The German government on Monday downplayed the significance of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s comments over the weekendthreatening to change the Russian military position if Installations in the United States More medium-range cruise missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads are planned for German territory in the coming years.
“We will not allow ourselves to be intimidated by such comments,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Sebastian Fischer told a news conference in Berlin.
Christiane Hoffmann, the deputy government spokeswoman, was also asked to respond.
“We have taken note” of Putin’s comments, she said, but she also said the proposed changes would serve “only” as a deterrent, which had become necessary because of recent Russian actions.
She added, “The reason is that Russia has changed the strategic balance in Europe and is threatening Europe and Germany with cruise missiles, and we must create a deterrent force.”
What did Putin say?
Putin said at a naval parade in St. Petersburg on Sunday that if the United States went ahead with plans to deploy additional weapons in Europe that could theoretically target Russia, Moscow would consider taking “corresponding measures.”
It evoked the arms race of the early 1980s, at the tail end of the Cold War, when one of the fundamental Soviet grievances was resolved. Deployment of Pershing missiles in West Germany at the timePutin claimed that the United States risks repeating a similar phenomenon.
“If the United States implements such plans, we will consider ourselves free from the previously imposed unilateral moratorium on the deployment of medium- and short-range strike weapons, including increasing the capabilities of the coastal forces of our Navy,” Putin said.
Here Putin was referring to the terms of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty – From which the United States and then Russia withdrew in 2019..
Both sides blamed each other for violating the terms of the treaty.
But Putin also claimed that Russia had been sticking to its terms anyway since leaving the deal — an assessment that the United States and Germany are likely to dispute — and warned that this could stop if more US weapons were deployed to Germany.
These conflicts were already taking shape before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but the tone and urgency on both sides may have hardened since then.
What changes are planned, and are they new?
According to a joint statement from Washington and Berlin, by 2026 the United States will begin deploying weapons including SM-6 missiles, improved Tomahawk cruise missiles, which could be nuclear-capable, and some “evolutionary hypersonic weapons” in Germany.
The United States and Germany say the move comes in response to developments such as: Russia deploys similar Iksander missiles in Kaliningrad enclave bordering Poland and Lithuania.
“What we are planning now is a response to prevent these weapons from being used against Germany or other targets,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Sebastian Fischer said Monday.
There are already a series of US military bases in Germany, a legacy of World War II and then the Cold War.
Various American missiles, albeit of shorter range, are officially stationed in the country.
It is also an open secret—though neither government officially acknowledges it—that the United States still maintains nuclear weapons at one of its bases in Germany, down from two sites in the years and decades before 2005.
However, the numbers remaining in Germany and some other European countries have fallen dramatically compared to what they were at the height of the Cold War.
msh/wmr (AFP, DPA, Reuters)