(Washington) Donald Trump on Friday ordered the deployment of two nuclear submarines in response to “incendiary” comments from former Russian president, Dmitri Medvedev on Friday, a surge of fever that intervenes when Washington hardens the tone towards Moscow on the war in Ukraine.
Reconciting Vladimir Putin after returning to the White House, the Republican billionaire has threatened in recent days to impose new sanctions against Russia, which ignores its ultimatums and intensifies its bombings on Ukraine.
On his Truth Social network, Donald Trump wrote that he “ordered that two nuclear submarines are positioned in the appropriate areas, in case these silly and incendiary declarations are more serious than that”.
“Words count and can often have unforeseen consequences, I hope this will not be the case this time,” said the President of the United States.
He did not specify where exactly the submarines would be sent, nor if they were submersibles with nuclear propulsion or atomic warheads.
Asked shortly after his decision by a Newsmax channel presenter to find out if these submarines were “closer to Russia”, Donald Trump simply replied with a little laugh: “Yes, they are closer to Russia”.
Dmitri Medvedev was president of Russia from 2008 to 2012, between two mandates of Vladimir Putin, and was then considered in the West as a reformist and a moderate.
But since 2022 he has multiplied provocative remarks, especially on the threat of a nuclear conflict, even if his influence on Russian policy remains limited.
Hypersonic missiles
Thursday, Medvedev had castigated Mr. Trump by quoting “the famous” dead hand “”, an allusion to an ultra-secret automated system set up by the Soviet Union during the Cold War to take control of its nuclear arsenal in the event of destruction of his chain of command.
The current number two of the country’s security council had judged in another message published on X on July 28 that each new ultimatum set by the American president to end the conflict in Ukraine “was a threat and a step towards war” between Russia and the United States.
Donald Trump’s statements also take place a few hours after the announcement by Vladimir Putin that Russia had launched the production in the Orechnik series, its latest generation hypersonic missile, which can wear a nuclear charge.
He repeated that Moscow could soon deploy these Missiles in Belarus, an ally of Russia and Frontier of several NATO and EU countries.
The American president had operated shortly after his return to power in January a spectacular rapprochement with Vladimir Putin, convinced that his good relationship with the Russian leader would allow him to quickly arrest the war that has been raging since the Russian offensive in February 2022.
The conflict has made it for tens, even hundreds of thousands of deaths in both countries.
The 79 -year -old Republican now sums up Moscow to stop hostilities by the end of next week. He envisages so-called “secondary” sanctions, that is to say inflicted on countries that buy Russian oil, with the aim of drying up this source of essential income for the Russian war machine.
Saturated defenses
Despite these threats, AFP analyzed on Friday that the Russian armed forces had never launched as many drones against Ukraine as in July (6297).
This includes a large share of lure drones, especially intended to saturate Ukrainian anti -aircraft defense already undermined by the intensity of the attacks.
Between January and June, Russia has tripled the number of missiles sent to Ukraine (77 against 239, then 198 in July), according to the data analyzed by AFP from figures provided by Kyiv.
These air attacks take place every night, pushing the inhabitants to take refuge in a shelter, in their bathroom or in the corridors of a metro, under the din of alert sirens.
During the night from Wednesday to Thursday, an attack on Kyiv killed 31 civilians according to a new assessment communicated on Friday by the authorities, one of the worst of this type against the capital in more than three years of war.
Five children are among the victims, of which “the youngest was only two years old,” said Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky.
Mr. Putin nevertheless assured Friday that he wanted a “lasting peace” in Ukraine on Friday, Mr. Zelensky calling him, in response, to what they meet to negotiate.
