Russian President Vladimir Putin took over US President Donald Trump on Thursday for qualifying Russia as “paper tiger”, which suggests that NATO could be one and warn the United States that if he provided Tomahawk missiles in Ukraine, this would trigger a new dangerous escalation.
The Russian War in Ukraine, the deadliest in Europe since the Second World War, sparked the greatest confrontation between Russia and the West since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, and Russian officials say they are now in a “hot” conflict with the West.
Putin, speaking to Valdai discussion Group in the resort of the Black Sea of Sochi, said that Russian forces were advancing throughout the front in Ukraine and that almost the whole alliance led by the United States was now fighting against Russia.
Trump, who had previously said that kyiv should abandon land to make peace with Moscow, strongly reversed his rhetoric last week, saying that he thought that Ukraine could reconquer all the territories of Russia and qualify Moscow as “paper tiger”. He repeated the line this week.
“A paper tiger. What follows then? Go face this paper tiger,” said Putin. “Well, if we fight with the whole NATO block, we move, move forward and we feel confident, and we are a” paper tiger “, so what is NATO itself?”
Putin paid irony to European claims that Russian drones had invaded NATO airspace, jokingly that he promised that he would not do it again in Denmark and that he had no drones that could fly to Lisbon.
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The European authorities have accused Russia of cheeky violations of the region’s airspace, in particular with recent incursions by drones above Poland and fighter planes on Estonia.
He has taken a more serious tone on the possibility that the United States provides Tomahawk cruise missiles in Ukraine, saying that such a step would lead to a new wave of dangerous climbing.
“It is impossible to use tomahawks without the direct participation of American military personnel,” said Putin. “This will mean a completely new and qualitatively new escalation step, including in relations between Russia and the United States.”
The United States has so far announced any decision to provide Tomahawks to Ukraine.
At the same time, Putin praised Trump’s efforts to help negotiate peace in Ukraine and described their August summit in Alaska as a productive.
“It was good that we tried to seek and find possible ways to settle the Ukrainian crisis,” he said, adding that he felt “comfortable” to speak to Trump.
“Cool, sleep calmly,” says Putin
NATO members, he said, provided Ukraine intelligence, weapons and training, and whip what he presented as hysteria on the alleged plans of Russia to attack a member of NATO, whom he rejected as “impossible to believe”.
“If someone still wants to compete with us in the military sphere, as we say, do not hesitate, let them try,” said Putin. “The countermeasures of Russia will not be long to come.”
Putin depicts war as a moment of the watershed in Moscow’s relations with the West, which, according to him, humiliated Russia after the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union by widening NATO and encroaching on what he considers the sphere of influence of Moscow.
The leaders of Western Europe and Ukraine threw war as an imperial style taking and have repeatedly promised to overcome the Russian forces. They argue that Russia is defeated, Putin risks an attack on a member of NATO.
“I just want to say: cool, sleep calmly and take care of your own problems. Take a look at what’s going on in the streets of European cities,” said Putin.
Putin said the Armed Forces of Ukraine had a serious lack of workforce and desertions, while Russia had enough soldiers. He suggested that Kyiv is negotiating the end of the war.
Russia, he said, controlled almost the entire province of Luhansk, around 81% of the Donetsk region, and around 75% of the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.
– with additional files from the Associated Press
