Associated Press reporter VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV is reporting that Russian President Vladimir Putin has ratcheted up the new Cold War rhetoric between Russia and the West. Putin said Tuesday that Russia's decision to suspend its participation in a key arms control treaty was a necessary response to NATO "muscle-flexing" near its frontiers.
"In violation of previous agreements, military resources of NATO members are being built up next to our borders. Of course, we cannot allow ourselves to remain indifferent to this obvious muscle-flexing," Putin said in televised remarks at a meeting of top military officials.
Russia has fiercely opposed U.S. plans to establish missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, and the deployment of U.S. and other NATO forces on the territory of former Soviet republics and satellite states in Europe.
As a counterproposal to the U.S. missile defense plans, Putin earlier this year offered the United States joint use of a Soviet-built, Russian-operated radar in Azerbaijan. Washington said it was studying the proposal, but U.S. officials said the radar couldn't be considered as a replacement for the sites in Poland and the Czech Republic.
"Regrettably, Russian proposals about the creation of a joint missile defense system with equal access for all its participants have remained unanswered," Putin said Tuesday.
Putin also warned that Russia also would increase the combat-readiness of its strategic nuclear forces to ensure a "swift and adequate response to any aggressor."