(Ken Silva, Headline USA) Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed on Friday that his country’s first nuclear warheads have been delivered to Belarus, and that the entire batch will be deployed by the end of the year, according to the Russian news service, TASS.
“As you know, we held talks with our union state, with President [of Belarus Alexander] Lukashenko on deploying part of these tactical weapons to Belarusian territory,” Putin reportedly said at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.
“It has happened—the first nuclear warheads have been delivered to Belarusian territory,” he continued. “This is the first batch. We will complete this work by the end of this year.”
Putin reportedly said the nukes were deployed “so that everyone who is thinking about hitting us strategically will not forget about this fact.”
Reacting to this latest step towards nuclear World War 3, President Joe Biden called it “totally irresponsible.”
But Putin sees his deployment as akin to NATO storing U.S. B61 nuclear gravity bombs in Italy, Germany, Turkey, Belgium and the Netherlands, according to Antiwar.com editor Dave DeCamp.
DeCamp also noted that, when Putin first announced the deployment, he said it was being done in response to the United Kingdom having provided Ukraine with depleted uranium ammunition. Last week, the U.S. also confirmed that it was providing the cancer-causing weaponry to Ukraine.
Perhaps the most chilling aspect of Putin’s deployment is that he reportedly said nuclear weapons could be used if Russia or its “territory” is attacked.
While the U.S. has not endorsed Ukraine attacking the Russian mainland, American leaders have given the Ukrainians a green light to attack Crimea, which has been Russian territory since 2014.
“We have not placed limitations on Ukraine being able to strike on its territory within its internationally recognized borders,” Biden National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told CNN’s Jake Tapper last month.
“What we have said is that we will not enable Ukraine with U.S. systems, Western systems, to attack Russia,” Sullivan added. “And we believe Crimea is Ukraine.”
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
