The former head of the UK’s foreign intelligence service, the old acquaintance Sir Richard Dearlove who dared that Nikolai Patrushevthe secretary of the Russian Security Council, who would succeed Vladimir Putin in the event of health problems, reacted alarmingly to the Russian president’s nuclear threat: “Russia is in a real war with Europe.”
Putin speculated this Thursday about a possible attack on Ukrainian operational centers in the capital kyiv, notably with the new ballistic missile developed by Russia, the Oreshnik, as part of a war in Europe that has already lasted for more than a thousand days . Remember that this ballistic missile can be loaded with nuclear warheads.
The escalation of war tensions and the attacks themselves in recent days writes a final chapter this Thursday with Putin’s supersonic threat. Mr Richard Dearlove, former director of MI6did not hesitate to assert that Europe is no longer in a “pre-war situation”, but in a “real war” with Putin’s Russia.
“Europe must accept reality”
Dearlove points out that Russia considers itself not only at war with Ukraine, but also with all of Europe. “We have seen very aggressive movements by the Russians in several European countries,” he said, referring to the sabotage tactics And hybrid warfare led by Moscow.
The former intelligence chief stresses that the situation is more dangerous than many European leaders want to admit. “I don’t think there is any reason to soften reality,” and warns that Europe and the United States are in an “extremely dangerous” period.
“In Soviet times, we joked about weather forecasts: today, everything is possible during the day,” quipped the Russian president during a press conference in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, when asked about a possible missile attack. against kyiv.
Putin confirmed last week that the Russian armed forces had carried out andThe launch of these new projectiles against Ukrainian territory, and then ordered the massive production of a weapon for which, he assures, today neither Ukraine nor the Western powers have an answer.
In fact, the Russian leader again mentioned this Thursday the Orechnik missiles, and pointed out that at the moment of impact, it looks “like a falling meteorite.” “We know from history which meteorites fell, where and what consequences it had, sometimes whole lakes were formed,” he said.
Shortly before, Putin himself had already stated that the massive use of Oreshnik missiles would be equivalent in terms of effects to the launch of a nuclear bomb, although it is true that he clarified that the new Russian projectile “well sure, is not a weapon of “mass” destruction, according to comments collected by the press agency TASS.
“We have enough weapons. Although we are all aware that the appearance of weapons like Oreshnkik strengthens Russia’s military positions,” said the Russian president, who once again emphasized that the new projectiles “are not nuclear weapons”, while warning of their effects on massive attacks.
Russia has reported the use of new projectiles in response to the launch of long-range Western missiles by the Ukrainian armed forces, including the US ATACMS and the UK’s Storm Shadow. Since Moscow launched the first Oreshnik, Ukraine has not stopped its attacks with Western weapons.
This was explained by Putin, who nevertheless stressed that the ATACMS missile attacks had caused “minimal damage” to Russia. The Russian Defense Ministry reported several of these attacks and confirmed that there were military “losses” in the impact zones.
“They attacked Russia twice after responding with Oreshnik and were used twice more in the Kursk region,” the Russian leader said of a region where kyiv directs much of its attacks against the Russian territory. “The damage is minimal, but we still cannot stop paying attention to it,” he said.
