NATO is talking about deploying more nuclear weapons, removing weapons from storage and putting them on standby because of the growing threat from Russia and China, the alliance head said today.
Jens Stoltenberg told Britain’s Telegraph newspaper that NATO members are discussing using transparency about their nuclear arsenal as a deterrent.
I won’t talk about the operational details of how many nuclear warheads should be put into action and which ones will be retained, but we should consult on these matters. That’s exactly what we’re doing,” he told the paper.
“Transparency helps to convey a direct message that we are, of course, a nuclear alliance,” said the NATO Secretary General.
NATO’s goal, of course, is a world without nuclear weapons, but as long as nuclear weapons exist, we will remain a nuclear alliance, because a world in which Russia, China, and North Korea have nuclear weapons, and NATO is not, it is a more dangerous world”, he added.
Stoltenberg said last week that nuclear weapons are NATO’s “ultimate security guarantee” and a tool to keep the peace.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly warned that Moscow could use nuclear weapons to defend itself in extreme circumstances. Moscow accuses the United States and its European allies of pushing the world to the brink of nuclear conflict by supplying Ukraine with weapons worth billions of dollars, which are used in attacks on Russian territory.
NATO, which has taken a greater role in coordinating military aid to Kiev, rarely speaks publicly about nuclear weapons, although the US is known to have nuclear bombs located in several countries in Europe.
The Russians simulated the launch of a tactical nuclear weapon
It should be recalled that the Russian military exercise of deploying tactical nuclear weapons and firing them, which was recently ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin, was conducted along the border with Ukraine and included the transfer of mock nuclear warheads to storage sites and airports. where they were loaded into the bomber, she announced a special nuclear unit of the Russian army.
The exercises were held in southern Russia, not far from the border with Ukraine. Soldiers from the Leningrad Military District in northwestern Russia took part in it, and mobile missile launchers, the Air Force and the Navy were used, the Russian Defense Ministry announced.
Russia’s 12th Military Administration (12 GU MO), which stores, maintains, transports and distributes Russia’s vast arsenal of nuclear weapons, said the drills will be analyzed to make improvements. The Nuclear Administration “provided delivery of training nuclear munitions to field depots of missile brigade positions and the Air Force operational airfield,” she said.
Further improvement of the training of non-strategic nuclear forces will be determined to ensure the fulfillment of tasks in various scenarios of the development of the military-political situation,” the statement said.
A video released by the defense ministry shows Russian soldiers focusing on a mock target and then counting down to launch. The video also shows the launch button being pressed.
Russia says the United States and its European allies are pushing the world to the brink of nuclear conflict by giving Ukraine billions of dollars worth of weapons, some of which are being used to attack targets on Russian soil.
All the major nuclear powers – Russia, the United States, China, France and Britain – hold regular nuclear drills, but this was different. According to Reuters, they are rarely explicitly linked in public to a major current crisis – as Russia did in this case over Ukraine.
By doing so, Russia is trying to send a signal to the United States and its biggest European allies that allowing Ukraine to hit Russia with increasingly advanced Western weapons is an escalation that could have consequences.
The United States says it has seen no change in Russia’s strategic posture, but senior US intelligence officials say they must take Moscow’s remarks about nuclear weapons seriously.
Russia and the United States are by far the world’s largest nuclear powers, possessing about 88 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons.
The United States has about 100 non-strategic B61 nuclear weapons, located in five European countries – Italy, Germany, Turkey, Belgium and the Netherlands, according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. The US has another 100 weapons within its borders.
Russia has about 1,558 non-strategic nuclear warheads, but arms control experts say it is very difficult to say exactly how many there are because of data secrecy.
Putin said last week that many of Russia’s tactical nuclear weapons have 70-75 kilotons of explosive power – about five times more than the US nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945.
