Russia wasn’t happy with some of the nasty things NATO leaders were saying about them at their big summit. Lloyd Austin got an earful about it on the phone when his opposite number in the Kremlin dialed his digits, on Friday. This call with Russian Minister of Defense Andrey Belousov “was the second time in less than a month.” Austin must not have understood the message the first time around.
Russia wants to talk
The whole focus of last week’s NATO summit was to come up with ways to help Ukraine beat Russia. Vlad Putin is a little miffed that nobody wants to hear his side of the story.
On Friday, July 12, Minister of Defense Andrey Belousov gave Lloyd Austin a jingle to hash it out. Keeping the Kremlin totally out of the loop is not a good idea, Belousov warned. European cities could end up glowing in the dark, that way.
Austin agreed, and “emphasized the importance of maintaining lines of communication.” That’s all deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh was going to tell reporters. The last time Austin got a call from Russia was June 25.
Russia’s top military brass reached out for a phone call with Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin one day after the conclusion of the NATO summit in Washington.https://t.co/t11IGc8zRG
— NTD News (@NTDNews) July 14, 2024
Two calls in two-and-a-half weeks might not seem noteworthy, until you put it in perspective. Austin “had not directly spoken with his Russian counterpart since March 2023.”
Ever since Russia rolled their tanks into Ukraine, diplomatic relations have been frosty. “Communications between Washington and Moscow have almost entirely broken down since Kremlin forces invaded Ukraine in February 2022.”
Joe Biden was another big topic of conversation on Friday. The Russians wanted to know if Joe is really in as bad of shape as he appeared on TV. They didn’t bring it up hoping for reassurance, they did it as a dig.
Irreversible path
While NATO isn’t going to let Ukraine join the alliance just yet, the summit made clear that it’s only a matter of time. Alliance members “issued a joint communique laying out new military and financial support for Ukraine.”
While they were at it, they “pledged their support for an ‘irreversible path‘ to future membership for the embattled country.” They burned their bridges behind them and declared to Russia there’s no going back.
The thing that had Belousov jumping up and down about is the NATO agreement to back “Ukraine’s push for more latitude in its use of Western-supplied weapons to strike inside Russia.” The UK’s delegate announced they “would allow Kyiv to hit targets over Russian borders with British-provided long-range missiles.”
MOSCOW, Russia — Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov and his US counterpart Lloyd Austin held a telephone call where they discussed lowering the risk of "possible escalation," the Russian defense ministry said on Friday.
READ: https://t.co/DAAzpe3bUT pic.twitter.com/bCHLkVi4ab
— The Manila Times (@TheManilaTimes) July 13, 2024
The Kremlin has hinted back, separately, that they might just point some of their own long-range missiles at London if that were to happen.
Germany is working with U.S. suppliers to deliver “more strategic weapons into Europe,” including a long range hypersonic missile system. Moscow, “which has long viewed the expansion of NATO as a national security threat, said it would retaliate.”
Peskov used a little tact, warning Secretary Austin that Russia sees “that the alliance’s military infrastructure is constantly and gradually moving towards our borders.” They don’t like that. “All of this will require us to take thoughtful, coordinated and effective responses to deter and confront the alliance.“
