Putin's Warning: African Expert Talks Russia's Military Might, Its Call for De-Escalation in Ukraine
17:20 21.12.2024 (Updated: 17:21 21.12.2024)
© Sputnik . Kristina Kormilitsyna
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President Vladimir Putin's recent end-of-year press conference delivered a stark warning to the West, punctuated by boasts of Russia’s advanced military capabilities and a pointed call for de-escalation in Ukraine.
Professor Macharia Munene, an expert in history and international relations at USIU-Africa, analyzed Russian President Vladimir Putin's recent end-of-year press conference, stressing that the leader's remarks that Russia's new Oreshnik hypersonic missile was invulnerable to interception was "a message to the West to be careful."
"It's a warning to the West and the claim that Russia is not as weak as some people have been saying in terms of military progress," the professor told Sputnik Africa.
Regarding Putin's assertion that "almost all NATO countries are at war with Russia," Prof. Munene agreed that this statement holds considerable weight.
"They are funding, they are supplying weapons, and maybe even some are giving advice on how to fight the Russians. They've just not declared themselves in the open, in which case if they did in the open, then Russia would be obliged to retaliate on their soil. But they are involved; that is true," he argued.
To de-escalate the conflict, Prof. Munene proposed returning to the foundational issues: NATO's eastward expansion. He argued that the West's disregard for earlier commitments not to expand NATO eastward, thereby threatening Russia's security, is at the root of the conflict.
"That was ignored, and because it was ignored, then you got the repercussions of that behavior. Russia feels insecure having a neighbor who is hostile to its security," he explained.
On the increasingly popular BRICS alliance, Prof. Munene clarified Putin's statement that BRICS is not intended to counter the West. However, he acknowledged that BRICS offers an alternative to Western dominance, appealing to nations feeling marginalized or dissatisfied with Western relations.
"Not necessarily encountering the G7 or the other Western groupings. It's something that has its own value that various countries can be related to, and that what it becomes very clear what it is," Prof. Munene concluded.
