During his public question-and-answer session yesterday, Russian President Vladimir Putin argued, in response to one question, that even if the Russian military had sunk the HMS Defender, last week, it would not have triggered a war. “You said the world teetered on the brink of a world war. No, of course not. Even if we had sunk that ship, it would still be difficult to imagine that this would have put the world on the brink of WWIII, since those who are doing this, they know that they cannot emerge victorious from this war,” he said. (Putin would do well to recall the advice of Lyndon LaRouche, who frequently said that one should never discount the possibility that one’s interlocutors on the other side of the table might actually be insane.) Putin added that a new war wouldn’t make Russia happy either. “But we at least know what we are fighting for. We are fighting on our territory for ourselves, for our future,” Putin stressed.
The political question, Putin continued, is “ why was it necessary to stage such a provocation? What was this all done for? For the sake of emphasizing that these people don’t respect the choice of the Crimean people to join the Russian Federation, that they don’t recognize something there? Well, okay, carry on with not recognizing this. But why stage such provocations?” the president asked.
In response to the cessation of Russian military exercises near Ukraine’s borders, Western countries showed up on Russia’s borders, he went on to say. “It was not us coming to them from thousands of kilometers away, flying or sailing. It was they who approached our borders and violated our territorial sea, and this is an essential element in all that construction,” Putin stressed.
“Look, first, there was a big fuss over our exercises we were holding near the Ukrainian borders. I issued instructions to the Defense Ministry to gradually curtail them and pull the troops back, if somebody finds them worrisome,” Putin said. But instead of reacting to this positively and saying: “Good, we have seen your response to our anger,” what did they do? They showed up on our borders,” Putin said.
Putin also warned against the ongoing Western militarization of Ukraine. “I am concerned over another, more fundamental thing, namely that the military exploitation of Ukrainian territory is starting to unfold,” he said. Putin acknowledged that the Ukrainian constitution does permit the establishment of foreign-operated training centers on Ukrainian territory as well as other forms of military cooperation. “However, the military exploitation of the territory that directly borders on our country, this process creates considerable security problems for us. This now concerns the vital interests of the Russian Federation and the people of Russia,” Putin highlighted. “This is what raises our concern and we must think about that,” he said, pointing out that this is not at all about attempts to ‘take digs” at Russia by any means.
