RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin indicated in an interview set to be broadcast Sunday that Russia suspended its participation in the New START treaty not only because of U.S. nuclear capabilities but those of other NATO countries.
As he has done repeatedly during the Ukraine war, also Putin claimed in excerpts carried by Russian news agencies that Russia faces an existential threat because, in his view, NATO members are seeking his country’s “strategic defeat.”
Putin announced Tuesday that Moscow was suspending its participation in the 2010 treaty’s nuclear warhead and missile inspections. In the interview scheduled to air on state TV channel Russia 1 following Friday’s one-year anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, he said his declaration stemmed from the need to “ensure security, strategic stability” for Russia.
“When all the leading NATO countries have declared their main goal as inflicting a strategic defeat on us … how can we ignore their nuclear
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