MOSCOW (AP) – Russian President Vladimir Putin sternly warned the United States yesterday against deploying new missiles in Europe, saying Russia will retaliate by fielding new weapons that will take just as little time to reach their targets.
While the Russian leader didn’t say what specific new weapons Moscow could deploy, his statement further raised the ante in tense relations with Washington.
Speaking in his state-of-the-nation address, Putin charged that the US has abandoned a key arms control pact to free up its hands to build new missiles and tried to shift the blame for the move to Russia.
“Our American partners should have honestly said it instead of making unfounded accusations against Russia to justify their withdrawal from the treaty,” Putin said.
The US has accused Russia of breaching the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty by deploying a cruise missile that violates its limits – the accusations Moscow has rejected.
The INF treaty banned production, testing, and deployment of land-based cruise and ballistic missiles with a range of 500 to 5,500 kilometers (310 to 3,410 miles).
The intermediate-range weapons were seen as particularly destabilizing as they take shorter time to reach their targets compared to the intercontinental ballistic missiles. hat would leave practically no time for decision-makers, raising the likelihood of a global nuclear conflict over a false launch warning.
Putin reaffirmed that Russia will not be the first to deploy new intermediate-range missiles but warned of a quick retaliation if the US puts such weapons in Europe.
“They will only take 10-12 minutes to reach Moscow,” he said. “It’s a very serious threat to us, and we will have to respond.”