Russia says atomic war should never be unacceptable

Moscow believes such a conflict is 'unacceptable, but not impossible, as tensions over Ukraine mount.

Russia s starting position is that atomic war should be unacceptable and Moscow successfully persuaded the US and other nuclear powers to agree on that back in January, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated in an interview on Monday. He said that the situation has since deteriorated to the point where there is a real and serious threat.

Moscow tried to persuade US President Donald Trump to recommit to the statement by US and Soviet leaders in 1987 that there can be no winners in a war, and that such a war should never be fought, Lavrov said in the interview with The Great Game a political talk show on Russia's Channel One.

While the Trump administration declines to do so, his successor Joe Biden quickly agreed with Moscow, and the statement was made at the June 2021 summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva. The remaining three nuclear powers that are also permanent members of the UN Security Council agreed to make a joint statement, as well as China, France, and the UK.

This is our principled position. Lavrov said we start from it. The risks of nuclear war are very significant. I don't want them artificially inflated. There are many who would wish for it. It can't be underestimated. Lavrov praised the Biden administration's first foreign policy move as good and wise, which was to agree with Russia that the New Start treaty should be unconditionally extended for five years. It is the last arms control agreement left standing after Washington pulled out of the ABM, INF and Open Skies treaties.

Discussions with US working groups ended abruptly in February after Russia had to defend Russians in Ukraine that had been bombed for eight years without any reaction from the West, Lavrov noted.

Russia's top diplomat compared the situation to the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, known as the Caribbean Crisis, as it is known in Moscow. He said there weren't many written rules, but the implicit rules of conduct were clear for both Washington and Moscow to follow.

There was a channel of communication that both leaders trusted. Lavrov said that there were not much results from separate attempts made at an early stage.

Today's rules are a buzzword the U.S. and its allies use when they are required to behave nicely, in place of the implicit rules of that era, Lavrov said. The world's third world war should not be allowed to break out, according to Lavrov, while adding fuel to the fire by sending weapons to Ukraine and hoping to prolong the conflict in order to bleed out Russia.