MOSCOW. Jan 24 (Interfax) - Relations between Moscow and Washington have not entered a pre-war stage, but the ongoing propaganda campaign of the United States is a kind of psychological warfare, according to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov.
"No, we are not at a pre-war stage. It is true that propaganda bacchanalia is part of the psychological warfare that creates a particular mood and mentally broadens the admissible boundaries. At least, some members of U.S. society now have a different idea of what is possible and permissible. This is a disquieting fact," Ryabkov told the journal International Affairs.
"There is no pre-war stage, but there is every indication that people aware of the essence of the issue should double their efforts and unmask those intentions," he said.
"We believe that in these circumstances [there is a need for] work by the public, Track Two work, Track One and a Half work, conferences, and publications; we also think that it deserves the attention of everyone who cares about the sphere where security and stability were forged over the course of decades," Ryabkov said.
"It [the situation] may not be stable at the moment, but it can still shift to the risk zone if the playing with fire continues and if illegal strikes on sovereign states go on. We saw the United States and its allies use force against Syria twice last year," he said.
It will be dangerous "if the concepts that belong to the 1950s and 1960s, such as the idea of building low-yield miniature nuclear devices, supposedly to prevent an escalation leading to nuclear war, emerge in the doctrinal documents and concepts," Ryabkov said.
"Is the ideology of using nuclear weapons on the battlefield being reinstated? I believe that this kind of approach could be not merely dangerous but suicidal for the authors of these ideas," he said.