Reuters
4 MIN READ
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian
President Vladimir Putin said Russia is militarily ready for a Cuban
Missile-style crisis if the United States wanted one and threatened to place
hypersonic nuclear missiles on ships or submarines near U.S. territorial
waters.
The Cuban Missile Crisis
erupted in 1962 when Moscow responded to a U.S. missile deployment in Turkey by
sending ballistic missiles to Cuba, sparking a standoff that brought the world
to the brink of nuclear war.
More than five decades on,
tensions are rising again over Russian fears that the United States might
deploy intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Europe, as a landmark Cold
War-era arms-control treaty unravels.
Putin’s comments, made to
Russian media late on Wednesday, follow his warning that Moscow will match any
U.S. move to deploy new missiles closer to Russia by stationing its own
missiles closer to the United States or by deploying faster missiles or both.
Putin detailed his warning for
the first time, saying Russia could deploy hypersonic missiles on ships and
submarines which could lurk outside U.S. territorial waters if Washington now
moved to deploy intermediate-range nuclear weapons in Europe.
“(We’re talking about) naval
delivery vehicles: submarines or surface ships. And we can put them, given the
speed and range (of our missiles)... in neutral waters. Plus they are not
stationary, they move and they will have to find them,” Putin said, according
to a Kremlin transcript.
“You work it out: Mach nine
(the speed of the missiles) and over 1,000 km (their range).”
TREATY VIOLATIONS
The State Department dismissed
Putin’s earlier warning as propaganda, saying it was designed to divert
attention from what Washington alleges are Moscow’s violations of the
Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty.
It referred queries about
Putin’s latest remarks to the Pentagon, which did not immediately respond.
The INF pact bans Russia and
the United States from stationing short- and intermediate-range land-based
missiles in Europe. Washington announced on Feb. 1 it will withdraw from the
treaty in six months unless Moscow ends its alleged violations.
Analyst Kingston Reif of the
Arms Control Association think tank said Putin may be seeking to signal that
Russia can keep up with the United States, to distract from its internal
problems or to deflect blame for the parlous state of the INF treaty.
“He may also be trying to send
the message that, look, neither side should want this world (of a new arms
race) so we should sit down and resume discussions,” Reif said.
Putin has said he does not
want an arms race but would have no choice but to act if Washington deployed
new missiles in Europe, some of which he says could strike Moscow within 10 to
12 minutes.
The United States does not
currently have ground-based intermediate-range nuclear missiles that it could
place in Europe but could develop and deploy them if the INF treaty collapses.
Putin said his naval response
to such a move would mean Russia could strike the United States faster than
U.S. missiles deployed in Europe could hit Moscow because the flight time would
be shorter.
“It (the calculation) would
not be in their favor, at least as things stand today. That’s for sure.” said
Putin.
Relations between Moscow and
Washington were strained, he added, but the tensions were not comparable to
those of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
“They (the tensions) are not a
reason to ratchet up confrontation to the levels of the Cuban Missile Crisis in
the 1960s. In any case that’s not what we want,” said Putin. “If someone wants
that, well OK they are welcome. I have set out today what that would mean. Let
them count (the missile flight times).”
Separately, Washington said on
Thursday that it was carrying out an observation flight over Russia under the
Open Skies Treaty, the first one since 2017.
In a statement, the Pentagon
said an unarmed OC-135B aircraft was being used and Russia was aware of the
flight.
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