MOSCOW, October 13. /TASS/. NATO’s nuclear drills may prompt Russia to respond; lasting peace in the Gaza Strip remains uncertain; and Afghan-Pakistan border clashes are unlikely to turn into a war. These stories topped Monday’s newspaper headlines across Russia.
October 13 marks the start of NATO’s nuclear deterrence exercise, dubbed Steadfast Noon. This year, Finland is for the second straight year participating in the drills. This is a risky development because such an exercise may prompt Moscow to take retaliatory steps, a senior member of Russia’s Federation Council (upper house of parliament) told Izvestia.
These kinds of drills make it obvious that NATO is not a defensive alliance but an offensive one, Federation Council Deputy Chairman Konstantin Kosachev stressed. According to him, it’s NATO that has been taking provocative steps since the end of the Cold War, while Moscow has repeatedly called on the alliance to stop the eastward expansion of its military infrastructure and end the integration of states bordering Russia.
Russia may respond by conducting its own maneuvers, Alexey Leonkov, military expert and editor of the Arsenal of the Fatherland magazine, pointed out. "We hold annual strategic drills anyway, which notably involve our strategic nuclear forces - the nuclear triad," he explained. The combat capability of Russia’s nuclear triad has been upgraded by 99%, Leonkov noted, adding that no NATO country has managed to reach such a level yet.
