Putin Orders Nuclear Deterrent Boost to Step NATO Threat

[Purveyor]

By Ilya Arkhipov and Henry Meyer Sep 10, 2014 10:15 AM ET

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a long-term defense spending plan by the end of next month, saying it must address new threats the country faces from the U.S. and its NATO allies.

“We have to assess accurately and fully the potential threats to the military security of Russia,” Putin said at a Kremlin meeting on defense-spending plans to 2030. The main security task over that period will be ensuring the country’s nuclear deterrent, he said.

Russia must bolster its defenses after the U.S. unilaterally pulled out of a missile-defense treaty and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization uses the crisis in Ukraine to win a new lease on life for the Cold War-era bloc, Putin said at the meeting.

The comments follow the U.S.-led military alliance’s summit last week in the U.K., where leaders agreed to shore up NATO’s eastern defenses against a resurgent Russia by rotating more troops through the area and setting up a rapid-reaction force.

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Russia is concerned over the decision, as well as the militarization of space and the U.S. building missile defenses in Europe and Alaska, close to Russia’s borders, Putin said. Still, the country won’t allow itself to be drawn into a new arms race, he said.

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-09-10/putin-orders-nuclear-deterrent-boost-to-step-nato-threat.html

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

1. The pissing contest continues.