Russian President Vladimir Putin said he could deploy conventional missiles far enough away from the United States and its European allies if they allowed Ukraine to strike deeper into Russian territory with long-range Western weapons.
Putin, in his first face-to-face meeting with the editors-in-chief of international news agencies since the start of the war in Ukraine, said the West was wrong to assume Russia would never use nuclear weapons and said the Kremlin’s nuclear doctrine should not be taken lightly.
Asked about NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg’s calls for Ukraine to be allowed to use Western weapons to attack Russian territory, Putin made a distinction between different missiles, but warned that allowing Kiev to attack Russia with increasingly powerful weapons was a serious escalation that would draw The West at war with Russia.
Russia’s response, said the 71-year-old leader of the Kremlin, would be to shoot down Western missiles, and he specifically mentioned the American ATACMS, and the British and French missile systems.
Putin also said Moscow was considering deploying similar high-tech long-range missiles close enough to hit states that have allowed Ukraine to attack Russian territory with such missiles.
“If we see that these countries are involved in a war against the Russian Federation, then we reserve the right to act in the same way. In general, that is the path to very serious problems,” said Putin.
US President Joe Biden has authorized Kiev to launch some of the weapons supplied by the United States at military targets inside Russia.
Washington continues to prohibit Kiev from attacking Russia with ATACMS missiles, which have a range of up to 300 kilometers, and other long-range weapons supplied by the US.
British Foreign Minister David Cameron, during a visit to Kiev on May 3, told Reuters that Ukraine has the right to use the weapons it received from Britain to attack targets inside Russia, and it remains up to Kiev whether it will do so.
