US protection officers say they don’t see any indications that Moscow is planning a nuclear assault
The US Protection Division doesn’t consider {that a} Russian nuclear strike is imminent, a number of Pentagon officers instructed journalists this week. Washington nonetheless treats Moscow’s supposed threats “very severely,” they added.
“We don’t assess that President Putin has decided to make use of nuclear weapons presently,” the Pentagon’s press secretary, Brigadier Normal Patrick Ryder, instructed journalists at a briefing on Thursday. He spoke after US President Joe Biden warned that the chance of a nuclear battle is on the highest stage for the reason that Cuban Missile Disaster of 1962.
For now, the US doesn’t possess any data that might warrant a change in its “strategic deterrence posture,” Ryder mentioned, including that Washington will proceed to carefully monitor the state of affairs, because it takes Russia’s threats “very severely.”
On Friday, one other Pentagon spokesman, J. Todd Breasseale, instructed Politico that the US nonetheless doesn’t see any indication that Russia is getting ready for a nuclear strike. “To be clear: we’ve not seen any purpose to regulate our personal strategic nuclear posture nor do we’ve indications that Russia is getting ready to imminently use nuclear weapons,” he mentioned.
Breasseale additionally accused the Kremlin of creating reckless statements in regards to the potential use of nuclear weapons. “The sort of irresponsible rhetoric we’ve seen is not any manner for the chief of a nuclear armed state to talk,” he mentioned, warning {that a} nuclear strike “on any scale” can be “disastrous for the world and would entail extreme penalties.”
Though Moscow has proven no indicators that it intends to make use of nuclear weapons, President Vladimir Putin mentioned in a current speech that Russia has “varied technique of destruction,” and that he wouldn’t hesitate to make use of them to defend the nation, including: “This isn’t a bluff.”
On Thursday, Biden warned that additional escalation of hostilities between Russia, Ukraine, and the West might result in “Armageddon.”
On Friday, the Estonian navy said that the specter of Russia utilizing nuclear weapons “shouldn’t be very massive.” The assertion got here amid UK media experiences hinting that Russia plans to conduct drills of its nuclear forces – which the Kremlin has dismissed.
Russia’s present doctrine permits for the usage of nuclear weapons within the occasion of an preliminary nuclear strike on its territory or infrastructure, or if the existence of the Russian state is threatened by both nuclear or standard weapons.
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