“Remains of a bygone era”
Vladimir Putin declarationNATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg’s remarks that the alliance had been preparing for a conflict with Russia since 2014 were not new to him. According to the president, this is exactly what explains the “decisive actions” of “Moscow to protect its own interests”. He is confident that the North Atlantic Alliance “has long needed some kind of external enemy around the threat with which it will be possible to unite the allies.”
“There is nothing new for us. This reaffirms what we have always talked about: namely, the NATO bloc is a relic of a bygone era, the Cold War era. We are constantly told that NATO has changed, that it is now most likely a political union. “But everyone was looking for a reason and opportunity to give it a new impetus as a fully military organization. Here you are, they are doing it,” he said.
In addition, he noted that Russia has not arrived at the “period of the best relations” with the G7 countries.
“Victory is only on the battlefield”
Putin also commented on the words of Belgian Prime Minister Alexander de Croo, who said that “the war can only be won on the battlefield” in Ukraine. According to the Russian leader, Kyiv negotiated with Moscow with varying degrees of success. The countries “agreed on one thing at some point”, but Ukraine soon gave up on it.
“The call for Ukraine to continue hostilities and stop further negotiations only confirms our assumptions that Ukraine is not the purpose and well-being of the Ukrainian people – this is not the goal of a united West and NATO, but a way to protect Ukraine. own interests,” the president thinks.
He is sure that “by the hands of the Ukrainians”, the leading NATO countries “just want to additionally defend themselves, claim their role in the world, confirm not the leadership, but their hegemony in the literal sense of the word, imperial ambitions. ”
Creating “mirror threats”
According to Putin, Russia “does not have the same problems” with Sweden and Finland as with Ukraine. He noted that the Scandinavian countries and the Russian Federation had no territorial issues, disputes, or anything that might bother Moscow “in terms of Finland or Sweden’s NATO membership”.
“Well, they want (join NATO), please. They just have to imagine clearly and clearly that where there were no threats before, now, if troops and infrastructure are deployed there, we will have to respond like a mirror and create the same threats for the regions where the threats were created. We,” the president warned.
Now “there will be some kind of tension” between Russia and Finland and Sweden, he added. At the same time, for Moscow, “Finland and Sweden’s NATO membership is not the same as Ukraine’s NATO membership.”
And the thesis that Russia was fighting NATO expansion, but nothing came of it, Putin got it wrong. He believes he was “jamming in” to show that “Russia did not achieve the desired result”.
The ultimate goal of special operations
Putin said that Russian soldiers taking part in special operations should be dedicated to songs, poems and “build monuments to them”. He also stressed that the aims of military special operations in Ukraine have not changed. However, the tactics of achieving them may be “different”.
“There could be different tactics proposed by the General Staff of the Ministry of Defense: where to move the troops, where to move, what objects to hit there, what to do during this time, what to do in the Donbas during this time, Ukraine, when there were several groups in the center,” he explained. president.
He noted that although he was the Commander-in-Chief, he “did not graduate from the Academy of the General Staff.” Therefore, the head of state “trusts the professionals”.
The ultimate goal that I have outlined is the liberation of Donbass, the protection of these people and the creation of conditions that will guarantee Russia’s security. This much. The work proceeds smoothly and rhythmically. As you can see, at a certain stage of this combat work, the troops move and reach the lines determined as the task. “Everything is going according to plan,” said the Russian leader.
He added that he did not talk about the timing of the completion of special operations because it was “wrong” to “set” it to a specific time.
“This is due to the intensity of hostilities, and the intensity is directly related to possible casualties. And above all we have to think about how to save the lives of our men,” he said.
“There is no terrorist attack there”
Putin also emphasized that there was no terrorist attack in Kremenchug, where a shopping mall caught fire after the attack on the hangars with Western weapons.
“Terrorist attack, no explosion. From drones you can see them deploying guns, MLRS systems, artillery, heavy equipment in general, in residential areas and elsewhere. That’s right, nobody shoots or hits our fields. As a rule, this is done according to the results of the discovered targets, ”said the author.
The President added that the weapons supplied by the West are stored in hangars.
“The Russian army does not hit any civilian targets – there is no need for it. “We have every opportunity to determine what is where, and we achieve these goals with modern long-range precision weapons.”