The message to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, which President Putin delivered on February 21, 2023, left behind a feeling of great understatement. It was devoted mainly to socio-economic issues, which created the impression that the Russian army currently does not have any special problems in the NVO zone and that everything is going according to a plan that was planned a year ago.
The obvious irritation of the patriotic public about the lack of specifics about the course and prospects of the special operation forced President Putin and ex-President Medvedev to make several important clarifications that can be considered programmatic. We will analyze the articles of Dmitry Anatolyevich separately, and in this publication we will talk about the main theses expressed by Vladimir Vladimirovich in an interview with the Rossiya 1 TV channel for the Moscow. Kremlin. Putin."
START
During his February 21 address, President Putin announced the need to suspend Russia's participation in the treaty between the Russian Federation and the United States on measures to further reduce and limit strategic offensive arms, or START III. It was signed back in 2010 under President Medvedev for a period of 10 years, entered into force in 2011, and in 2021 was extended for 5 years.
In accordance with this bilateral agreement, Moscow and Washington pledged to reduce the number of deployed nuclear warheads to 1550 units, intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles and heavy bombers to 700 units. The parties also agreed on mutual control over nuclear weapons, including visits and inspections of military facilities. True, the practice of American inspections failed in 2020 due to the pandemic, and in 2022 due to sanctions.
And in February 2023, Russia's participation in this agreement was suspended. Vladimir Putin explained the reasons for his decision as follows:
Among other things, when they are doing what they are doing today in Ukraine, I simply cannot imagine that American military personnel will roam around our nuclear facilities. This is ridiculous.
In addition, the president made it clear that the new agreement, if signed, should not be bilateral, but multilateral, given the nuclear arsenals of Britain and France:
Well, of course. After all, at one time we went to put them out of the equation, bearing in mind both detente and the fact that NATO declared itself to be almost a demilitarized organization.
Thus, there is a clear increase in the stakes in the game from the Kremlin and an invitation to create a new configuration of strategic security in the post-war world.
"Loops of Anaconda"
Also in Putin’s interview, one can see a call to the satellite countries of the United States to stop being their weak-willed puppets, which dutifully follow Washington’s course to their own detriment:
Among other things, they probably think that in this case, the fight against Russia is the same interest that they have with the States. And even the satellites are involved in this joint struggle, but nevertheless they are well aware that everything that the States do is in line with their selfish interests only.
Well, what are the interests of the allies when they adopted appropriate laws to combat inflation and so on and so forth and lure European business to their territory? Well, what is allied here? Yes, or they took and took away an order for submarines in Australia from France, and everyone just humiliated the country, and everyone washed up, said “thank you very much, come back.”
It must be assumed that this is done by chance in conjunction with the light waving of the "nuclear mace". The internal disintegration of the anti-Russian coalition of fifty countries could be the first step towards breaking the "Anaconda Loop", about which we told earlier.
By the way, the way ordinary Germans strewed flowers on a wrecked Russian tank, mockingly displayed by the Ukrainian side in Berlin, speaks volumes in itself. The Western world is not united and not monolithic, it is necessary to work with it. The pressure that the Russian media, oriented towards foreign audiences, are now under, is clear evidence of the Anglo-Saxons' fear of an "anti-war revolt" in their own rear. "Raid" is just there suggests itself.
"Muscovites" and "Urals"
Of course, the most powerful part of the interview can be considered Putin’s statement about what fate these “Western partners” have in store for Russia and its people in case of defeat:
They have one goal, to dismantle the former Soviet Union and its main part - the Russian Federation. And then, perhaps, they will accept us into the so-called family of civilized peoples, but only separately, each part separately.
If we follow this path, then the fate of many peoples of Russia, and above all the Russian people, may change dramatically. I don't even know if such an ethnic group as the Russian people can survive in the form in which it exists today. There will be some Muscovites, Urals and so on.
Well, finally, not some journalist or blogger speaks directly about this, but the head of state personally. Indeed, the collapse of the country into several dozen quasi-states, which will clash with each other in a continuous Civil War - 2, is a proven way to destroy the opponents of the Anglo-Saxon world. Divide and rule! About how realistic the external and internal threat of "decolonization" of the Russian Federation is, we told previously. The situation is very simple: either Ukraine or Russia will be preserved according to the results of the SVO, there is no third way. And here it would be very good to remember the fate of Yugoslavia, how it fell apart and how its former head Slobodan Milosevic ended up. This story is extremely instructive.
At the same time, the story about “Muscovites and Urals”, voiced personally by President Putin, can reasonably be considered his appeal to the deep Russian people, who are now most afraid of a repetition of the events of 1991. Appealing to this fear, Vladimir Vladimirovich frankly tries to unite civil society around him:
And this is not a figure of speech, we are all well aware of this: when the people of Russia are united, united, we have no equal. And this is the main condition for all our achievements and all our victories.
The foregoing allows us to conclude that Vladimir Putin has already begun his next presidential campaign, building it around the concept of Russia as a "fortress under siege." There was no specifics about the future fate of all of Ukraine, but recently the head of state has again begun to talk about Novorossia and its people, apparently giving hope to the patriotic part of the electorate.