Chris Lange, FISM News

[elfsight_social_share_buttons id=”1″]

Russia continues to raise the specter of a nuclear war, becoming increasingly direct in its rhetoric that they are not afraid to use its arsenal of nukes if they deem it necessary.

A top Putin official said on Tuesday that “Russia has the right to use nuclear weapons” to protect itself and that the West won’t interfere because they don’t want ‘to die in a nuclear apocalypse.”

Dmitry Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of the Kremlin’s Security Council, said the warning is “certainly not a bluff,” echoing the words of President Putin who said last week that he was “not bluffing” in his threat to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine – a caution that has taken on greater significance than previous warnings from the Russian leader in the context of Moscow’s preparations to annex four separatist regions in Ukraine’s east and south by the end of this week. Any military effort by Kyiv to retake the territory could be framed as an attack on Russia itself, a pretext for the use of nuclear arms under Russian law.

“Let’s imagine that Russia is forced to use the most fearsome weapon against the Ukrainian regime which had committed a large-scale act of aggression that is dangerous for the very existence of our state,” Medvedev said in a post on Telegram. “I believe that NATO would not directly interfere in the conflict even in this scenario. The demagogues across the ocean and in Europe are not going to die in a nuclear apocalypse.”

“I have to remind you again – for those deaf ears who hear only themselves. Russia has the right to use nuclear weapons if necessary,” Medvedev continued, adding that it would do so “in predetermined cases” and in compliance with state policy.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that at the conclusion of the annexation voting process, which has included Russian troops forcing people to vote in door-to-door sweeps, “the situation will radically change from the legal viewpoint, from the point of view of international law, with all the corresponding consequences for protection of those areas and ensuring their security.”

The final day of voting in the preordained referendums was taking place in Russian-held regions of Ukraine on Tuesday, signaling a dangerous new phase in the conflict. In the wake of recent humiliating battlefield losses resulting from a surprisingly successful counteroffensive by Kyiv forces that saw Ukraine recapture territories in the east, analysis are saying that the referendums, coupled with Putin’s announcement of Russia’s first military draft since World War Two, which has served to increase anti-war sentiment among his countrymen, are signs that the quixotic leader feels he’s been backed into a corner, heightening fears that he will abandon restraint in an effort to regain control of the conflict as it drags into its eighth month.

Russia and the U.S. possess around 90% of the world’s nuclear warheads.

On Sunday, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan warned, “If Russia crosses this line, there will be catastrophic consequences for Russia,” and that “The United States will respond decisively.”