President Putin has used a video link to observe Russian nuclear drills in the remote Kamchatka region that simulated a “massive” strike against his enemies.
They involved Yars intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarines and Tupolev Tu-95 “Bear” strategic bombers, said Valery Gerasimov, Russia’s top general, with all the missiles apparently hitting their targets.
Sergei Shoigu, the defence minister, told Putin that the drills, codenamed Grom (Thunder), simulated “a massive nuclear strike by strategic offensive forces in response to an enemy nuclear strike”. He warned earlier that the eight-month war in Ukraine was heading towards an “uncontrolled escalation”.
The United States said that Russia had notified it in advance about the annual exercises.
The Kremlin accused Kyiv this week of planning to use a “dirty bomb” – one laced with radioactive material – in Ukraine but did not produce any evidence to back up its claim. Nato dismissed the accusation as “absurd” but some analysts say the allegation could be aimed at preparing the ground for a Russian “false flag” attack.
Putin has threatened to use Russia’s nuclear arsenal, the world’s largest, to prevent Ukrainian forces from recapturing territory in four regions of the country that the Kremlin now claims as its own. State television pundits have urged him to launch nuclear attacks on western countries, including Britain.
However, American defence officials have said there is no intelligence to indicate that Putin has made any decision to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine. Oleksii Reznikov, the Ukrainian defence minister, said today that he did not believe that Russia would use nuclear weapons.
Alexander Dugin, the nationalist philosopher whose daughter, Darya, was killed in a car bombing in August, told Russia’s religious and political elite yesterday that the Ukraine conflict was a holy war between Russia and demonic western forces that would lead to the end of the world. “This is why we are talking more often about Armageddon, the end of times, and the Apocalypse,” Dugin, whose books are said to have influenced Kremlin policymakers, told a meeting of the World Russian People’s Council in Moscow. “This is all unfolding in front of our eyes.”
