This statement was made after Russian Defense Minister Sergey Ivanov presented the report “Urgent issues regarding the development of the Russian armed forces”. The Minister promised not to “rattle the saber”, but at the same time, he indicated that Russia was ready to treat nuclear arms as combat weapons, and it did not rule out the possibility of carrying out pre-emptive strikes.

According to the newspaper, this gives a new meaning to Russia’s defense strategy, adopted on April 21, 2000. If the Defense Ministry’s proposals are backed by the presidential decree, one can speak about a new defense doctrine, especially given that the report mentions a potential enemy.

As for foreign experts, their reaction was negative. According to them, Russia’s “potential enemy” is the United States and NATO. So, the German newspaper Die Welt published an article headlined “Russia warns NATO”, saying that Russia threatens NATO with a radical change in its military doctrine. According to the newspaper, Russian authorities will consider the possibility of adopting a new nuclear strategy if NATO remains “aggressive”.

For its part, the BBC believes that Vladimir Putin resorted to such measures after he failed to agree with his American counterpart George Bush during their recent meeting, or the two leaders might have fallen out. And The Washington Times notes that Mr. Putin decided to review the nuclear doctrine in order to remind NATO about the role of Russia in the international community.

However, an increase in the arsenal of the country’s most powerful missiles would contradict Russia’s plans to remain partners with NATO. In other words, Vladimir Putin’s statement was interpreted as imperial ambitions, fraught with the military threat.

In his recent statement, the Russian President said that Russia had significant reserves of strategic missiles. He stressed that these were Russia’s most powerful missiles, 100MUTTH, capable of breaking through any anti-missile defense system.

According to Mr. Putin, the available heavy missiles would be put into active service as the deployed missiles get decommissioned. “All modernization measures will correspond to Russia’s national interests and the overall international situation,” he added.