British minister calls Putin’s nuclear posture ‘battle of rhetoric’

London, Feb 28, (dpa/GNA) – British Defence Minister Ben Wallace says Russian President Vladimir Putin’s statements on the country’s nuclear posture are a “battle of rhetoric.”

“We don’t see or recognize in the sort of phrase or the status he described as anything that is a change to what they have currently as their nuclear posture,” Wallace told the BBC.

“This is predominantly about Putin putting it on the table just to remind people, remind the world, that he has a deterrent.”

Wallace said, “We will not do anything to escalate in that area. We will not do anything to feed any miscalculation. We take it very, very seriously.

“But at the moment this is a battle of rhetoric that President Putin is deploying, and we just have to make sure we manage it properly.”

GNA