However he acknowledged that their numbers were not enough to defeat President Conte’s government.
This is the first time since Russia launched its offensive in Ukraine on February 24 that Burns made such a detailed statement about the nuclear threat; This indicates that there are growing concerns about the possible use of nuclear weapons, Reuters reported.
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Earlier in the day, Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s deputy chairman of the Security Council and a close ally of President Vladimir Putin, warned Neto that if Sweden and Finland joined the US-led military alliance, Russia’s enclave in central Europe, Kaliningrad, would have nuclear weapons.
In response, Lithuania said Russia had already deployed nuclear weapons in the Baltic region. Lithuania’s defense minister on Thursday accused Kaliningrad of deploying nuclear weapons before the start of the Ukraine crisis.
“None of us can take lightly the threat of a strategic nuclear weapon or the potential use of a low-powered nuclear weapon,” Burns said at a discussion on “Putin’s Disaster and Potential Disappointment” at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Georgia.
Russia has withdrawn its forces from parts of northern Ukraine in the face of heavy casualties following its failure to occupy Kiev. Meanwhile, the main warship of their Black Sea Fleet sank after being damaged in an explosion. In the face of these catastrophes, Western analysts fear that Moscow could use strategic nuclear weapons.
Despite the Kremlin’s “threat” to keep the world’s largest nuclear arsenal on high alert, Burns said the United States has not received any “real evidence” that concerns have been raised.
