In his interview with Tass on Dec. 26, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned against threats made by “anonymous Pentagon officials” of a “decapitation strike” aimed at assassinating Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin. “The one who’s gone the farthest of all the others is in Washington. There are some ‘anonymous officials’ from the Pentagon who have actually enunciated threats to deliver a ‘decapitating strike’ on the Kremlin, which is in fact an assassination threat against the Russian President,” Lavrov said.
“If someone really has such ideas, then this someone should think long and hard about the possible consequences of such plans,” the Foreign Minister cautioned.
Lavrov may well have been referring to a Sept. 29, 2022, Newsweek article by the discredited Pentagon leaker, William Arkin, entitled “Biden Thinks Non-Nuclear Threats Will Stop Putin. His Military Doesn’t.” The article is based on the false premise that the danger of nuclear war comes from Putin threatening to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, which the US must “deter.” According to Arkin, the Biden Administration and the Pentagon disagree over whether or not Putin can be “deterred” from using nuclear weapons by threats to devastate Russia by non-nuclear means. He quotes at least three unnamed US officials to the effect that US threats to “devastate” Russia by conventional means won’t “deter” Putin from using nuclear weapons if he chooses to do so.
