Operation Unthinkable 2.0? Pentagon Updating War Plans Against Russia
SputnikNews.com
19.09.2015
According to State and Defense Department sources speaking to Foreign Policy, the Pentagon is “dusting off,” reevaluating and updating its contingency plans for war with Russia. The publication explains why all of this is Russia’s fault, and where things may go from here.
The article, written by well-known Russian politics critic and self-confessed Russophobe Julia Ioffe, explains this is “the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union” that the Pentagon has decided to review and update its contingency plans for war with Russia, based on revised appraisals of the country as a potential threat, rather than a potential partner, to NATO.
The reason for the Pentagon’s rush to update its war plans is, ostensibly, Russia’s ‘annexation’ of Crimea, referring to the referendum held in the territory in the aftermath of the Maidan coup d’état in Kiev in early 2014, which saw the peninsula breaking off from Ukraine and joining Russia. It also includes Russia’s ‘invasion’ of eastern Ukraine, referring to the repeated allegations made by officials in Kiev that between nine and 200,000 regular Russian troops are engaged militarily in the eastern breakaway regions of Donetsk and Lugansk.
An unnamed senior defense official familiar with the updated plans told FP that “given the security environment, given the actions of Russia, it has become apparent that we need to make sure to update the plans that we have in response to any potential aggression against any NATO allies.”
The official did not comment and presumably was not asked about whether the US’s policy of supporting regime change in Kiev against an unpopular but democratically elected president in February 2014 may have had anything to do with Russia’s response to the Ukraine crisis, and thus with the deterioration of relations between Washington and Moscow.
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