Russia has threatened the use of unspecified military measures if the US follows through on its announced plan to deploy intermediate-range missiles to Germany starting in 2026.

The US-German agreement was announced during the NATO Summit last week.

The United States will begin episodic deployments of the long-range fires capabilities of its Multi-Domain Task Force in Germany in 2026, as part of planning for enduring stationing of these capabilities in the future.  When fully developed, these conventional long-range fires units will include SM-6, Tomahawk, and developmental hypersonic weapons, which have significantly longer range than current land-based fires in Europe.  Exercising these advanced capabilities will demonstrate the United States’ commitment to NATO and its contributions to European integrated deterrence.

In a press conference, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova was asked about this announcement.

Question: How would you comment on the US-German statement on the intention to start deploying US ground-based intermediate-range missiles in Germany from 2026?

Maria Zakharova: This is yet another and very visible confirmation of the extremely destabilising US policy in the post-INF Treaty, which President of Russia Vladimir Putin spoke about quite recently in anticipation of a briefing meeting with the permanent members of the Security Council of the Russian Federation on this topical issue.

In particular, the head of state noted that immediately after Washington's deliberate destruction of the INF Treaty, the Americans clearly indicated their intention to move towards the deployment of weapons previously prohibited under this agreement in various regions of the world, and now, with the unquestioning support of their allies, they have begun to actively implement these plans in practice.

As we have repeatedly warned, the actions of the United States and its satellites to create additional missile threats against Russia will not remain without a proper response from our part. In this regard, President Putin openly and directly stated the need to substantively consider the fate of Russia's unilateral moratorium on the deployment of ground-based intermediate-range missiles and our possible further steps in this area in the current circumstances.

Let's clear away the underbrush before David Sacks makes it part of his daily churn on X and uses it in a speech to a GOP gathering.

President Trump withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty. He did so for two reasons. First, Russia was cheating on the treaty like it always cheats on treaties (which is why I categorize anyone wanting an agreement with Russia as invincibly stupid, terminally naive, or a Russian agent of influence). It had developed and deployed prohibited weapons in Europe. Second, China was not bound by the treaty and was developing intermediate-range nuclear weapons while we were prohibited.

There is no "unilateral moratorium on the deployment of ground-based intermediate-range missiles" on Russia's part for Putin to suspend. Putin made several proposals for a general moratorium, which the Trump administration rejected. There are no monitoring or verification measures in place.

If you want more details on the events leading up to President Trump's departure from the INF, read Trump Announces the US Is Leaving a Treaty Russia Is Violating, and You Can Guess What Happened.

What Putin wants is to retain roughly 100 forward-deployed launchers for missiles that would be covered by the INF and for the US to negotiate away its ability to respond. Putin's lapdogs are all upset about Russian cities being within range of NATO weapons but not a single one of those voices has ever expressed any concern about Russian weapons based in Kaliningrad threatening a majority of NATO capitals.

When people claim medium-range missiles in Germany are destabilizing because they can reach homeland targets deep inside Russia, including Moscow, ask how often they’ve complained about short-range ballistic and land-attack cruise missiles stationed in Kaliningrad.

1/5 pic.twitter.com/aOkgQXovG3

— Fabian Hoffmann (@FRHoffmann1) July 15, 2024

And threatening to nuke NATO capitals is something that happens on Russian state television a couple of times a month.

Attention, EU and UK!

Russian state TV channel showed a map of nuclear strikes on European capitals.

MP Popov: "Britain is in the most vulnerable state. Three missiles are enough for this civilization to collapse." pic.twitter.com/m9rRiaK1cK

— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) July 17, 2024

The fact is that we don't have a treaty with Russia covering intermediate-range nuclear weapons. Russia has deployed nuclear weapons that can strike anywhere in Europe, and its media threatens to use them if Russia does not get its way. We can't have such a treaty with Russia unless China, Iran, and North Korea are also parties to the agreement. Otherwise, we are tying our own hands to appease one totalitarian whack-job while letting three others run amok. 

Hopefully, Trump won't let himself be rolled by Putin the way that China's Xi pantsed Biden; Checkmate? US Removes Missiles From the Philippines As China's Xi Plays JFK to Biden's Khrushchev.