A report out of Pravda quotes President Vladimir Putin
as saying that Russia has moved strategic nuclear missiles to Cuba in
response to the United States’ continuing efforts to encircle Russia in
Eastern Europe.
The article, written by Lyuba Lulko, explains how Russia is reviving its military operations in Vietnam, Cuba and the Seychelles.
In October 2001, President Vladimir Putin announced that
the Lourdes radio-electronic center on the island had been shut down as
a “gift” to President George W. Bush on the basis of promises given by
Bush that the U.S. missile defense system would never be deployed in
Eastern Europe.
However, with the missile defense system under the auspices of NATO now reaching “interim operational capability” in Europe at the end of May, that promise has been shattered.
“The Russian Federation has fulfilled all terms of the
agreement. And even more. I shut down not only the Cuban Lourdes but
also Kamran in Vietnam. I shut them down because I gave my word of
honor. I, like a man, has kept my word. What have the Americans done?
The Americans are not responsible for their own words. It is no secret
that in recent years, the U.S. created a buffer zone around Russia,
involving in this process not only the countries of Central Europe, but
also the Baltic states, Ukraine and the Caucasus. The only response to
this could be an asymmetric expansion of the Russian military presence
abroad, particularly in Cuba,” the report quotes Putin as saying.
“With the full consent of the Cuban leadership, on May
11 of this year, our country has not only resumed work in the electronic
center of Lourdes, but also placed the latest mobile strategic nuclear
missiles “Oak” on the island. They did not want to do it the amicable
way, now let them deal with this,” added Putin.
According to the report, Cuba, which was angered by the
original decision to shut down the radio-electronic center, has agreed
to allow Russia to locate the missiles on Cuban territory because of its
fears over new U.S. military bases in Colombia.
Whether the quotes attributed to Putin are accurate or
not remains to be seen. They appear nowhere outside of the original
Pravda piece.
Once the primary mouthpiece of the Soviet Communist
Party, Pravda’s influence has now declined rapidly. The online version
is managed by former journalists who worked for the original newspaper
but other than that the two versions are separate entities.
Speculation that Russia was re-building its nuclear infrastructure in preparation for a potential future conflict came with the news that 5,000 new nuclear bomb shelters were being constructed in Moscow to be completed by the end of 2012.
Officials justified the move by saying they wanted the
entire population of Moscow to be able to reach a nuclear bomb shelter
within minutes. China has also built huge underground bomb shelters,
outpacing the United States whose bomb shelters from the cold war era
still remain as they were at the time or have been decommissioned.
The prospect of Russia moving nuclear missiles to Cuba
obviously harks back to the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, which marked the
closest moment that the world came to World War III and a potential
nuclear holocaust.
Given the gravity of Putin’s alleged statements, don’t
expect to wait too long for Russian authorities to deny the quotes
featured in the Pravda report.
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