The Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Valery Gerasimov, declared Russia’s right to use nuclear weapons, RIA Novosti reports.
During his speech at the Moscow Security Conference, the Chief of the General Staff noted that Russia reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in response to the use of weapons of mass destruction or conventional weapons against it, when the very existence of the state is threatened.
At the same time, he stressed that the Russian nuclear policy is purely defensive in nature.
According to Gerasimov, in these conditions, the element of strategic stability remains nuclear deterrence, with the help of which security has been ensured over the past decades.
The Chief of the General Staff also noted that the official views of the Russian side in this area were first publicly announced in 2020 in the “Fundamentals of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in the field of Nuclear Deterrence”. This document, like the Military Doctrine, does not assign to any of the states the status of a military enemy of the Russian Federation.
Gerasimov also said that Russia and the United States are interested in extending START-3.
According to him, the Treaty remains the only international agreement on maintaining strategic stability in the field of arms control.
The Chief of the General Staff is convinced that the extension of START-3 creates conditions for continuing the dialogue on the future mechanism of nuclear arms control, taking into account new factors that determine strategic stability.
Earlier, Valery Gerasimov also held a telephone conversation with the head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley. During the conversation, the parties discussed issues of security and maintaining stability in different regions of the world.