Fiona Hill insists Putin WOULD use nuclear weapons

Trump impeachment witness and Russia expert Fiona Hill insists Putin WOULD use nuclear weapons: Warns strongman wants to recreate the Russian ‘imperium’ and US needs to figure out how to stop him using warheads

• Dr. Fiona Hill, a Russia expert and former member of the National Security Council, warned that Putin is willing to use nuclear weapons 
• ‘Every time you think, “No, he wouldn’t, would he?” Well, yes, he would,’ she said
•  Putin warned of ‘ominous consequences’ in his rambling speech before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
• She speculated that Putin has been in the Kremlin archives studying old maps of the Russian ‘imperium’ 
• Hill testified in the first impeachment of President Trump  

Russia expert Dr. Fiona Hill has issued a dire warning about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s willingness to use nuclear weapons as his military seeks to batter Ukraine into submission.

The former star witness of the first Trump impeachment speculates that the Russian strongman has been huddled in the basement of the Kremlin during the pandemic poring over old maps of the already expansive Russian state – with designs on restoring imperial dominion. 

‘The thing about Putin is, if he has an instrument, he wants to use it. Why have it if you can’t?’ she said – pointing to his operatives’ use of a radioactive polonium and the nerve agent Novochok in assassinations and assassination attempts.  

‘So if anybody thinks that Putin wouldn’t use something that he’s got that is unusual and cruel, think again,’ she added. 

‘Every time you think, “No, he wouldn’t, would he?” Well, yes, he would,’ Hill said in an extensive interview with Politico as the Putin’s invasion unfolded.

Dr. Fiona Hill, a Russia expert and former member of the National Security Council, said in an interview that Russian President Putin is willing to use nuclear weapons. She served as a key witness in Donald Trump’s first impeachment, where she spoke about a campaign by Trump officials to pressure Ukraine to investigate President Biden’s son

 ‘And he wants us to know that, of course. It’s not that we should be intimidated and scared…. We have to prepare for those contingencies and figure out what is it that we’re going to do to head them off,’ she said. 

Western nations took notice when Putin appeared to reference nuclear weapons during his rambling speech announcing his attack on Ukraine and warning others not to interfere.

‘There should be no doubt for anyone that any potential aggressor will face defeat and ominous consequences should it directly attack our country,’ Putin said in his pre-invasion speech last week.  

‘Basically, what President Putin has said quite explicitly in recent days is that if anybody interferes in Ukraine, they will be met with a response that they’ve “never had in their history.” And he has put Russia’s nuclear forces on high alert. So he’s making it very clear that nuclear is on the table,’ she said. 

Hill, a British-born Harvard Ph.D. in Russian history who served on the National Security Council and testified in 2019 about a ‘political errand’ where Trump officials sought to pressure Ukraine, also warned about Putin’s territorial designs.  

A number of Russia experts have warned that Putin has long been set on reestablishing some of the old stature and size of the former Soviet Union. But Hill noted that he also may have designs on territory that was part of the earlier Russian empire – including a collection of vassal states who were essentially under Russian control. 

‘It’s reestablishing Russian dominance of what Russia sees as the Russian ‘Imperium.’ I’m saying this very specifically because the lands of the Soviet Union didn’t cover all of the territories that were once part of the Russian Empire. So that should give us pause,’ she said.

‘I’m pretty sure that this is not the last item on Mr. Putin’s menu, unfortunately. Poland will be targeted, the Baltics will be targeted,’ Marek Magierowski, the Polish ambassador to the U.S., told CNN Tuesday.

Hill’s warnings were published Monday, on a day when Ukrainian intelligence official said Belarus was preparing to join in Russia’s invasion.  

‘It doesn’t mean that he’s going to annex all of them and make them part of the Russian Federation like they’ve done with Crimea. You can establish dominance by marginalizing regional countries, by making sure that their leaders are completely dependent on Moscow, either by Moscow practically appointing them through rigged elections or ensuring they are tethered to Russian economic and political and security networks,’ she said. ‘You can see this now across the former Soviet space.’

Old maps of the Russian empire, which featured multiple waves of expansion, show modern states such as the Baltic republics under its control. 

‘I’ve kind of quipped about this but I also worry about it in all seriousness — that Putin’s been down in the archives of the Kremlin during Covid looking through old maps and treaties and all the different borders that Russia has had over the centuries. He’s said, repeatedly, that Russian and European borders have changed many times,’ she said.

‘Putin’s view is that borders change, and so the borders of the old Russian imperium are still in play for Moscow to dominate now.’

With western analysts pondering whether Putin is becoming less rational that his calculated reputation, Ukraine may have special appeal to Putin, not only because of its position on the Russian perimeter with the West. 

‘But amid all this, Ukraine was the country that got away. And what Putin is saying now is that Ukraine doesn’t belong to Ukrainians. It belongs to him and the past. He is going to wipe Ukraine off the map, literally, because it doesn’t belong on his map of the ‘Russian world,’ said Hill.    

Putin will turn 70 in October, and has in the past timed invasions and military confrontations during critical electoral moments.   

In addition to his rambling speech where he cast Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as an attempt at ‘denazification’ despite Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s jewish roots, Putin has made other puzzling moves, including sitting yards away from his advisors at comically long tables.

Putin also skewered his intelligence chief on camera. 

Of Putin’s age, Hill said: ‘It’s old for Russians. And Putin’s not looking so great, he’s been rather puffy-faced. We know that he has complained about having back issues. Even if it’s not something worse than that, it could be that he’s taking high doses of steroids, or there may be something else,’ speculated Hill. ‘There seems to be an urgency for this that may be also driven by personal factors.’

She called on nations and individual companies to suspend all business activity with Russia, saying it was not just democracies who benefit from a rules based system where one country is prohibited from swallowing another. 

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