Dmitry Medvedev, a former president of Russia, on Sunday said that a nuclear "apocalypse" involving Russia and Western nations is not just possible, but also "quite probable."
Medvedev, who currently serves as the deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council, made the comments in an opinion article he wrote for the Kremlin-controlled Rossiyskaya Gazeta newspaper.
Medvedev wrote that current tensions between Russia and the West are "much worse" than during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, which has often been cited as perhaps the closest the Cold War came to escalating into a nuclear conflict before cooler heads prevailed.
Medvedev said Western "opponents" set on the "defeat" of Russia have created the current hostile environment. While emphasizing that a nuclear war was unlikely to have any winners, he said it might not be avoidable.
"One thing that politicians of all stripes do not like to admit: such an Apocalypse is not only possible, but also quite probable," he wrote.
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Medvedev was President Vladimir Putin's stand-in president between 2008 and 2012, and he has been one of the most outspoken Kremlin critics of Kyiv's Western supporters ever since Putin began his invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. He has also been accused of nuclear saber-rattling for his frequent talk of using nuclear weapons.
In April, Medvedev said the likelihood of nuclear weapons being used in the Ukraine war was growing by the day. He has also suggested Moscow may turn to the use of nukes should Russia be defeated in Ukraine.
"Defeat of a nuclear power in a conventional war may trigger a nuclear war," Medvedev said in a January Telegram post. "Nuclear powers have never lost major conflicts on which their fate depends."
In the Rossiyskaya Gazeta story, Medvedev said Russia and the West had entered into a "confrontation phase," and "the standoff will last decades."
One resolution, he said, would be to start a third world war, but he added that such a move would be "obviously bad" because even "the victors are not at all guaranteed further prosperity."
The former Russian leader added that Russia and the West must continue to negotiate in order to prevent an escalation, but he said that the current Kyiv government "must be annihilated" and "legislatively banned in civilized Europe as a fascist."
Elsewhere in the article, he said Moscow remains committed to preventing Ukraine from joining NATO.
"Our goal is simple—to eliminate the threat of Ukraine's membership in NATO. And we will achieve it. One way or another," he said.
Since NATO rules prevent inviting new countries into membership when they are involved in territorial conflicts, Medvedev said the current Ukraine war could become "permanent, because this is a question of the existence of Russia."
Newsweek reached out to Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs via email for comment.
About the writer
Jon Jackson is a News Editor at Newsweek based in New York. His focus is on reporting on the Ukraine ... Read more