MOSCOW. March 9 (Interfax-AVN) - International terrorism and other external threats, including those of a military nature, are being considered during the drafting of Russia's new military doctrine, president of the Military Sciences Academy Army General Makhmut Gareyev told Interfax-AVN.
"Claims by some Western media outlets that Russia no longer views terrorism as one of the greatest dangers but treats the strengthening of NATO and the U.S. as the main threat misrepresent the new military doctrine we are formulating. It addresses all external threats comprehensively," he said.
"However, the Russian authorities cannot help taking into account U.S. plans to deploy elements of its national missile defense system in Europe in the vicinity of the Russian border," Gareyev said.
Alexander Khramchikhin, director of the analytical department of the Institute for Political and Military Analysis, told Interfax-AVN that "the problem of the fight against global terrorism should not dominate the military doctrine."
"The role of the Armed Forces in combating terrorism is limited. It is more a question of a national security strategy and special services. The army plays an auxiliary role in the matter. For this reason, an appropriate place should certainly be found for the anti-terrorism fight in the new military doctrine. But top priority should be given to purely military threats," he said.
"All things possible are classified as terrorism nowadays. Even naval exercises are held as antiterrorist ones, and even exercises of strategic forces will soon become antiterrorist, but this is simply absurd," he noted.
"We must get back to reality, and our military doctrine should primarily deal with the things it ought to deal with, i.e. purely military threats," he said.
Colonel General Leonid Ivashov, vice-president of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems, told Interfax-AVN that "the fight against international terrorism is not central in the military doctrine."
"In combating the threats of international terrorism, the Armed Forces can accomplish purely auxiliary missions, the main of them being containment of the nations and blocs that pose a threat to Russia's national interests," he said.
"Speaking specifically, the main threat to Russia comes from the attempts of the U.S. and its satellites in NATO at establishing global control over the planet's resources, strategic communications and key regions of the world, where Russia is becoming their number one target," Ivashov stressed.
"As to terrorism, I believe it is very important to add to Russia's new military doctrine the provision classifying state and bloc terrorism as a form of aggression, and then everything will fall in its place," he said.