Rumors Of War: Russian General Issues Warning To NATO

Russia's top general warns NATO is preparing for a 'large-scale military conflict'

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

NATO exercises near the Russian border could spark a 'large-scale military conflict',  Moscow's top general has claimed. 

Valery Gerasimov said yesterday that Western pressure on Russia could trigger 'crisis situations' which might spin out of control and provoke a war.  

Speaking to foreign military attaches, he accused NATO of heightening tensions in Europe and reducing security along the Russian border.   

NATO has staged drills in countries bordering Russia including Norway, Latvia and Estonia this year, while Moscow has also staged extensive war games with relations at their worst since the Cold War.

Gerasimov, who is chief of the general staff of Russia's armed forces, said the Kremlin does not see 'any preconditions for a large-scale war'. 

However, NATO drill scenarios 'point at NATO's deliberate preparation for its troops' involvement in a large-scale military conflict,' he alleged.  

Moscow has repeatedly voiced concern over the deployment of NATO forces in the Baltic countries which border Russia.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also said today that the 'continuing expansion of NATO's military infrastructure toward our borders raises concern.' 

Ties between Russia and the West have sunk to their lowest levels since the 1980s after a series of flashpoints. 

Russia's annexation of Crimea, its alleged interference in Western elections and the assassination plot against Sergei Skripal in Britain have all sparked diplomatic crises. 

Moscow has also staged extensive war games, including practice launches of several intercontinental ballistic missiles. 

Warships and strategic bombers have also fired cruise missiles at test targets in exercises involving 12,000 troops and 105 aircraft. 

Defence minister Sergei Shoigu said the Thunder exercise in October was intended to check 'the military's capability to fulfill tasks in an armed conflict and a nuclear war'. 

In addition, fears of a new arms race have grown after the U.S. formally withdrew from the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces treaty in August, a move it had been signalling since last year.