Experts shared views on Minsk's elegant response to West’s nuclear blackmail
It is important that Minsk gets the right to use these weapons for the defence of the country if necessary, and the Belarusian military master the relevant competencies – as stated by Belarusian political expert Aleksandr Shpakovsky, commenting on the statement of Russian President Vladimir Putin that Moscow and Minsk have agreed to deploy tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of Belarus
Vladimir Putin made his statement on March 25th in his talk with Rossiya 24 TV channel’s journalist, Pavel Zarubin. The Russian leader, in particular, said, “On April 3rd, we will start training the crew, and on July 1st, we will complete the construction of a special storage for tactical nuclear weapons on the Belarusian territory.”
Mr. Shpakovsky commented, “As I have predicted, nuclear weapons will be deployed in Belarus. It seems important that Minsk gets the right to use these weapons for the defence of the country if necessary, and the Belarusian military master the relevant competencies.”
The expert added, “The prediction of the Constitutional Commission in 2021 that the international situation would worsen and that it was necessary to exclude the provision on the nuclear-free status of the state from the Basic Law has turned out to be absolutely accurate.”
A Russian political expert, the Deputy Director of the RUDN Institute for Strategic Studies and Forecasts, Victoria Fedosova, also touched upon the topic of the construction of a special storage for tactical nuclear weapons in her talk with the Soloviev Live channel. “We all paid attention when Aleksandr Grigorievich [Lukashenko] was the first to touch on this topic, responding very elegantly to the UK threats to provide depleted uranium shells. We already understood that the issue was on the agenda: Lukashenko would not just have said anything like that.”
Back in November 2021, Belarus’ President did not rule out the possibility of deploying Russian nuclear weapons in Belarus. He said that in an interview to Dmitry Kiselyov, the General Director of Rossiya Segodnya international news agency. The Head of State was asked to comment on the NATO Secretary General’s recent statement about the possibility of deploying nuclear weapons in Eastern Europe. “Well, I’ll then propose Putin to bring nuclear weapons back to Belarus," Aleksandr Lukashenko said. "What nuclear weapons do you mean?" Mr. Kiselyov asked in reply. The President then explained, “We will agree on what kind it will be. These will be nuclear weapons that will prove most effective in such an engagement. It's not for nothing that I said: we are ready for this move on the territory of Belarus. As a judicious landlord, I have destroyed nothing [of the USSR nuclear weapon infrastructure].”
