MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/. A new provision in the Russian Foreign Policy Concept regarding the use of the country’s Armed Forces allows to prevent an attack of a possible enemy without waiting for it to strike first, TASS military analyst Viktor Litovkin said.
Provision 25 of the 42-page long document on the Russian Foreign Policy Concept states in particular that Russia may use its armed forces to defend or prevent attacks on itself or its allies.
"If it is obvious that our neighbor or probable enemy is preparing an attack on our country, and this is proven not only by our intelligence, but also by concrete actions on behalf of the enemy, for instance, his strike fists are accumulating on our border, why should we wait until these fists cross the borders of our state and strike at our cities, villages and settlements?" Litovkin said.
According to the military expert, this is exactly what the United States and NATO member states do.
"I believe that we should act like the leading powers and show that Russia is not in second or third place, that it is not waiting to be slapped once and to turn the other cheek later," Litovkin said.
The new Russian Foreign Policy Concept that President Vladimir Putin endorsed on March 31 states that Russia is a distinct civilization, a bulwark of the Russian World and one of the sovereign centers of global development, which will defend its right for development with all means at its disposal in light of the unfriendly moves by the West.
The document states that Eurasia should become a space of peace, stability, trust and prosperity interconnected by transport corridors, and this is Russia's flagship project in the 21st century. The new concept has noticeably revised the assessments of the main trends and prospects of the modern world: It’s now going through "revolutionary," rather than "deep" changes, "elements of crisis phenomena" in the world economy have now turned into a "crisis of economic globalization," and the escalation of competition has turned into a "hybrid war" that the US and its allies wage on Russia.