Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday slammed the US for its military expansion in Eastern Europe as Russia is seeking guarantees that NATO won’t move further east.
“We have made it clear that Nato’s move to the east is unacceptable,” Putin said at an annual year-end press conference. “The United States is standing with missiles on our doorstep. Is it an excessive requirement not to install shock systems at our house? How would the Americans react if missiles were placed at the border with Canada or Mexico?”
Putin pointed out that at the end of the Cold War, the US said NATO wouldn’t expand. “Sometimes it seems we are living in different worlds,” he said. “They said they wouldn’t expand, but they are expanding,” he said.
Since the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, NATO has grown from 16 member states to 30, including some former Soviet states. A major demand of Putin’s is for NATO to formally rescind a promise made in 2008 that Ukraine would eventually become a member of the military alliance.
The US and Russia have agreed to begin talks on Russia’s proposed security guarantees in January, although a date hasn’t yet been set. “American partners tell us that they are ready to launch this discussion, these talks in Geneva at the very beginning of next year. Both sides’ representatives have been appointed. I hope that the situation will unfold exactly under this scenario,” Putin said.
Besides the calls to halt NATO’s eastward expansion, Russia wants mutual agreements on the deployment of nuclear weapons and other military assets in Eastern Europe. The US has signaled it’s willing to negotiate with Moscow on the issues but has called some of the Russian demands “unacceptable.”
It might be posturing but it seemed to me putin was genuinely angry.
He has reason to be
https://anti-empire.com/putin-its-not-an-ultimatum-we-simply-have-nowhere-further-to-retreat-to/
I know the history but putin is very calculated and don’t get emotional, the way turkey moved in Russian spheres of influence in places like Ukraine and Azerbaijan while being a middle power would have made us insane with rage if someone did it to us but putin still accommodating the turks.
He genuinely sees the west as a strategical threat that kept coming at Russia when Russia always tried to accommodate us
Putin has a lot of good company. There are millions of us who are tired of the US and Israel constantly causing problems. If the Neocons are so hell bent in screwing with Putin let them go to Ukraine and fight. The rest of us will take a powder. We don’t give a damn about Ukraine and Syria.
I agree with most of what you said but I think that we should care about Ukraine and Syria. What we don’t need is to be interfering in this region, which is complicated enough.
Perhaps its best that the USA/NATO remembers, ‘Don’t poke the bear!”
Sound advice.
“How would the Americans react if missiles were placed at the border with Canada or Mexico?”
A question that never gets answered. Or even asked by the MSM.
That would take too much thought.
Ever notice that political polls here in the US, never delve into foreign policy issues? Evidently the Deep State doesn’t want to hear that most of the people don’t want to risk nuclear MAD over a backwater like Ukraine.
Well said. Although I do not agree that Ukraine is a backwater…
Sadly, foreign policy is not something that Americans care about. I find few people who know or care about it. All they know is the garbage they get from the mainstream media – Russia, China and Iran, bad. Israel, good. It’s probably best that the “News” doesn’t usually cover what’s happening in the rest of the world.
Putin asks, “How would the Americans react if missiles were placed at the border with Canada or Mexico?”
When Khrushchev placed missiles in Cuba, a hundred miles from Florida, it made JFK fighting mad.
Well said.
In a nutshell I’d doubt Putin would order an full scale invasion of a fellow Slavic nation knowing how unpopular it’d be with his fellow Russians.
If these talks in Geneva fail next month, expect another Cuban Missile Style Crisis. Putin has already warned about this back in 2019. Then we’d better pray if that happens a compromise JFK Krushchev style happens like in October 1962.
“….How would the Americans react if missiles were placed at the border with Canada or Mexico?” – V. Putin
that’s all you really need to know to decide this issue
Full version of this press conference is on youtube – search for “putin press conference 2021”, video is there – a bit longer than 4 hours.
Nothing will come out of the conference. Washington in its arrogance, has no intention of taking Russia seriously. Past promises mean nothing. Wahington thinks it can win a war with Russia, something they have wanted for a long time. If Washington wants a fight in Ukraine, they’re going to get it and pay a heavy price. They’ll be crushed.
I’d be surprised if Russia invades Ukraine, Putin isn’t that stupid, because he knows full well how unpopular a war with a fellow Slavic nation will be among his fellow Russians.
Expect Russia to put weapons in either Venezuela or Cuba. He has already warned the West about this. This time if there is a US blockade , he’ll sink it.
“how unpopular a war with a fellow Slavic nation” – those who voted for Yanukovich wouldn’t mind Russia to do the same in their regions what was done in 2014 in Crimea. May be you don’t know that southern and eastern regions of Ukraine always voted for pro-Russian candidates. For example, in Donbass in 2010 presidential election, Yanukovich got over 90% support. Now those people live under neo-Nazi occupation, thousands killed, thousands arrested and disappeared.