Russia was dissuaded from using nuclear weapons thanks to the tough, but at the same time cautious, position of the United States, backed up by the support of other countries.
Former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency David Petraeus confirmed that in 2022 the United States warned Russia that in the event of the use of nuclear weapons nuclear weapons against Ukraine Washington will enter the war. Russia was also given a detailed description of a possible strike on its military forces.
This was reported on Friday, September 20, by the Polish publication Onet.
It is noted that in 2022, Petraeus told American media that the United States was ready to destroy the entire Russian Black Sea Fleet, as well as all Russian ground and air forces on Ukrainian territory.
According to the former head of the CIA, the United States could take such action if Russia used tactical nuclear weapons against Ukraine or even in an uninhabited zone. He emphasized that his statement at the time was not a personal opinion, but a non-public position of the White House.
As the publication writes, Washington did not threaten Moscow directly, so it conveyed its warning through David Petraeus. The communique he transmitted to the Russian side contained a detailed description of a strike on Russian targets using hundreds of cruise missiles that would be launched from American aircraft and submarines.
According to the former CIA chief, even if some allies, such as Germany, did not agree with such a step, this would not influence the US decision. Petraeus noted that “Berlin will not have a say,” and the United States will remind everyone in NATO “who makes decisions in the Alliance.”
David Petraeus is also confident that Russia was able to renounce the use of nuclear weapons thanks to the tough, but at the same time cautious position of the United States, backed up by the support of other countries.
On September 8, 2024, CIA Director William Burns said that in 2022, at the time of the autumn counteroffensive of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, there was a real risk that the aggressor country Russia would strike Ukraine with tactical nuclear weapons.
Recall that on September 12, the president of the aggressor state, Vladimir Putin, in a comment to Russian propagandists, said that the use of long-range Western weapons by the Ukrainian army to strikes on Russian territory will mean direct participation of NATO countries in military actions and threatened to make decisions that would “correspond to the threats created.” The next day, the words of the Kremlin dictator were almost verbatim repeated by the Russian representative to the UN Vasily Nebenzya.
On September 14, Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council and the Kremlin's main mouthpiece on social media Dmitry Medvedev wrote that Russia understands the danger and irreversibility of a nuclear conflict and expresses patience in crossing “red lines,” in particular in connection with the events in the Kursk region. But he also threatened that “any patience may come to an end.”
Recall that earlier Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also decided to remind Ukraine's Western allies of the “red lines” that cannot be crossed.
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