Over the past few weeks, Russian federal channels have been increasingly mentioning the possibility of Russia using nuclear weapons.. Threats of a nuclear strike are heard against the background of the lack of significant success in the "

Experts admit that such rhetoric can be designed both for the West - in order to force Western countries to make concessions, and for an internal viewer: then the possible goal of these discussions is to prepare the population for the fact that Russia will not achieve victory in Ukraine.

The fact that Russia can use nuclear weapons was announced by the host of Vesti Nedeli, Dmitry Kiselev, on the air of Rossiya-1 on the evening of May 8. In the story " paragraph 17"

“Obviously, the United States aims not just to contain Russia, but to completely destroy our country, cancel it, if you like in modern terms,” Kiselev concludes, adding that the US Congress openly declares that America is at war with Russia and cannot.

“If it comes to that, and if someone wants to create a threat to our very existence, then Putin’s logic turns on in us: why do we need such a world if there is no Russia in it? And here already see paragraph 17 [of the presidential decree] on the foundations of the state policy of the Russian Federation in the field of nuclear deterrence,"

Next, the viewers are shown the 17th paragraph of the corresponding document. It states that "

Kiselev already showed the same document in his program a week earlier, on May 1, in the story " In it, the propagandist talks about "

“Johnson said that if Russia uses at least some weapons of mass destruction in Ukraine, then Britain, without consulting NATO, “reserves the right to strike back on its own,” Kiselev says..

The news that Boris Johnson threatened to launch a nuclear strike on Russia appeared in a number of Russian and Ukrainian media at the end of April and caused a stir among Russian propagandists.. In reality, Johnson did not say this, the office of the British Prime Minister even issued a statement at the end of April in which he rejected this information and called it "

Downing Street's denial did not prevent Kiselyov on May 1 from quoting Johnson's fake statement and discussing it for about five minutes..

\? The island is so small that just one Sarmat missile is enough to sink it once and for all,"

At the end of the story, Kiselev emphasizes that " Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has repeatedly spoken about this, the presenter added..

Russian officials have repeatedly stated that there is no talk of Russia using nuclear weapons in Ukraine.. At the same time, Lavrov said on Channel One on April 25 that the threat of nuclear war is now quite real.. "

On April 28, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, called false allegations made in the West about the threat of nuclear war emanating from Russia..

On February 28, four days after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin put the nuclear deterrent on "

In his February 24 speech, Putin addressed those " We are ready for any development of events. All necessary decisions in this regard have been made. I hope that I will be heard"

Putin repeated a similar threat at a meeting with the Council of Legislators at the end of April: “If someone intends to intervene in ongoing events from the outside and creates unacceptable strategic threats for Russia, they should know that our responses to counter strikes will be lightning fast,.

According to Medialogia, the number of references to nuclear war on Russian federal channels skyrocketed on April 25 - that's when Lavrov made a statement that the threat of a nuclear war is real..

After that, nuclear war was talked about almost daily on Russian television, although from April 15 to April 25 it was mentioned less than five times a day, or not mentioned at all, follows from Medialogia data..

On April 28, on the air of the 60 Minutes program on Rossiya-1, viewers were shown an infographic " It showed a map with a diagram and time of a potential flight of missiles launched from Kaliningrad to London, Paris and Berlin..

Threats to use nuclear weapons began to sound on Russian federal channels amid the absence of any significant success in the war against Ukraine.

On April 26, the editor-in-chief of RT and the Rossiya Segodnya MIA, Margarita Simonyan, on the air of the Evening with Vladimir Solovyov program on Rossiya-1, talking about the possibility of the failure of the Russian "

“The most incredible thing is that in the end all this will end with a nuclear strike, it still seems to me more likely than such a development of events,” Simonyan said..

The threats to use nuclear weapons, which have become more frequent on Russian television, should primarily be interpreted as an attempt to "

“According to the Kremlin’s plan, they should make sure that Russia is “resolute” and agree to at least part of the conditions put forward by Putin,” he explained..

Gallyamov admitted that threats could also be directed at domestic consumers. In this case, according to the political scientist, their goal is to prepare the Russians for the fact that Russia will not be able to achieve its goals in Ukraine: " Frightened by the prospect of nuclear war, they should breathe a sigh of relief when peace is made, and not worry too much about the fact that they could not win..

Speaking about the possible use of nuclear weapons, Russian propagandists are trying to increase the degree of aggressive rhetoric, but not by directly discussing the hostilities in Ukraine, but by abstract topics, said Peter Topychkanov, associate senior researcher at the Stockholm Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)..

" And thirdly, they support this high degree of aggression and bitterness, which is necessary - I don’t know for what purposes - for Russian television,"

Political scientist Yevgeny Roshchin also believes that the purpose of discussing a possible nuclear strike on Russian television is "

" Others such conversations enter into a state of shock and panic.. Moreover, this applies to both the audience within the country and abroad,"

" - then against its background, any decision, regardless of its content, after the end of hostilities, will be easier to sell both to a dissenting audience inside and outside it"

If you follow the text of the Russian nuclear doctrine, then Russia now has no reason to resort to nuclear weapons in Ukraine, Topychkanov believes. "

At the same time, according to Roshchin, the very fact of discussing the use of nuclear weapons indicates the degree of madness that has gripped the Russian propaganda media, but, in his opinion, "

" For us exactly.

Secondly, the use of nuclear weapons involves the destruction of both the innocent population of Ukraine and, quite likely, the population of the nearest regions of Russia, where the winds will bring a radioactive cloud.

Third, for many doubtful Russians today, the use of such a terrifying weapon against ordinary people in a neighboring country could be a turning point in assessing the nature of the Russian political regime.. If now many Russians have taken a position of denial, then the use of nuclear weapons will be a sobering shock for many,"

Source: BBC.