While President Joe Biden has repeated that the US will not send troops to Ukraine to fight Russian forces, he announced that “Russia would pay a severe price” if it uses chemical weapons in Ukraine, raising questions over what those consequences would look like.
Biden announced new trade sanctions against Russia on Friday, March 11, 2022, and reiterated his position from the White House that “we will not fight a war against Russia in Ukraine,” but so far, economic sanctions from the international community have not stopped Russian President, Vladimir Putin’s invasion.
The Biden administration earlier this week, claimed that Putin could use chemical or biological weapons, but officials refused to specify if a chemical attack would cross a red line or whether they have intelligence that an attack is imminent.
A reporter asked the US President about the evidence it is seeing to determine the alleged use of chemical or biological weapons likely to be used by the Russians to lunch an attack on Ukraine.
In President Biden’s response, he said “I’m not going to speak about intelligence, but Russia would pay a severe price if they use chemical weapons.”
White House Deputy Press Secretary, Andrew Bates, while briefing reporters on Air Force One after the President’s remarks, echoed Biden that there would be “severe consequences,” but also declined to go into specifics about what those would look like for Russia.
“They have used chemical weapons, which again, they are the only country in the mix here who possesses those, in Syria, and time again, we have warned about this particular pretext, and so it is something that we are being attentive to.”
White House Deputy Press Secretary, Andrew Bates
The White House Deputy Press Secretary also revealed that “Russia is the only country in this equation with a chemical and biological weapons program in violation of international law”.
Pentagon Press Secretary, John Kirby, who asked about a Russian false flag to justify Russian chemical weapons use, said “We don’t have firm indications right now,” but that it’s something they’re watching for”.
“I don’t want to get into intelligence assessments,” he said, explaining that the US was trying to forestall any Russian pretext.
“One, this is a country that has a reputation for using those kinds of weapons on people, and we know they have a program.”
White House Deputy Press Secretary, Andrew Bates
“And two, we continue to watch for the potential, and I want to stress the word potential, potential that they could be banging this drum with the intent of creating some sort of false-flag event, that they could use it as an excuse to escalate the conflict even more.”
Pentagon Press Secretary, John Kirby
Russia escalates false chemical weapons claims
Russia on the other hand has doubled down on false claims that the US is helping Ukraine develop chemical or biological weapons.
UN Ambassador for Russia, Vassily Nebenzya, brought the accusations to the world’s stage at the UN Security Council’s emergency session.
“I can foresee what the reaction will be from our Western colleagues, who I am sure are going to be saying now that all of this information is fake and Russian propaganda, but this is self-delusion and I do not think this will be helpful to the European people in case there are outbreaks in Ukraine and neighbouring states.”
U.N. Ambassador for Russia Vassily Nebenzya
Russia has not supplied any credible information to support their claims, but a web of disinformation spread the conspiracy theory this week, heightening concern among US and Ukrainian officials that Russia may be planning to deploy chemical or biological weapons against Ukrainian targets or as part of a so-called “false flag” operation.
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