyin: “If I consider Russia my Motherland, that means that I love as a Russian, contemplate and think, sing and speak as a Russian; that I believe in the spiritual strength of the Russian people. Its spirit is my spirit; its destiny is my destiny; its suffering is my grief; and its prosperity is my joy.”
Behind these words stands a glorious spiritual choice, which, for more than a thousand years of Russian statehood, was followed by many generations of our ancestors. Today, we are making this choice; the citizens of the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics and the residents of the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions have made this choice. They made the choice to be with their people, to be with their Motherland, to share in its destiny, and to be victorious together with it.
