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Lavrov – Extended Range Weapons In Ukraine Will Lead To More Loss Of Its Land
Today the foreign minister of the Russian Federation, Sergei Lavrov, announced the extension of the land in Ukraine that Russia intends to capture.
It will depend on the maximum weapon range of the systems the Ukraine will have under its control.
Via RIA Novosti (machine translation):
Lavrov: deliveries of long-range weapons to Kyiv will expand the geography of the special operation
MOSCOW, July 20 – RIA Novosti. If Ukraine receives long-range weapons from Western countries, then the geographical tasks of the special operation of the Russian troops will change, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of RT and the Rossiya Segodnya media group.
"The President said very clearly, as you quoted him – denazification, demilitarization in the sense that there are no threats to our security, military threats from the territory of Ukraine, this task remains," the minister stressed.
At the same time, he recalled that during the meeting of the negotiators in Istanbul at the end of March, the situation on this issue was significantly different.
"Now the geography is different. It is far from being only the DPR and LPR, it is also the Kherson region, the Zaporozhye region and a number of other territories, and this process continues, and continues consistently and persistently," the head of Russian diplomacy added.
He pointed out that as the West, in impotent rage or in a desire to make the situation as bad as possible, pumps more and more long-range weapons into Ukraine, for example, HIMARS, the geographical objectives of the special operation will move even further from the current line.
“Because we cannot allow the part of Ukraine that Zelensky will control or whoever replaces him to have weapons that will pose a direct threat to our territory and the territory of those republics that have declared their independence, those who want their future decide for yourself," he concluded.
Note to Washington: If you deliver HIMARS missile to Ukraine with an extended (300km instead of 80km) range, Russia will have to move further into Ukraine to secure its own and the Donbas republics borders.
This comes after calls in Ukraine to hit the bridge over the Kerch street that connects Crimea with Russia with extended range HIMARS missiles. The nearest point of the area which the Ukraine still holds is some 260 kilometer away from the bridge.
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There are also rumors that the Ukraine has already received such missiles. Via Naked Capitalism:
Zelensky Orders Troops to Hold Siversk Despite Heavy Losses, Purges More Officials; Putin in Tehran – Alexander Mercouris.
Note in particular starting at 10:10, Mercouris reports that DPR official Eduard Barsurin has stated that Ukraine has received the 300 km missiles for the HIMARS. Ukraine has made clear it intends to hit targets in Crimea, which Russia regards as Russian territory, particularly the Kerch bridge. Mercouris thinks it would take an awful lot of missiles to do that, as in more than Ukraine has now, but any strikes at Crimea would lead to very forceful retaliation by Russia. Ukraine is smoking something strong if it thinks that will lead the West to do meaningfully more for Ukraine than it is doing now.
Mercouris is wrong when he claims that the long range HIMARS missile would only have a small warhead as it must be fired out of one of the 6 tubes of the regular HIMARS canister. The long range missile is the ATACMS. It comes in a different canister which has only one tube for a missile with a diameter of 610 mm. It can be fired by all systems that usually fire the 6 missile canister.
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The version of the MFM-140 ATACMS missile that would most likely be used is the M57 (ATACMS TACMS 2000):
It carries the 500 lb WDU-18/B penetrating high explosive blast fragmentation warhead of the US Navy's Harpoon anti-ship missile, which was redesignated as WAU-23/B when used in ATACMS.
It is not the ideal warhead to attack a hard target but it is significant enough to at least heavily damage the Kerch bridge.
If it should be used Ukraine will lose all land that is within 300 kilometer of Crimea, the Donbas and Luhansk oblasts and Ukraine's northern border with Russia. Odessa is only 180 kilometer from Crimea and Kiev some 200 kilometer from the nearest Russian border. If we take Lavrov's words seriously those cities would come under Russian occupation should an extended range HIMARS missile be used.
Lavrov named several Ukrainian oblasts that are already on Russia's wish list:
It is far from being only the DPR and LPR, it is also the Kherson region, the Zaporozhye region and a number of other territories, ..
The number of other territories will have to include the Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts to protect the border of Donetsk and Luhansk from longer reaching weapons. Mykolaiv and Odessa may have to be taken to protect Russia's oil and gas installations west of Crimea. The Ukraine has already attacked those with longer range weapons.
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If I were a Ukrainian decision maker I would take Lavrov's threat very seriously.
The longest reaching weapon that the U.S. and Great Britain have delivered to Ukraine so far is the Harpoon anti ship missile with a range of 124 kilometer which is near to the 120 kilometer range that Ukrainian Tochka-U missiles have. The Russian defense ministry had previously claimed that at least two Harpoon launchers had been destroyed. According to its daily report another one was eliminated yesterday near Usatovo in the Odessa Region.
And off into the new direction which is mostly about EU but also a host of other “people” issues:
Before your arrival, Maria Zakharova and I discussed those whom you have just described as “serious, it seems, people.” Of course, they made fun of them, because how not to do it? For example, the latest comment by White House Press Secretary Catherine Jean-Pierre, who replaced our “beloved perennial” J. Psaki. She was asked what President Joe Biden had been doing for two days. She said he was “thinking about the American people.”
What am I getting at? Western leaders are now all “crumbling.” Many of them show signs of, as it were, “limited adequacy”, and sometimes even “limited sanity”. Now they will change. Do we have reason to believe that those who succeed them will be able to show signs of slightly less “limited adequacy”?
Sergey Lavrov: There is another way to put it. The current political establishment, which has “grown up” in the West, belongs to the class of “adequate narrow-mindedness”: from their own point of view, they are adequate, but in terms of political experience and outlook, they represent a limited elite.
Q: Why is that?
Sergey Lavrov: I don’t know, but many people pay attention to this. Recently, G. Kissinger, recalling G. Schroeder, J. Chirac, spoke about this. Not so rude, but generally made it clear that the contrast is striking.
There is such an “average” attitude to political processes. It is necessary to elect people who are understandable and will hit some simple banal point. They came up with this “green transition”: everyone will soon suffocate, die, dolphins, fish will disappear, people will be left alone in the desert. That’s the “green transition” they got. President of Russia Vladimir Putin spoke in detail about how this was built in Western politics, and how it turned out to be a huge failure, since nothing was calculated.
I don’t know what the inadequacy is. Perhaps the lack of bright leaders is convenient for someone.
Q: For whom?
Sergey Lavrov: There are 60,000 bureaucrats who make up the European Commission. That’s a lot. They have become a “thing in themselves.” It is no coincidence that Poland, Hungary, or someone else asks the question: why obey these people, including in those areas where competence was not transferred to them. It really is.
Question: So this is the American “deep state” in Europe, right?
Sergey Lavrov: It turns out that this is the case. Not quite, however, the “deep state”, but the elite, the European Commission.
Q: “Shallow state”?
Sergey Lavrov: Yes, and here the pendulum is now swinging: from the side that was associated with rapid integration to another. The demands imposed by Brussels, which are not always based on any legislative agreements, are beginning to irritate and prevent countries from building their internal, national life in accordance with traditions and with their religion. Today they “stick” to Budapest with the propaganda of non-traditional values. Hungarians, like us and many others, do not want this. The European Commission begins to indoctrinate them, to demand to change their position, otherwise the already agreed funding will not be allocated. I think this is sad for the European Union.
Question: But joyful for us?
Sergey Lavrov: I don’t think this is a joy for us. I think we should take an indifferent stance. We cannot rejoice that people in Europe will freeze and live poorly.
Question: There is no freezing. Or maybe the Europeans will get tired of the “imposition” you are talking about? And in the countries will come to power nationally-oriented politicians who think about their citizens, and therefore do not want to quarrel with Russia? It is not good for any people to quarrel with our country.
Sergey Lavrov: That is true. This healing process is correct. People get rid of the illusion that Brussels will decide everything for them, that every day everything will be the same: cheap energy, food, everything is fine. It is probably in the interests of Europe itself and its constituent peoples to do this, but I do not know how such processes will take place.
We will not rejoice, but we will not worry much either. I think we need to stick to a detached line. It is they who have created such a story for themselves, they want to live in such conditions, to get rid of natural, profitable ties that have been created for many decades in the field of energy, logistics, transport communications. It’s their choice. “You won’t be forcibly cute.” This process, when they complete it (if they can do it at all, since it is not possible to obtain benefits), will be expensive for the subsequent development of the European economy. Let them not ask us to return to some agreements again. They have proven to be unreliable. We cannot plan long-term strategic investments in the development of our country and its external relations, taking into account such “partners”. We will have other partners, understandable. They have always been: in the East, in the South, on other continents. Now that the share of the West in our foreign economic relations has sharply decreased, the share of our other partners will increase accordingly.
About trends in Europe. There is also complete irresponsibility in explaining to the peoples of their countries the causes of the current crisis. German Chancellor O. Scholz declares that there is no slightest doubt that Russia intends to limit gas supplies via Nord Stream for political, not technical reasons. He has no doubt! It is as if the facts that we have repeatedly reported, and President of Russia Vladimir Putin spoke about this, do not show how Europe systematically and consistently reduced the opportunities for Nord Stream 1, how it “suspended” Nord Stream 2, how restrictions were retroactively imposed on the use of Nord Stream when investments have already been made and it is impossible to change the rules for capital investments at this stage. Nevertheless, the European Commission insisted and it was done. Instead of one hundred percent filling of the pipe, they limited its volume to half.
We are now accused of using hunger as a weapon. This is what W. von der Leyen said.
Question: Hunger and cold. Remember we had “General Frost”? Now ” General Wheat” and “General Heating”.
Sergey Lavrov: US Treasury Secretary John Yellen recently made a pathetic statement that the United States will not allow Russia, China or anyone else to change the international economic rules that are allegedly approved by the whole world. She said that Russia will not be allowed to use the processes of economic integration as a weapon. In my opinion, this already “interrupts the other pearls” that we hear in greater numbers today, and resembles agony – people no longer know how to explain their failures.
Question: You mentioned the “green” transition and how they are trying to “push” some eastern European countries, which, like us, do not have an LGBT agenda. As an experienced person who has observed many processes for decades, perhaps this is clearer and more understandable than to us, ordinary people. This whole agenda is the “green” transition, LGBT, MeToo, BLM, the abolition of ballet in the main English dance school, the ban on passing mathematics, since minorities will not master this subject in some other schools, the ban on calling breast milk breast milk, mothers – mothers. People sit and think, but can not find answers to the questions: what is it for, what is the idea, who manages it, who benefits from it. What do you think is behind this?
Sergey Lavrov: With the analysis available to us, we cannot get into their shoes and understand why all this is necessary. It’s impossible to understand. If a person has any inclinations, why shouldn’t he be left with it? Let him get carried away. Why make all this a “banner of movement”?
Q: Why does the president’s newly appointed press secretary come to the podium and say she’s lesbian and “black”?
Sergey Lavrov: I am also interested in how and where Western political thought is evolving. Some progressive, in terms of rejection of imperialism and colonialism, philosophers believe that the “golden billion” or those who lead it and solve political issues want to reduce the world’s population, because “there is not enough for everyone.” Everything is not enough, but everyone is a lot. As M.M. Zhvanetsky joked in his mise-en-scene, “there should be fewer of us.” This was in the Soviet Union. At that time, we lacked food and goods. Now one of the explanations that I read in some Western sources is just that. It’s creepy.
Question: It is not very logical, because the “golden billion” thus reduces the “golden billion”, and Africa, on the contrary, multiplies. In Nigeria, which now wants to be friends with us, there are seven people for every woman.
Sergey Lavrov: No. All these habits are constantly broadcast there.
Q: Until they get there… Look at the entire Hollywood elite. Every second child is already transgender or someone else in this spirit, non-binary, that is, they will no longer have grandchildren. We started with ourselves. That’s for sure.
Sergey Lavrov: Perhaps this is also part of the plan to share less. I immediately said that I could not explain it clearly and reasonably. I probably presented one of the conspiracy theories to you.
I find it very interesting to know Lavrov’s thoughts on all the above. IMO, he’s describing a Nomenclatura that’s very Neculturny and expects the commonfolk to follow their terrible examples. And as you’d expect, the line of questioning and answering changes yet again and will take another comment.
Posted by: karlof1 | Jul 20 2022 23:16 utc | 178
A number of questions and speculations respond here at MoA over this next segment of the interview which discusses not publicly mentioned until now aspects of the UN’s “Grain Deal” and deals with the oft asked question, Why does the UN act that way?
Question: Both before the special operation and now it is believed that the West will not be able to cope without us. In many ways, this is true. We see this in the partial lifting of sanctions. It is not clear: the package adopted this week was a set of new restrictions or the abolition of old ones. And what if they do? What do you see as a prospect? Can the West completely abandon our energy resources in the future: not for this winter, but for the next or through one; not to launch Nord Stream 2, to stop using the resources of Nord Stream 1? Is there even such a possibility? How do you assess it?
Sergey Lavrov: What is the next announced package of restrictions: sanctions or exemptions from them – both, since the West has already exhausted all possible areas in which it was ready to harm us. Right now, they are already forced to think about what they have done and how it affects them. Now, as I understand it, the Westerners have made clarifications that will allow servicing the export of Russian food. For many months, we were told: Russia is “guilty” of the food crisis, because food and fertilizers are not subject to sanctions, so our country, they say, should not “dodge”, but is obliged to trade – because no one prevents this. We, in turn, explained for a long time that although food and fertilizers themselves are not subject to sanctions, freight, insurance, visits by our ships carrying these goods to foreign ports, visits by foreign ships to our harbors in order to pick up cargo immediately fell under the first or second package of Western restrictions. They just lie in our eyes, saying that all this is not true and depends only on us. It’s unclean.
Unfortunately, they (Westerners) tried and are still trying to draw UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres into their games, who, concerned about the food crisis, came to Russia. At a meeting with President of Russia Vladimir Putin, he came up with a package deal. There is Russian grain, which must be freed from artificial, illegitimate restrictions, and there is Ukrainian grain, which must be “cleared of mines”. A. Guterres proposed that he would get Europe and the United States to remove all obstacles to the export of Russian grain, and Russia would cooperate with them, the Turks, ukrainians in clearing the Black Sea ports in order to export grain from there. We replied that, in principle, the Black Sea ports can be cleared without us, but if there is such a desire, we can agree. The Secretary-General advertised this package and promoted it.
Last week, our colleagues went to Istanbul to agree on this scheme. We agreed on the basic principles according to which Ukrainian grain will be exported, but when the Russian delegation recalled the second part of the package deal, the Ukrainians categorically refused, and the UN delegation simply shamefully remained silent.
Yesterday we sent a signal to the Secretary-General that this was his initiative. In response, A. Guterres proposed to first resolve the issue of Ukrainian grain, and then with Russian grain. It’s unclean. It is not appropriate for people involved in big politics to behave like this. This fact means only one thing – I am convinced that the Secretary-General is under enormous pressure, first of all, by the Americans and the British, who settled in the UN Secretariat around A. Guterres as deputies and are actively using this “privatised” structure in their own interests. It’s sad.
Question: How can this pressure be exerted technically? To explain to ordinary people: if you don’t do that, we’re going to … will we plant it? What will we do?
Sergey Lavrov: I do not think that any personal methods of blackmail are used. When there is a vote at the UN General Assembly, ambassadors are approached and told that a resolution against Russia has been submitted to the vote, while reminding, for example, about the bill through Manhattan and their daughter at Stanford. Something like that.
Q: It’s kind of the same thing.
Sergey Lavrov: It happens. Here, of course, they act not to such a degree of arrogance. Employees of the UN Secretariat (the vast majority of them are from Western countries, since the number of delegated secretariat employees depends on the contribution of each state) in more cases do not act completely neutrally, as required by the UN Charter and the Regulation on the Secretariat of the Organization. That’s life. I state this. It’s always been that way.
On the second part of your question, I think that westerners are now trying not to show their fallibility in any way. The ruling parties will do this with all the truths and untruths – they have no other choice, but there is still opposition. In Austria, voices have already begun to cut through (the Austrian Freedom Party, which is not very welcome in Brussels, exists, and this is a legitimate entity). In other countries, there is an opposition that asks why they are doing this, why it is impossible to look and agree. Many have questions.
In developing countries, there is no such perception that Russia has crossed a certain “red line”. They remember what the Americans did in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, and Yugoslavia in 1999. No warnings, no warnings that American interests have been infringed upon, and no calls to do anything…
Question: No eight years of trying to reach an agreement…
Sergey Lavrov: 10,000 kilometres from its coast, the United States bombed these countries and leveled their cities. No Europe has even dared to “pick” that this is a bad thing.
Question: Without protecting the American population living en masse in these territories…
Sergey Lavrov: Yes. In our case, the situation is fundamentally different. This is a real threat, not invented in order to extend its imperialist tentacles overseas, a threat on our borders. For many years, we warned that we should not make anti-Russia out of Ukraine, introduce NATO into this country, and create direct military threats to our security. Everyone understands this very well.
Posted by: karlof1 | Jul 20 2022 23:32 utc | 182
The interview’s last segment covers lots of ground–Africa, Former USSR, relations with exes, how Europe will cope with sanctions fallout and ending with the SMO. Those who read all segments of the transcript or watched it via video ought to have a much greater appreciation for Lavrov the Human as well as Lavrov the diplomat. As he relates, he’s been through a great deal, some of which that was not at all comfortable. I have an idea what dimension his unanswered question would take that emotionally is very complex and very personal. Russia and the world are very fortunate to have a man of Lavrov’s capabilities at this moment in history.
Returning to Europe, I do not think that it is in European interests to completely sever all ties with us and switch to LNG, which the Americans are trying to do to them…
Question: Learn.
Sergey Lavrov: I would like to say a less decent word, but “learn” will do.
Sergey Lavrov: It will be their choice. Serious scientists write that all economic life, all the well-being of the last decades of Germany was associated primarily with Russian energy at affordable, acceptable and predictable prices. Yes, LNG is a more flexible commodity. At the “end” of the pipe, gas must be bought, and LNG can be redirected. But that’s a minus. When demand rose in Asia, the Americans sent their LNG there, because it is more expensive there. All this can be associated not only with higher prices, but also with a shortage of supplies at a certain stage. But if they do, we won’t have any particular problems.
President of Russia Vladimir Putin said that, due to what they are doing about Nord Stream 2 (we are always ready to launch it, it is under pressure), already in the current situation 50% of the volumes intended for this gas pipeline have been reserved for our domestic consumption: both for heating purposes, for the chemical industry and for other industrial tasks.
We are reorienting ourselves without any major losses. I have no doubt about that. We have buyers, demand, in the end, there are needs within the country: gasification and the development of the chemical industry.
Question: And thousands of villages without gas…
Sergey Lavrov: That’s what I’m saying is gasification.
So it will be their choice. I want to say again that we should not (and, thank God, no one is trying) now build any schemes that will proceed from the possibility, probability, and even desirability of returning to the situation six months ago, when it was possible to restore all these “chains”. I believe that they should be “finished” and new ones should be built that will be more reliable. That’s what we’re doing now. Including the North-South corridor from St. Petersburg to the Indian Ocean, from India to Vladivostok. There are a number of projects in a high degree of implementation. If and when at some stage Europe suddenly says that they are hot and are interested in restoring our relations in the economic and trade spheres, then there is no need to push them away. We need to see how beneficial this is to us, and only then react.
Question: They threw it once, and they threw it a second time – that’s how they speak Russian. You mentioned the diversification of our areas of cooperation. We talked at length and a lot about the East (China, India). Now you are flying to Africa, that is, to the south. What are you going to do there? What do you expect from this? And what can we expect from this?
Sergey Lavrov: We have long-standing good relations with Africa since the days of the Soviet Union. The USSR was a “pioneer”, the leader of the movement that eventually culminated in decolonization. We provided assistance to the national liberation struggle, then to the restoration of independent states and the rise of their economies. Many hundreds of enterprises have been built, forming the basis of the economy of many African countries. At the UN, we were ahead of the movement for this decolonization to be formalized as an integral part of international law and life.
Then there was a period when the Soviet Union disappeared and the Russian Federation appeared. The problems were acute. Not in Africa, but much closer. First of all, inside our country.
We have been restoring our positions for many years. Africans reciprocate. They are interested in us coming to them. We have never taught them anything, we have always helped them solve problems that allow them to live in their country the way they want.
Question: They just think that we taught them, but in a good sense of the word.
Sergey Lavrov: No. We helped them to solve the tasks that they set for themselves. Here’s the thing. They were never told, don’t be friends with America or anyone else. We still do not read any notations, unlike the Americans, who, traveling around Africa, constantly say: “Do not communicate with either the Chinese or the Russians. They’re always driven by some kind of self-interest, even when you’re being traded.”
We have mutual visits every year. Every one to two years, the Minister of Foreign Affairs visits African countries. We try to do this in such a way as to cover as many countries as possible in a period of two to three years. This year will be Egypt, Ethiopia, Uganda and the Republic of the Congo. In all these countries, we have good traditions and economic groundwork.
Egypt is our first trade and economic partner in Africa. The volume is under $5 billion. The first nuclear power plant is being created. The formation of the Russian industrial zone on the banks of the Suez Canal is nearing completion. History becomes even more forward in the context of the decisions taken by the African Union last year to establish the African Continental Free Trade Area. Now specific criteria and tariffs that make up the content of this zone are being agreed upon (it will take some time). For Russia, as a growing partner of Africa, this will be beneficial and useful in terms of increasing our volumes in trade and investment. But they are very modest in comparison with the United States, China and the European Union. We must now work well with our colleagues on preparations for the second Russia–Africa summit. The first was in Sochi in 2019. We are planning the second one for next year.
Question: In Odessa, for example?
Sergey Lavrov: No. Probably not in Odessa. We’ll announce later. But in parallel with the summit, there will be an economic forum, there will be round tables on trade, on energy, on “cyber affairs”, on agriculture, on space, on nuclear energy.
We need to increase our volumes. Africa is 1.4 billion people. This is comparable to China, to India. This is the most powerful part of the modern world. Probably the most promising market. Therefore, far-sighted campaigns, states are building a long-term strategy towards Africa. This is the continent of the future. We have an excellent political foundation for our relations and a good understanding, based on the fact that thousands of Africans who hold positions in their Governments have studied and continue to study with us. We need to translate this capital (human, political) into economic form.
Question: What kind of relationship do we have with our “former” (I understand that “former” are rarely friends, but still sometimes happen)? Are there any real friends among our “former” ones, including Belarus? What is really happening with Kazakhstan (we see multi-vector signals from there)? Isn’t there a feeling that we ourselves are a little to blame for some things? That we ourselves “missed” them, “gave” them to Europe, America, even Turkey. What do you think?
Sergey Lavrov: There was such a period. The Soviet Union ceased to exist. We signed the Belovezhskaya Accords. Of course, the countries that were not invited to the Belovezhskaya Pushcha were wounded. There’s no doubt about it. I see them. Then they tried to correct this situation (to smooth out the awkwardness, so to speak). Until the end of 1991, a special meeting was organized in Alma-Ata. But the residue remained. Most importantly, it was an event; and the event was followed by trials.
In the first years after everyone became independent and sovereign, our leadership, by and large, paid little attention to preventing any cooling in relations with our neighbours, closest allies and associates. Thousands, many hundreds of years lived together. I remember that. From 1992 to 1994, he was Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs until he left to work in New York. I was engaged in international organizations, but at some stage A.V. Kozyrev asked me to “deal with” the CIS. I didn’t have long to do that. The situation was not very optimistic (it is clear that it was not the Foreign Ministry that decided the issues of how to build policy in this space – it was decided in the Presidential Administration). Everyone thought at the time: where would they go? We lived together all the time: the language is the same, we went to universities the same, our tastes are the same as theirs. Therefore, they say, “we live and live.” The economy, of course, has been intertwined over all these long decades and centuries in a way that cannot be broken.
But the West did not sit idly by. That’s the truth. And not just the West. If you look at Central Asia now, how many “Central Asia plus partner” formats are there. These are “plus the United States”, and “plus the European Union”, and “plus Japan”, and “plus China”, “plus Turkey”, “plus India”. And “plus Russia” as well. Because, despite the fact that we have the CIS, the EAEU, the SCO, the CSTO, there was no such structure where all five Central Asian countries and Russia are together. Now it’s there.
This is not only through our foreign ministries, but also through our economic structures. This is an important process. Water management, energy – everything was the same. Now our Western “partners” are trying to “infiltrate” these areas. The European Union and the United States offer their own programs that will be already under “them”, under “external” players, adjust the processes maturing in the field of water use, energy, based on the Soviet legacy. Here, it would seem, God himself commanded. As we actually offer to our partners. They agree with this, but this natural process the West is trying in every way to “upset” and “infiltrate” from the outside into our affairs with our “exes”, as you say. A.A. Voznesensky once said: “Do not return to your former lovers.” This is where the poem begins. But it ends with the words: “You still have nowhere to go.”
Question: Valentina Polozkova, a fashionable contemporary poetess, has the following lines: “She is friends with all her exes as if they have never betrayed her.”
You, and the Foreign Ministry, said that you did not know about it before the start of the SVO. At least long before they started, they didn’t know. Maybe it wasn’t, but that was the impression. May I ask you, how did you find out about this? How did you feel? I remember well how we felt with T.E. Keosayan at night at home when we found out about it. I wonder how you felt. What do you think of the people who are now called “frightened patriots”, who left frightened, who are “ashamed”, etc.?
Sergey Lavrov: As for when I found out about this, it is not my secret.
Question: So this is not a state secret?
Sergey Lavrov: This is not a state secret, but it is not my secret. I will not, with your permission, touch upon this topic.
As for the sensations and feelings that I experienced when all this was already announced, it is inevitable. Not joy. It is difficult to rejoice when hostilities are coming, when the citizens of your country go to defend justice and risk their lives. But inevitability and even a sense of relief. For many years, we could not answer the question of these people, not only from Donbass, but also many of our citizens: “How long?” As long as it is possible to mock common sense, the people, the UN Security Council resolution, everything that was associated with it and what was sabotaged “brazenly”.
Question: What do you think about those who are ashamed to be Russian?
Sergey Lavrov: We are currently having a big discussion about foreign agents, whether it was right to draft a new law, which some consider expansive and wonder whether it is right or wrong.
I watch talk shows, including those in which you participate, where there is an argument that is understandable to any person: “They left, what to do with them next?”, “If they return, how to treat them?”, “Should they be let in?”. I don’t have a point of view. Each person is the master of his own destiny. Absolutely. But everyone should have a conscience. And that particular person should live with it. I proceed from this. But what I cannot accept are publications (it is my duty to read some resources declared by foreign agents in our country) and with what pleasure they describe the insurmountable (from their point of view) problems faced by the Russian Federation. With what …
Q: Schadenfreude.
Sergey Lavrov: Yes, they predict collapse. Someone there wrote that now Russia faces death from the point of view of high technology, because it has neither brains nor organizational structures. So write about your country!
Some others exercise too. When Roscosmos, in response to the sanctions, told the Americans that since they themselves do not want to, we do not transfer the engines to them and the British, so they brought our corporation under sanctions. So, they cannot contact Roscosmos. Another foreign agency website erupted with the maxim that our corporation has violated all imaginable obligations, now it is a dishonest partner and now no one will communicate with it. We say double standards. Here they are. There is not even a need to look for any complex designs.
I proceed from the fact that these people themselves should be left alone with themselves and understand. How to treat them is another matter. Their former acquaintances, whether they will communicate with them, how much the state is going to resume relations with them is another matter. The main thing is to leave them alone with their own conscience.
Question: Your belief that everyone has a conscience has already let you down with Petr Poroshenko and the Minsk agreements. Maybe you just stop believing it? Not everyone has a conscience, unfortunately.
We’re all curious, and every person in the country is thinking about when “it” will end. We all want the special military operation to end as soon as possible. So that people stop dying: our fighters, civilians, who are “shuffled” every day by their former Ukraine, which still considers them de jure their own, which does not interfere with it, as we know. When will it end? We don’t know. I’m not going to ask you about it. Obviously you can’t answer me.
In your opinion, where should this end? We are not talking about the fact that Vladimir Putin initially announced to us the goals, which means the future results of this operation: demilitarization, denazification. That’s understandable. And where geographically? Where would that be reasonable, right, and good for us?
Sergey Lavrov: As for the predictions and deadlines, I remembered a funny fact. The other day, Foreign Minister of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba said that Vladimir Zelensky had set a deadline for joining the European Union, but he would not name this deadline, because many in the European Union may be frightened and will begin to slow down their accession to the EU.
We don’t have deadlines. As for the special military operation and geographical coordinates, President Vladimir Putin said clearly (as you quoted him): denazification, demilitarization, in the sense that there are no threats to our security, military threats from the territory of Ukraine. That task remains. When there was a meeting of negotiators in Istanbul, there was only one geography. Our readiness to accept the Ukrainian offer was based on the geography of the end of March 2022.
Question: That is, the DPR and LPR?
Sergey Lavrov: So, more or less. Now the geography is different. This is not only the DPR, LPR, it is also Kherson, Zaporozhye region and a number of other territories. This process continues, and continues consistently and persistently. As the West, in such impotent anger, in the desire to aggravate the situation as much as possible, “pumps” Ukraine with more and more long-range weapons. These are “HIMARS”. Defense Minister Alexander Reznikov boasts that they have already received three hundred kilometers of ammunition. This means that geographical tasks will be pushed even further away from the current line. We cannot allow the part of Ukraine controlled by Vladimir Zelensky or who will replace him to have weapons that will pose a direct threat to our territory and the republics that have declared their independence and want to determine their own future.
Q: How is that technical? Here’s our territory. This is the territory of the republics that will join us. Yeah, obviously they’ve already joined us. Kherson, Zaporozhye region. You are diplomats, you can’t say that. I’m a journalist. I call a spade a spade. Then the territory that is controlled by V.A. Zelensky. They’re touching. That is, either there should be some kind of buffer zone between them in these 300 kilometers, or we should go to Lviv inclusive.
Sergey Lavrov: There is a solution to this problem. The military knows this decision.
Q: But it’s a secret? Do you think there is a chance that we will leave without finishing? This is very much feared by our subscribers, viewers.
Sergey Lavrov: I see no reason to question what President Vladimir Putin announced on February 24 and what he once again confirmed a few days ago: all the goals remain the same. And they will be fulfilled. [My Emphasis]
Yes, as predicted, all of Ukraine must be cleansed. There’s simply no other path. The very odd point is the West could foil Russia’s aim by surrendering tomorrow, but hatred of Russia, the fear of being pulled down from the mountain top and their very deep pleonexia completely confound what remains of their ability to reason.
Posted by: karlof1 | Jul 21 2022 0:08 utc | 184
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