HUH? PUTIN’S REASON FOR AXING NUKE DEAL
‘How can we ignore [U.S.’] nuclear capabilities in these conditions?’ sez Vlad, ignoring treaty covers both sides
Russia has suspended participation in a nuclear arms treaty with the U.S. because it is under threat of being destroyed by the West, President Vladimir Putin said in interview excerpts on Sunday.
Stepping back from the New START treaty is necessary to “ensure security, strategic stability” for Russia, Putin claimed in parts of an interview run by Russian news agencies.
“When all the leading NATO countries have declared their main goal as inflicting a strategic defeat on us ... how can we ignore their nuclear capabilities in these conditions?” the Russian strongman said.
Putin said last week that Moscow would not participate in the 2010 treaty’s nuclear warhead and missile inspections while the U.S. and NATO are seeking Russia’s defeat in Ukraine.
He has argued since the fullscale invasion began a year ago that the goal was to reduce threats to Russia’s security.
CIA Director William Burns countered Sunday that the real reason for the invasion was Putin’s loss of control over Ukraine in the past decade.
“What he’s seen is Ukraine’s stubborn independence, its democratic progress, its movement toward the West in political and economic and security terms,” Burns said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
“He’s seen that as a direct threat to the ambition that cuts to the core of his view as a Russian leader, and I think that’s the backdrop to the horrific aggression that he’s launched.”
Calling on the West to keep up sanctions pressure on Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said over the weekend that there must be “decisive steps” taken against the Russian nuclear industry.
Putin said last week that his country was working to ensure it can resume nuclear weapons tests if necessary.
The Russian president knows the topic of nuclear war is powerful, said Fiona Hill, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who has worked in several U.S. presidential administrations.
“He’s kind of menacing the world on every nuclear frontier because he knows that that’s the ultimate psychological weapon,” Hill said. “Nuclear weapons are pretty effective politically.”
The CIA director added that Putin mistakenly believes he can “grind down the Ukrainians” and is “quite determined” to wage war despite Russia’s losses economically, politically and on the battlefield.
“I think Putin is, right now, entirely too confident of his ability ... to wear down Ukraine,” Burns said.
Some U.S. Republican lawmakers, meanwhile, criticized the Biden administration for not sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine to help end the war more quickly.
“When we give them what they — what they can really use and ask for, they win,” said Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee and a Texas Republican, on ABC’s “This Week.”
“When we slow-walk and slow-pace this thing, it drags it out, and that’s precisely what Putin wants,” he said.
Other Republicans say the U.S. should provide less aid to Ukraine and focus on domestic needs.
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said the focus of U.S. efforts is helping Ukraine take back territory that Russia has occupied.
“What they need right now are tanks and armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles, artillery and air-defense systems up there on the front line. That’s what we’re giving them,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“And the question of F-16s is really a question for another day, for another phase.”
From the battlefields, Ukraine’s military authorities said Russian offensive efforts remained concentrated in Ukraine’s industrial east and northeast.
Fighting raged near Bakhmut, a city in the Donetsk region that has become a focus of the war in recent months. Territory in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk province is split between Russian and Ukrainian control.
The European Union agreed over the weekend to impose new sanctions on Russia, taking aim at officials and organizations that support the war, spread propaganda or supply drones and also restricting trade on products that could be used by the Russian military.
It put prohibitions on transactions with some of Russia’s largest banks and imposed asset freezes on several additional Russian banks.
The EU already targeted nearly 1,400 Russian officials, government ministers, lawmakers and oligarchs and froze assets of more than 170 organizations, including political parties, banks and private companies.
“Sanctions will continue to be introduced so that nothing remains of the potential of Russian aggression,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address on Saturday.