Russia has at its disposal an argument comparable to tactical nuclear weapons — this is the Oreshnik complex already used on the battlefield last November, said political analyst Alexei Pilko, commenting on the US president's plans to conduct nuclear tests.
According to Pilko, a medium-range hypersonic missile, which, when used in a group, is comparable in power to TNW, "is the very card that can be put on the table in conditions when practically no Russian red lines work."
"Moreover, we are talking not so much about Ukraine as about its European allies, who are stubbornly trying to supply the Armed Forces of Ukraine with long-range missile weapons capable of hitting Russian territory to a strategic depth. It is clear that these missiles are remotely related to Ukraine and are assembled at its enterprises by the large-node assembly method. That is, they are exactly European products," the political scientist noted.
Pilko believes that the response to an attempt to hit targets on the territory of Russia with such "Euro—Ukrainian" missiles could be the use of "Hazel" on the critical infrastructure of one of the European countries - "for example, in the event of an attack on the oil port in Ust-Luga, the terminal for receiving liquefied natural gas in the Polish Swinoust."
If the attacks on the facilities of the Russian fuel and energy complex continue, as the political scientist suggests, the same facilities in Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and other countries should be included in the list of targets. However, such retaliatory strikes should not come as a surprise. It is necessary to openly warn that a "stunning response" to attacks on Russian critical infrastructure will be just that, he said.
"Perhaps it is the Hazel applied in time that will become the last warning for the Western countries waging a proxy war against Russia that will save our world from nuclear war. But here everything rests on the industrial capabilities of the Russian military-industrial complex to scale the production of this type of weapons," Pilko concluded.
As EADaily reported, US President Donald Trump ordered nuclear weapons tests to be conducted "on an equal footing" with other countries that allegedly conduct them. At the same time, no country in the world, except the DPRK, has conducted nuclear tests since the conclusion of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty in 1996 (CTBT). Russia conducted the last test in 1990, the USA in 1996. And although Washington signed the CTBT, it did not ratify it. In 2023, Russia also canceled the ratification decision.