Lukashenko: Belarus, Russia doing the same as Western countries as regards training with tactical nuclear weapons
Belarus and Russia are doing the same as Western countries in terms of training the use of tactical nuclear weapons – as stated by President of Belarus Aleksandr Lukashenko in his conversation with media representatives following today’s talks with President of Russia Vladimir Putin
Answering the question about the training, Aleksandr Lukashenko stressed: we have no desire to attack anyone, only to defend ourselves. So, according to the Head of State, it is necessary to be able to use these weapons. The same is true about strategic nuclear weapons.
“This is a deadly, dangerous weapon, you cannot compare it with a machine gun – so it is necessary to train. I have honestly admitted that this is our third training session since the deployment of nuclear weapons on the territory of Belarus. As for Russians (they did not speak of that openly), they have probably conducted dozens of such trainings,” the President said.
According to the Belarusian leader, there is nothing surprising in such approaches. “We are doing the same what they [in the West] did it prior to us, and they continue doing this now: teaching, training foreign pilots, and so on. In particular, Americans are training German pilots to operate nuclear weapons carriers. There is nothing special. We are getting prepared, we are training, we must be ready. The world is unstable, dangerous, we cannot miss this blow – as it was in the middle of the last century. We will not allow this to happen. They should know about it,” he stressed.
Aleksandr Lukashenko also recalled that Belarus and Russia have created a joint group to protect the Union State, “We constantly keep in view everything that is happening on our borders. We see and know this, starting from building different fences and whipping up hysteria with exercises that are being held near our borders. As I said, the latter involve about 90 thousand foreign troops. It is really amazing what Americans, Germans and others are doing there, on our borders.”
The Head of State stressed that this is why up to 90 percent of the agenda is devoted to security issues in the Belarusian-Russian dialogue – although the current meeting was an exception, since it focused on the economy: the latter is at the heart of security as well.
With this in view, as noted by the President, attention has been paid to security issues, and this policy will continue. The Belarusian leader emphasised, “We are not escalating the situation. We do not need a war. We have talked only about peaceful prospects today, and I am grateful to the President of Russia, who took the head of the strategic initiatives group as part of his delegation, for telling me something that is difficult even to comprehend. This is our near future. That is why we are talking about peace, but we keep the powder dry. Nothing special.”
Vladimir Putin continued, “Russia has regularly conducted and conducts exercises of strategic and non-strategic nuclear deterrence forces. The only difference is that, in terms of non-strategic nuclear potential, we are doing this together with our Belarusian allies on the territory of Belarus.”
In this context, the Russian President made an important statement, “We treat the security of Belarus in the same way as we treat the security of the Russian Federation. This is a key element of our co-operation in this area.”
At the same time, Vladimir Putin stressed that the Russian Federation fully complies with all norms and obligations in the field of nuclear weapons, “There is nothing here that we would violate, there is nothing unusual compared to the work of the NATO bloc, for example. The same exercises are regularly held there, and they involve NATO countries, on whose territory American tactical nuclear weapons are deployed. All this is happening in our country in accordance with the pre-scheduled plans, and we are not escalating anything here. However, as it has been said, everything must be worked out. This is an area where neither failures nor mistakes can be allowed.”
