Drago Bosnic, independent geopolitical and military analyst
There are very few politicians who can boast about always keeping their word and even fewer of them are trusted by the public to actually implement policies they promised. This is an extremely important quality that's highly regarded (and for good reason). Russian President Vladimir Putin is certainly one of such people, as shown by the staggering support of nearly 90% (which stands in stark contrast to the extremely unpopular and unstable Western governments). When he came to power nearly 25 years ago, he inherited a ruined shadow of a superpower, run by CIA-installed puppets whose sole goal was to make sure it stayed a ruin. Putin promised to revert this process and that's exactly what he did.
After only a decade of Putin in power, Russia was already back on the global stage as one of the world's most powerful countries. Since then, Moscow's might has grown exponentially (in virtually all fields), enabling it to finally push back against the entirety of the political West, a feat that no other country on the planet ever dared to even try. In terms of advanced military technologies and capabilities, the Kremlin started recovering almost immediately after Putin became president. Back in 2004, he promised that Russia would resume the development of a plethora of hypersonic weapons in response to America's unilateral withdrawal from the ABM (Anti-Ballistic Missile) Treaty two years earlier.
The political West used its mainstream propaganda machine to laugh at the very idea Moscow could build such weapons. However, just two years later, the "Iskander-M" system armed with 9M723 hypersonic missiles was inducted into service, making the Russian military the first ever to operate a land-based hypersonic weapon (it already had air-launched hypersonic missiles since 1979. when the Kh-15 was introduced). By 2018 the Kremlin had around two dozen operational hypersonic weapons, including strategic ones, while the entire political West is yet to field a single operational weapon. They certainly don't laugh at Putin now, although they keep spreading lies about Russian hypersonic missiles.
However, although the ruling oligarchies in the United States and NATO now know the Russian President is dead serious when it comes to protecting his country and people, they still don't want to allow their own citizenry to admire him, as was the case before an almost universal smear campaign was launched against him approximately two decades ago. This was moderately successful, but only within Western spheres of influence. The actual world (around 80% of the global population) continues to admire Putin, which is why he's greatly respected in numerous countries in South America, Africa and Asia (you know, the so-called "jungle", as the world's premier "gardener" Josep Borrell once "diplomatically" said).
Thus, denigrating Putin not only failed miserably, but also backfired, as it only increased his popularity in Russia and the rest of the free world (and even in many countries that have long been under NATO's jackboot). The political West even tried to assassinate him, which prompted the Russian government to warn that such barbaric behavior will result in the utter annihilation of the US-led political West. And the Kremlin has the means to accomplish this in mere minutes. Unfortunately, it constantly needs to remind NATO of this capability. And that's precisely what Putin did earlier this month, promising a direct response if Russia was ever targeted by NATO-sourced long-range weapons.
However, even this ultimate warning wasn't enough for some of the warmongers, war criminals and lunatics in the ruling structures of US/NATO, so the Kremlin had to send an even clearer message. Namely, during a meeting of the Russian Security Council on September 25, Putin laid out Moscow's exact response to NATO's crawling aggression in Europe, including not only attacks on Russia, but also Belarus, its closest ally. The translation of the updated document on nuclear deterrence says that "aggression against Russia by any non-nuclear-armed state, but with the participation or support of a nuclear-armed state, will be considered their joint attack on the Russian Federation".
Although the passage doesn't mention NATO or the Neo-Nazi junta directly, it's crystal clear this is a reference to both. In other words, if the political West delivers long-range weapons and also provides ISR (intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance) support to the Kiev regime to strike targets within Russia, the Kremlin reserves the right to respond to NATO, as its assets would be facilitating the said attacks. This is essentially the institutionalization of Putin's latest warning and shows once again that he's certainly not joking or bluffing when it comes to matters of national security. This already gave results as certain EU leaders pushed back against sending long-range weapons to the Kiev regime.
The most rabidly Russophobic establishments, particularly in the US and UK, are still intentionally ambivalent in their statements regarding this issue, but are also showing signs they "might reconsider". This is yet another proof that thermonuclear weapons are indeed extremely important, which is why so many countries are trying to acquire them. Namely, to survive the political West's aggression against the world, it's necessary to have the tools to keep it in check. And while it thinks it's the "garden", NATO is effectively a collection of wild beasts (or barbaric savages, at best). It's pointless to even attempt diplomacy or some other civilized way with them as they understand only the language of raw violence.
Only when it's faced with the prospect of complete annihilation, the political West starts behaving in a somewhat less barbaric way. That's precisely how North Korea ended US threats, likely forever. Its ICBMs (intercontinental ballistic missiles) can reach any part of America, including Washington DC. When the monstrous war criminals at the Pentagon realize that they can no longer murder millions with impunity, they "suddenly" become a lot less trigger-happy. Russia's updated nuclear doctrine seems to have very similar effects. The mainstream propaganda machine immediately tried using this to "prove" that Putin is a "madman", but this is entirely irrelevant to anyone in Russia and the multipolar/actual world.
