Former NATO
Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said this in an interview with The
Telegraph, the Yevropeiska Pravda online newspaper reported.
"This is not
about Ukraine .
Putin wants to restore Russia
to its former position as a great power," he said.
According to him,
the true goal is to shatter Nato solidarity and reassert Russian dominance over
Eastern Europe .
"There is a
high probability that he will intervene in the Baltics to test Nato's Article
5," Rasmussen said, referring to the solidarity clause that underpins
collective security.
At the same time,
in his opinion, Putin "knows that if he crosses the red line and attacks a
Nato ally, he will be defeated. But he is a specialist in hybrid warfare."
In particular, according to Rasmussen, there is concern that the Kremlin will
generate a murky conflict in Estonia
or Latvia
where there are large Russian minorities, using arms-length action or “little
green men” without insignia to disguise any intervention.
Regarding the
crisis in Donbas , Rasmussen said that Putin is
trying to create a frozen conflict in the Donbass rather than trying to conquer
and hold large parts of the country. “He wants to keep the water boiling,” he
said.
In addition,
Rasmussen said there is no truth to Kremlin claims that the West violated
pledges at the end of the Cold War that there would be no eastward expansion of
the alliance into the territory of former Soviet Union .
“No such pledge was
ever made, and declassified documents in Washington
prove this. It is pure propaganda,” he said.
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