Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev delivers a speech during a meeting with members of the Security Council in Moscow, Russia February 21, 2022. Sputnik/Alexey Nikolsky/Kremlin via REUTERS
- Russia warns against nuclear use
- Says Iskander and hypersonic missiles are deployed
- Finland and Sweden are considering NATO membership
- Lithuania: nothing new in Russia’s threats
LONDON – One of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest allies warned NATO on Thursday that if Sweden and Finland joined the US-led military alliance, Russia would have to step up its defenses in the region, including by using nuclear weapons .
Finland, which shares a 1,300 km border with Russia, and Sweden are considering joining the NATO alliance. Finland will make a decision in the next few weeks, Prime Minister Sanna Marin said on Wednesday. Continue reading
Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Chairman of Russia’s Security Council, said that if Sweden and Finland join NATO, Russia would need to strengthen its land, sea and air forces in the Baltic Sea.
Medvedev also specifically addressed the nuclear threat, saying there was no longer any talk of a “nuclear-weapon-free” Baltic – where Russia has wedged its Kaliningrad exclave between Poland and Lithuania.
“There can be no more talk of a nuclear-weapon-free status in the Baltic Sea – the balance must be restored,” said Medvedev, who was president from 2008 to 2012.
“To date, Russia has not taken such measures and did not want to,” said Medvedev. “If our hand is forced well…note we didn’t suggest that,” he added.
Lithuania said Russia’s threats were nothing new and Moscow had moved nuclear weapons to Kaliningrad long before the war in Ukraine. Continue reading
The eventual accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO – created in 1949 to ensure collective Western security against the Soviet Union – would be one of the major European strategic consequences of the war in Ukraine.
Finland gained independence from Russia in 1917 and fought two wars against Russia during World War II, during which it lost some territories to Moscow. On Thursday, Finland announced a military exercise in western Finland involving forces from Britain, the United States, Latvia and Estonia.
Sweden has not been at war for 200 years, and post-war foreign policy has focused on international support for democracy, multilateral dialogue and nuclear disarmament.
KALININGRAD
Kaliningrad is of particular importance in the North European theater. The former Prussian port city of Königsberg, capital of East Prussia, is less than 1400 km from London and Paris and 500 km from Berlin.
Russia said in 2018 it deployed Iskander missiles to Kaliningrad, which was captured by the Red Army in April 1945 and ceded to the Soviet Union at the Potsdam Conference.
The Iskander, known by NATO as the SS-26 Stone, is a short-range tactical ballistic missile system capable of carrying both conventional and nuclear warheads.
Its official range is 500km, but some western military sources suggest its range could be much longer.
“No sane person wants higher prices and higher taxes, increased tensions along the borders, Iskander, hypersonic and ships with nuclear weapons literally at arm’s length from their own homes,” Medvedev said.
“Let’s hope that our northern neighbors’ common sense will prevail,” said Medvedev.
Lithuanian Defense Minister Arvydas Anusauskas said Russia had transferred nuclear weapons to Kaliningrad even before the war.
“Nuclear weapons have always been stored in Kaliningrad… the international community, the countries in the region, are perfectly aware of that,” Anusauskas was quoted as saying by BNS. “They use it as a threat.”
Russia’s February 24 invasion of Ukraine has killed thousands, displaced millions and raised fears of a major confrontation between Russia and the United States — by far the world’s largest nuclear powers.
Putin says the “special military operation” in Ukraine is necessary because the United States used Ukraine to threaten Russia and Moscow needed to defend itself against Ukraine’s persecution of Russian speakers.
Ukraine says it is fighting imperial land grabs and that Putin’s claims of genocide are nonsense. US President Joe Biden calls Putin a war criminal and dictator.
Putin says the conflict in Ukraine is part of a much broader confrontation with the United States, which he says is trying to assert its hegemony even as its dominance of the international order wanes.
Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Hugh Lawson