Putin Says Russia Is Ready for War With NATO

The Trump administration’s peace plan for Ukraine has hit a wall. After a five-hour negotiation session on Tuesday, the Russians rejected the proposal, which was revised multiple times by the time it got to Moscow. And just before those talks, Russian head of state Vladimir Putin told reporters that his country is ready for a fight with NATO if that’s where the war is heading.

Putin’s comments follow those by NATO officials who openly suggested they were thinking of attacking Russia. Italian Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone said NATO may take a “more ‘aggressive’ approach to deter Moscow from continuing its campaign of drone incursions and cyberattacks in Europe,” according to reports.

On Tuesday at an investment forum in Moscow, Putin was asked if Russia was preparing for war with NATO. He said Russia didn’t want to fight Europe, but if it came to that, the Kremlin’s strategy will be different from the one it’s using in Ukraine:

We are not planning to go to war against Europe. I have said that a hundred times. But if Europe wants to wage a war against us and suddenly starts a war with us, we are ready. There should be no doubt about that. The only question is if Europe suddenly starts a war against us.… Europe is not Ukraine. In Ukraine, we are acting with surgical precision. You see my point, don’t you? It is not a war in the direct, modern sense of the word. If Europe suddenly decides to go to war against us and actually follows through with it, then a situation may arise very quickly where we will be left with no one to negotiate with.