The US President did not answer the journalists' question about Washington's specific actionsWASHINGTON, September 17.
/tass/. US President Joe Biden has warned that if chemical or tactical nuclear weapons are used in Ukraine, Russia faces international consequences. Excerpts from his interview with CBS with a corresponding statement were made public on Friday.
The American leader was asked what he would say to Russian President Vladimir Putin "if he considered the possibility of using chemical or tactical nuclear weapons" in Ukraine. "Don't. You will change the face of war like nothing since World War II," Biden replied.
Then the journalist asked him what would be the consequences of the possible use of chemical or tactical nuclear weapons by the Russian Federation in Ukraine, what would be the reaction of the United States. "You think I would tell you if I knew exactly how it would be. Of course I won't tell you. This will have consequences. They will become more outcasts in the world than ever. And depending on the scale of what they will do, it will depend on what [our] response will be," the head of the White House argued.
Last month, the head of the Department for Nonproliferation and Arms Control of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Alexander Trofimov, rejected "absolutely groundless, detached from reality and unacceptable speculation that Russia is allegedly threatened with the use of nuclear weapons, in particular in Ukraine." He did not rule out that "this is being done specifically for the purpose of whipping up anti-Russian hysteria." As the diplomat recalled, Russia allows "nuclear reaction exclusively in response to aggression with the use of weapons of mass destruction or in response to aggression with the use of conventional weapons, when the very existence of the state is threatened." Trofimov added that "none of these hypothetical scenarios has anything to do with the situation in Ukraine." As the representative of the Russian Federation stressed, Moscow considers one of the most important tasks "the preservation by all the countries of the nuclear Five of their commitment to the postulate of preventing nuclear war, confirmed by them in the January joint statement at the highest level."
On February 24, Putin announced a special military operation in Ukraine in connection with the request of the leaders of the republics of Donbass for help. He stressed that Moscow's plans do not include the occupation of Ukrainian territories, and the goals are demilitarization and denazification of the country. The West, in response to Russia's decision, began gradually imposing numerous and large-scale sanctions against it. Along with this, Western states have begun to supply weapons and military equipment to Kiev for amounts estimated at this stage in the tens of billions of dollars. A number of Western politicians have admitted that it is, in fact, an economic war against Russia. As Putin stated on March 16, the Western sanctions policy towards Moscow has all the signs of aggression. He pointed out that the policy of containing Russia is a long-term strategy of the West.
