Top Russian military officials discussed using nuclear weapon in Ukraine, US report says
- Report says Vladimir Putin did not take part in the discussions, and there was no indication the Russian military had decided to deploy them
- The Russian leader’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov says Western media is ‘deliberately pumping up the topic’ of the use of nuclear arms
The White House said it was increasingly concerned over Moscow’s talk of using a nuclear weapon in Ukraine, after a media report said top Russian military officials had discussed how and when to use such a weapon.
“We have grown increasingly concerned about the potential as these months have gone on,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said on Wednesday.
Kirby did not confirm a New York Times report that said high-level Russian military officials recently discussed when and how they might use tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield.
The report, which cited unnamed US officials, said Russian President Vladimir Putin did not take part in the discussions, and there was no indication that the Russian military had decided to deploy the weapons.
But Kirby said any comments on the use of nuclear weapons by Russia are “deeply concerning”, and said the United States takes them seriously.
He pointed to recent Putin comments talking about nuclear weapons and referencing the bombs US forces dropped on the Japanese cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki near the end of World War II.