Putin lowers threshold for using nuclear weapons after Biden's decision over long-range missiles
- 19 November, 10:06
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday revised the country’s nuclear doctrine two days after his US counterpart Joe Biden authorized Ukraine’s use of long-range missile on attacks on Russia.
Under the updated doctrine Kremlin will consider aggression from any non-nuclear state that is supported by a nuclear country a joint attack on Russia. Thus, Putin lowered threshold for using nuclear weapons in a move that escalates the conflict. The moves comes after Ukraine struck an ammunition depot in Russia’s Buryansk region with US-supplied ATACMS long-range missile on Tuesday.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov emphasized that the Ukrainian strike in Bryansk marked an escalation of the war and urged Washington and other Western allies to study the modernized nuclear doctrine.
“If the long-range missiles are used from the territory of Ukraine against the Russian territory, it will mean that they are controlled by American military experts and we will view that as a qualitatively new phase of the Western war against Russia and respond accordingly,” Lavrov said on the sidelines of the G20 meeting held in Brazil this week.
Earlier, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Ukrainian attack with longer-range missiles could potentially trigger a nuclear response, pointing to the doctrine’s provision that holds the door open for it after a conventional strike that raises critical threats for the "sovereignty and territorial integrity: of Russia and its ally, Belarus.
