President Putin's remarks on Russia's progress in its nuclear rearmament have sparked panic in the West about Moscow's supposed plans to kick off an arms race and start a new Cold War. But what observers ignored was the core of his message – that it was the West itself that forced Russia to build up its capabilities amid endless provocations.
Vladimir Putin has made it crystal clear that Moscow is on the defensive, years after fruitlessly asking its Western 'partners' to stop encircling Russia with a web of strategic weapons, bases and power-changing conflicts – from the Middle East to Eastern Europe.
Commenting on the president's "Nobody wanted to listen to us. So listen now," remarks, which accompanied the new strategic weapons unveiled in his Thursday speech, the Guardian and Voice of America accused Putin of "threatening" the US with an arms race, while The Washington Post charged the Russian leader with digging up "chilling echoes" of the Cold War.
The Pentagon boasted that it was "ready" to react to "anything that may come our way." The White House, in turn, accused Moscow of "developing destabilizing weapon systems…in direct violation of its treaty obligations."
In Thursday's speech, Putin recalled a warning he made in 2004 to build a new generation of strategic weapons to counter the deployment of the US global missile defense system.
"As you can see, we made no secret of our plans and spoke about them openly, primarily to encourage our partners into holding talks. Let me repeat, this was in 2004," Putin emphasized. Unfortunately, notwithstanding Moscow's status as a nuclear power, "nobody really wanted to talk to us about the core of the problem. Nobody wanted to listen to us. So listen now," he quipped, before moving on to a series of presentations about Russia's latest strategic weapons.
For any mainstream media giants who would like to blame Russia's new weapons for being the opening shot in a Cold War 2.0 confrontation, there are a few things worth bearing in mind.
#1: It wasn't Moscow that withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 and began to deploy a missile defense system on its strategic rival's western borders, under the pretense of an imaginary threat from Iran.
In 2016, Putin recalled that Washington had continued its missile defense buildup in Poland and Romania even after the signing of the Iranian nuclear deal in 2015, thus dispelling any pretense that the system was a response to any sort of Iranian threat.
Pointing out that Moscow had made a series of proposals to Washington on the creation of a joint missile defense shield, Putin pointed out that all of Russia's proposals "were rejected…Everything is done unilaterally, without taking into account our concerns."
© FLICKR/ US ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS EUROPE DISTRICT
The US Army Corps of Engineers Europe District is managing the construction of a $134 million Aegis Ashore Missile Defense Complex in Deveselu, Romania
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