LONDON – One of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest allies warned NATO on Thursday that if Sweden and Finland join the US-led military alliance, then Russia will deploy nuclear weapons and hypersonic missiles in a European exclave.
Finland, which shares a 1,300 km (810 miles) border with Russia, and Sweden are considering joining the NATO alliance. Finland will make a decision in the next few weeks, Prime Minister Sanna Marin said on Wednesday.
Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, said that if Sweden and Finland joined NATO, then Russia would have to strengthen its ground, naval and air forces in the Baltic Sea.
Medvedev also explicitly raised the nuclear threat, saying he could no longer talk about a “nuclear-free” Baltic – where Russia has its own Kaliningrad exclave, sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania.
“We can no longer talk about the status of the Baltic Sea without nuclear energy – the balance must be restored,” said Medvedev, who was Russian president from 2008 to 2012.
Medvedev said he hoped Finland and Sweden would see the point. If not, he said, they would have to live with nuclear weapons and hypersonic missiles near home.
Asked how Washington views the potential accession of Sweden and Finland to NATO in light of Russia’s warning, the US State Department said there was no change in Washington’s position and reiterated that “NATO’s open door is an open door”.
“Without talking specifically to any country, we will not worry that expanding a defense alliance will do anything but promote the stability of the European continent,” ministry spokesman Ned Price said at a briefing.
Russia has the largest arsenal of nuclear warheads in the world and, along with China and the United States, is one of the world’s leaders in hypersonic missile technology.
Lithuania has said that Russia’s threats are nothing new and that Moscow deployed nuclear weapons in Kaliningrad long before the war in Ukraine. NATO did not respond immediately to Russia’s warning.
Still, the possible accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO – founded in 1949 to secure the West’s security against the Soviet Union – would be one of the biggest strategic consequences of the war in Ukraine.
Finland gained independence from Russia in 1917 and waged two wars against it during World War II, during which it lost part of its territory. On Thursday, Finland announced a military exercise in western Finland involving Britain, the United States, Latvia and Estonia.
Sweden has not fought a war in 200 years. Foreign policy focuses on supporting democracy and nuclear disarmament.
KALININGRAD
Kaliningrad, the former port of Königsberg, the capital of East Prussia, is less than 1,400 km from London and Paris and 500 km from Berlin.
Russia said in 2018 that it had deployed Iskander missiles in Kaliningrad, which had been captured by the Red Army in April 1945 and ceded to the Soviet Union at a conference in Potsdam.
Iskander, known as NATO’s SS-26 Stone, is a short-range tactical ballistic missile system that can carry nuclear warheads. Its official range is 500 km, but some Western military sources suspect it may be much larger.
“No sane person wants higher prices and higher taxes, increased border tensions, Iskanders, hypersonic and nuclear-powered ships literally within arm’s reach of his own home,” Medvedev said.
“Let’s hope that the common sense of our northern neighbors will win.
While Putin is Russia’s top leader, Medvedev’s comments reflect the Kremlin’s thinking and he is a senior member of the Security Council, one of Putin’s main chambers for strategic decisions.
Lithuanian Defense Minister Arvidas Anusauskas said Russia had deployed nuclear weapons in Kaliningrad before the war.
“Nuclear weapons have always been stored in Kaliningrad … the international community, the countries in the region are fully aware of that,” Anusauskas was quoted as saying by BNS. – They use it as a threat.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24 killed thousands, displaced millions and raised fears of a wider confrontation between Russia and the United States, the world’s two largest nuclear powers.
Putin says a “special military operation” in Ukraine is necessary because the United States used Ukraine to threaten Russia, and Moscow had to defend itself against the persecution of Russian-speakers.
Ukraine says it is fighting an imperial-style seizure of land and that Putin’s allegations of genocide are nonsense. US President Joe Biden has said Putin is a war criminal and a dictator.
Putin says the conflict in Ukraine is part of a much broader confrontation with the United States, which he says is trying to impose its hegemony, even as its dominance over the international order wanes.
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(Additional reports by Daphne Psaledakis and Humeirah Pamuk in Washington. Report by Guy Falkonbridge; Edited by Nick McPhee and Alistair Bell)
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