NEW YORK, March 28. /TASS/. Former US President Donald Trump says American people should pray following Russia’s decision to deploy tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus.
"Here we go!!! Just as I predicted, now we're playing with the ‘big stuff.’ The ‘N’ word is now being used, front and center. This situation was caused by us - it’s what happens when you have incompetent people running your government. All I can say to you right now is, pray!" Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on March 25 that, at Minsk’s request, Moscow would deploy its tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, similar to what the United States has been doing for some time on the territories of its allies. Russia has already handed over the nuclear-capable Iskander missile system to Belarus. Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova was perplexed by the outlandish reaction of a number of Western nations to Russia’s military cooperation with Belarus. According to the diplomat, "the concern that Western countries are expressing in this regard is targeted at an uninformed audience that is unaware that the West, posing as the self-proclaimed authority here, has its own years-long record of carrying out exercises in this area." Russian Ambassador to Washington Anatoly Antonov, in turn, pointed out that such a reaction exposed the hypocrisy of the US’ foreign policy.
According to Director of the Nuclear Information Project with the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) Hans Kristensen and his colleague Matt Korda, as for non-strategic nuclear weapons, the US has "the B61-3 and the B61-4 with yields varying from 0.3 kilotons up to 50 kilotons." "Approximately 200 such tactical B61 bombs are currently stockpiled," Kristensen and Korda said. About 100 of these are deployed at six bases in five European countries: Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey. The rest are stored in the United States for potential use in support of allies outside Europe, including Northeast Asia.