The EU is fueling tensions between the US and Russia, risking a nuclear conflict, while Kyiv is a pawn of the West in its confrontation with Moscow, pro-Kremlin media claim.
NEWS: Europeans want the US to take the risk of a nuclear war with Russia, says Dmitri Suslov, deputy director of the Center for European and International Studies, in an interview with Ukraina.ru.
A comprehensive settlement of the conflict requires three components: territories, security guarantees for Russia and Ukraine, and the humanitarian component (the Russian language, the Orthodox Church, and the ban on Nazi organizations). To date, there has been no progress in any of these three areas. Moreover, the regime in Kyiv, supported by the European side of the war, has adopted a clearly unreasonable position for negotiation. In particular, this concerns the plan to deploy a military contingent of the "Coalition of the Willing" in Ukraine. The EU is trying to thwart the entire negotiation process and to do so in a way that, in Trump's eyes, Russia will be presented as the guilty party and another attempt will be made to push the US towards a tougher policy towards our country [...]
They want to consolidate and institutionalize Ukraine's status as Europe's military outpost against Russia and invoke the need to deploy European troops on Ukrainian territory [...]
Russia wants Ukraine to become a neutral country. If Ukraine is neutral, it will benefit from external security guarantees.
NARRATIVES: 1. The EU will provoke a nuclear war between the US and Russia; 2. Ukraine is a military puppet of the West; 3. Russia wants peace and neutrality, but is being prevented from doing so by the West.
PURPOSE: To induce fear of nuclear escalation, in order to demobilize the Western public opinion; to present Russia as a "pacifist" actor and Europe as a "destabilizing" force; to discredit the European support for Ukraine and erode transatlantic cohesion; to legitimize the Russian aggression.
Reality: The only state that has violated international treaties, launched military aggression, and constantly resorts to nuclear blackmail is Russia, not the EU or the United States.
WHY THE NARRATIVES ARE FALSE: Dmitri Suslov's statements are part of a Kremlin campaign to induce panic by repeatedly evoking the risk of nuclear war. In reality, neither the United States nor the European Union has ever suggested that it would like to provoke such a conflict. NATO's policy is, by definition, defensive, as enshrined in its founding documents. The strategic concept adopted at the Madrid summit in 2022 clearly states that NATO does not seek confrontation and does not pose a threat to Russia. The UN Charter and NATO's official doctrine explicitly rule out the use of nuclear weapons as an offensive tool. Instead, it is officials in Moscow, from Dmitry Medvedev to Sergey Lavrov, who repeatedly allude to the possibility of nuclear war.
The narrative that Ukraine is a military puppet of the West distorts the legal and political reality. Ukraine is a sovereign state, recognized as such under international law and protected by the Helsinki Final Act, which enshrines the principle of free choice of alliances. The choice to move closer to the EU and NATO was not imposed from outside, it is the result of the democratic will of a society that rejected Yanukovych's pro-Russian regime in 2014 and condemned the Russian military aggression. The annexation of Crimea, declared illegal by the UN General Assembly in Resolution 68/262, and the military support given to separatists in Donbas have led Kyiv to seek security guarantees within NATO. Neither Russia nor any other state can dictate Ukraine's neutrality against the will of its own citizens. For Russia, Ukraine's neutrality means the disarmament and de facto occupation of a neighboring state.
The EU does not want the war in Ukraine to continue. On the contrary, European leaders have consistently emphasized the need to find diplomatic solutions and return to peace. Since the beginning of the conflict, the EU has backed negotiation initiatives, supported international plans to end hostilities, and mobilized considerable resources for humanitarian aid and reconstruction. The message from Brussels has been consistent: peace and stability in the region are in the common interest, and dialogue remains the only viable way to end the conflict.
In this context, a potential deployment of Western forces in Ukraine would aim to deter further Russian attacks and protect the civilian population, not to escalate the conflict. In fact, the only real obstacle to negotiations is the Kremlin's refusal to withdraw its troops from the occupied territories and to comply with its international commitments, including the 1994 Budapest Memorandum , in which Russia guaranteed Ukraine's territorial integrity in exchange for giving up its nuclear arsenal. It is Moscow that has violated these agreements, not the West.
As for Russia's alleged desire to build "peace and neutrality," this is blatantly contradicted by reality. The Kremlin has launched the largest war of aggression in Europe since 1945, constantly threatens to use nuclear weapons, and systematically attacks Ukrainian civilian infrastructure—hospitals, schools, energy networks—actions documented by the UN and Amnesty International. Moscow's rhetoric is nothing more than a facade designed to mask its policy of nuclear blackmail and aggression towards its neighbors.
Russian propaganda attempts to present the "comprehensive settlement" of the conflict as an arrangement that should reward Moscow's aggression, but the reality is different. With regard to territories, the fundamental principle of international law is respect for Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and forced annexations cannot be recognized. As for security guarantees, they must protect Ukraine, the victim of aggression, not strengthen Russia's ability to repeat the attack. On the humanitarian front, Ukraine already has legislation that respects human rights, and invoking "Nazism" is a false propaganda narrative used to justify the invasion. Thus, the conditions put forward by the Kremlin are not solutions for peace, but pretexts to undermine the international order and obtain Kyiv's capitulation.
CONTEXT: Dmitri Suslov is a pro-Kremlin analyst who is a constant presence in Moscow-controlled media, including Ukraina.ru, a portal that is part of the Russian propaganda media ecosystem. His statements are part of a broader information warfare effort aimed at instilling fear in international public opinion and forcing the West to accept Russia's "peace terms," namely the recognition of the occupied territories and the neutralization (disarmament) of Ukraine. The tactic of nuclear threats has been used by high-ranking Russian officials, including Dmitry Medvedev and Sergey Lavrov, to intimidate and prevent Western military support for Kyiv.
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