Part 2 of 2 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
On October 23rd, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said he had recently held phone talks with France’s defense minister Sébastien Lecornu, Turkey’s Hulusi Akar, and Britain’s Ben Wallace. During the talks, Shoigu expressed “concerns over the alleged possible use of a ‘dirty bomb’ by Ukraine”.
What is meant by the term dirty bomb? A dirty bomb is a mix of explosives, such as dynamite, with radioactive powder or pellets. When the dynamite or other explosives are set off, the blast carries radioactive material into the surrounding area.
Oleksiy Reznikov is the Defense Minister of Ukraine. He said, “A guilty conscience gives itself away. Today the Russian federation at the top international level gave an official illustration to this proverb. Lies about a ‘dirty bomb’ that Ukraine is supposedly preparing to use is an element of the Kremlin’s usual tactics. The one where Russian criminals are trying to preemptively blame the victim of aggression for their own crime”.
According to Reznikov, the Russians have repeatedly threatened the use of nuclear weapons. “In spring, they deliberately provoked disaster at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant, and now they are blackmailing the world with a disaster at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. Their missiles pose a threat to other Ukrainian nuclear facilities.” Reznikov emphasized that unlike Russia, Ukraine has always been extremely responsible in matters of nuclear safety. Even today, Ukrainian nuclear sites are open to the IAEA. “It is easy to make sure that Russian statements are nonsense.”
Reznikov continued, “The best response to Russian accusations is decisive steps to increase pressure on the criminal terrorist regime in Moscow, as well as active assistance to Ukraine with means that will help cleanse our land from the scourge quicker. So that no one would even think of committing a nuclear crime in Europe.”
Reznikov also said that Ukrainians had a special relationship to their land. “Today from the reaction of our soldiers and all our people I can see how sincerely they strive to free Ukrainian land from Russian dirt. From projectiles, remnants of equipment, garbage left behind by the Russian hordes. It is not even a military need; it is a mental one. Therefore, even theoretically, it is impossible to imagine that Ukraine is capable of doing something that could cause the long-term contamination of our land. This is nonsense.”
Volodymyr Zelensky is the President of Ukraine. He said that Russia’s statements about the alleged use of a dirty bomb by Ukraine indicate that Russia has already prepared all this. Therefore, he said, the world must react to that in the toughest possible way.
Following the statements by the Russian Defense Minister, U.S. officials flatly reject as false repeated Russian claims being made to senior western officials that Ukraine is preparing to use a radioactive dirty bomb in Ukraine. At the same time, these officials say that they are not seeing any indication that Russia is preparing to use nuclear weapons. In any case, U.S. officials, as well as UK and French officials, warned Russia that there would be severe consequences if Russia used even a tactical nuclear device in Ukraine.
All this provides scant comfort because a dirty bomb could easily be constructed somewhere in Russia and then transported to Ukraine in an ordinary freight truck to be detonated. Following such a dirty bomb explosion, it would be difficult if not impossible to prove who made the bomb.