Moscow, Sep 25 (EFE).- Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on Wednesday that he was revising his country’s nuclear doctrine to expand the nature and source of threats to which Russia could respond with nuclear weapons to include conventional attacks by non-nuclear states.<\/p>
“We reserve the right to use nuclear weapons in case of aggression against Russia and Belarus,” the president told a meeting of the Russian Security Council, specifying that a nuclear response would be justified by attacks with conventional weapons that “create a critical threat to our sovereignty.”<\/p>
The leader noted that “in the new wording of the document, aggression against Russia by any non-nuclear state, but with the participation or support of a nuclear power, will be considered a joint attack against Russia.”<\/p>
The changes would mark a significant lowering of Russia’s nuclear threshold at a time when the United States, the United Kingdom and France, NATO’s three nuclear powers, are debating allowing Ukraine to use Western-made Storm Shadow missiles to hit targets deep inside Russia.<\/p>
Putin said Russia could use nuclear weapons after receiving “reliable information” about a mass air attack by tactical or strategic aircraft, cruise missiles, hypersonic or other types of missiles.<\/p>
“All changes have been thoroughly analyzed and are in line with modern military threats and risks to Russia,” Putin said.<\/p>
He also stressed that the matter had already been agreed with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.<\/p>
Until now, the military doctrine has provided for the use of nuclear weapons only in “extraordinary cases”, i.e. when the very existence of Russia was under threat. EFE<\/p>
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