Former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen warns against Russian President Vladimir Putin in clear terms. He was as dangerous as the dictators Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin, he said in an interview.
He headed NATO for five years, from 2009 to 2014. Before that, he was Prime Minister of Denmark for more than seven years. So Anders Fogh Rasmussen had many opportunities to meet, talk to and get to know Russian President Vladimir Putin. In an interview with the Danish newspaper, he now looked at Putin, his rhetoric – and warns of the Russian president.
“Looking back, it’s clear that if we had really taken him seriously, if we had seen what he was doing and heard what he was saying, we would have known what to expect,” Rasmussen said. They were too naive and misjudged Putin’s intentions and brutality. “We believed far too much that our liberal values would automatically win. We should have reacted much earlier and stronger.”
Anders Fogh Rasmussen: “Putin extremely desperate and dangerous”
In the “Berlingske” interview, the former NATO Secretary General named Putin in the same breath as Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin. “I never thought I’d say this, but I think Putin is just as bad as Stalin and Hitler. You can also see that he tried to rewrite history about Stalin to cover up the atrocities he committed .” There is a special element in Putin’s story that Fogh believes makes him so extraordinarily dangerous that he draws parallels with the greatest mass murderers of the last century.
“Where China’s leader Xi Jinping is at the helm of a prosperous country, Putin is ruling a country that is going under by any means possible. Russia’s demographics are problematic, they haven’t implemented economic reforms and they are overly dependent on energy,” says Anders Fogh Rasmussen. “That makes Putin extremely desperate and therefore particularly dangerous.” The Russian President is “irrational, paranoid and brutal”.
Rasmussen sees freedom and democracy in danger
A particular danger is Putin’s power over the country’s nuclear weapons. “We have to take that seriously. It is to be hoped that the fact that the West – particularly the US – has nuclear weapons will put him off. But the situation is that we can see how outrageously brutal he is when he destroys cities bombed – and that its nuclear capability is enormous.” The former Prime Minister says: “The Cold War has warmed up.”
According to Rasmussen, freedom is also in danger with the Ukraine war. One can see that Putin sees freedom and democracy as the absolute greatest threat to himself. The alliance between Russia and China “to combat the influence of the United States and its allies on the world” is also dangerous. The war in Ukraine is “the beginning of a struggle for world order – between autocracies and democracies. There is a lot at stake.”
Moldova, Georgia and the Baltic States could be Putin’s next targets
At the same time, Rasmussen rejects a no-fly zone as demanded by Ukraine. Namely, this would trigger a war between Russia and NATO, since NATO would have to shoot down Russian planes if they violate the airspace. However, Rasmussen does not rule out the possibility that “the humanitarian situation or the Russian use of weapons” will at some point cross a line that will prompt NATO to act. “We don’t know what’s going to happen and nothing should be ruled out in such an uncertain situation.”
Regarding the sanctions against Russia, the 69-year-old believes that the thumbscrews should be left on as long as Putin is in power. “Russia is now an international pariah, run by a political thug – Vladimir Putin. It can’t be negotiated away. That’s also why in my world, as long as he’s in power – because he’s responsible for the war – the sanctions are there is.” The former head of NATO is even calling for a ban on imports of Russian oil and gas. It is unacceptable that Russia’s war is being financed in this way. He would rather pay a higher price for energy than lose freedom, Rasmussen said.
Anders Fogh Rasmussen fears that Putin’s next targets after Ukraine could be Moldova, Georgia and then the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The latter three are NATO members. However, he does not have the “imagination” to imagine that Putin would dare to start a war with NATO. Putin would be afraid of that. But he could imagine that Putin could influence the mood in the country and carry out cyber attacks.
Source: Stern
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