Highlighting the growing threat of a global nuclear catastrophe stemming from the prospect of a direct Russia-NATO clash in Ukraine, Lavrov in an interview with Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn, Russia’s leading international affairs journal emphasized that at its core, the risks stem from the Western alliance’s “gross violation” of the principles of indivisible security, and a desire to see Russia’s “strategic defeat” in the proxy war in Ukraine.
The Russian top diplomat stressed that Russia’s nuclear doctrine was and remains “purely defensive in nature,” and “aimed at maintaining the minimum necessary nuclear force potential to guarantee the defense of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the state, and prevent aggression against Russia and its allies.”
“In the context of deterrence, the possession of nuclear weapons is presently the only possible response to some of the major external threats to the security of our country.
The situation around Ukraine has only served to confirm the validity of our concerns in this area,” Lavrov said, with a “great danger” posed by the US and NATO’s drive toward escalation resulting in “direct armed clashes between nuclear powers. We believe that such a development can and should be prevented. Therefore, we are forced to remind and send sobering signals to our opponents of the existence of these extreme military-political risks.”
In the meantime, he said, Moscow will continue to adhere to the view that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought, and urge other nuclear states to “maintain adherence to these understandings and to exercise maximum restraint.”
The Russian top diplomat cited the West’s seemingly insatiable drive to dominate other nations as one of the key factors standing in the way of harmonious global development.
Russia, he said, has to “deal with the constant desire of the Western minority for military-political and financial-economic expansion. The slogans change, from globalization and Westernization to Americanization, universalization, liberalization, etc. But the essence remains the same: to subjugate all independent actors to their will, to force them to play by rules that benefit the West,” Lavrov said, Sputnik reported.
According to Lavrov, Washington and its allies are seeking to slow down “or even reverse” the evolution of international affairs to prevent the emergence of a multipolar order and a “more just architecture of international affairs,” which Russia sees as its “mission” to support.
“The West has people leading it today such as Josep Borrell [the European Union’s foreign policy chief, ed.] which divide the world into their ‘flowering garden’ and the ‘jungle,’ where, in their view, most of humanity resides. With such a racist worldview (and I’m not afraid to use this word), it is of course difficult to come to terms with the arrival of multipolarity. The political and economic establishment in Europe and the United States is right to fear that the transition to a multipolar system will be associated with serious geopolitical and economic losses for them, including the final breakdown of globalization in its current, Western-crafted form. First and foremost, they are afraid of the prospect of losing the opportunity to live parasitically off the rest of the world, ensuring faster economic growth for themselves at the expense of the rest of the world,” the Russian top diplomat said.
The crisis in relations between Russia and the West has created considerable risks, but also at least one benefit, Lavrov believes, with the majority of the world getting a unique “opportunity to see the true face of those who claimed almost a monopoly on the right to determine ‘universal values’.”
Lavrov stressed that the Ukrainian crisis didn’t start in 2022, with Western countries spending “many years” working to turn Russia’s neighbors into military footholds hostile to Moscow, “nurturing a whole generation of politicians preparing to declare war on our common history, culture, and in general everything Russian.”
“Western leaders have openly admitted that they did not plan to implement the Minsk Agreements aimed at resolving the conflict in Ukraine. In reality, they only stalled for time to prepare for a military scenario while pumping Kyiv up with arms,” Lavrov said, referring to recent revelations by former leaders of Ukraine, France and Germany regarding the Minsk deal.
“I think it’s important to understand the main thing: that the West wants to eliminate our country as a serious geopolitical competitor,” Lavrov said.
This, he noted, explains the “hybrid war” being waged against Russia, through sanctions, threats of secondary restrictions against countries cooperating with Russia, acts of sabotage, such as last year’s terror attacks against the Nord Stream pipeline network, efforts to “disconnect” Russia from international cultural, educational, scientific and sporting events, etc.
Meanwhile, he added, the roughly 50 countries representing the so-called “Ramstein Coalition” supporting Ukraine militarily are “factually involved in the armed conflict” against Russia, delivering cluster bombs and long-range missiles, using NATO instructors to plan operations and providing Kyiv with intelligence.
“It’s clear that these and other aggressive measures are aimed at weakening and exhausting Russia. They seek to exhaust our economic, technological and defense capabilities as much as possible, to limit our sovereignty and force us to abandon our independent course in foreign and domestic policy,” the diplomat said.
Lavrov pointed out that the West has now provided in excess of $160 billion in military and economic aid to the Zelensky regime, with one Washington-based think tank calculating that the $113 billion provided by the United States alone is equivalent to about $900 for every American household, plus $300 in interest on servicing the related debt obligations. “These are huge sums, especially given the difficult situation in the global economy.”
MNA/PR