Margarita Simonyan warned of retaliation if a Taurus is deployed by Ukraine against the Russian capital
Russia would not rule out a direct strike on Berlin if German personnel help Ukraine target Moscow with German-supplied Taurus missiles, RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan, has warned.
Speculation that Germany could supply Ukraine with Taurus missiles – capable of striking targets up to 500km away and potentially reaching the Russian capital from Ukrainian territory – was reignited after Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Berlin and its partners had lifted restrictions on the range of Western weapons Ukraine is allowed to use.
German officials, however, have not confirmed any decision to send the Taurus system, and a Bild report on Wednesday suggested that the government in Berlin still considers doing so “taboo.”
In a post on Wednesday, Simonyan warned that Germany could face dire consequences if the Taurus is ever used for attacking the Russian capital. “In Moscow offices, it is being discussed that if German troops strike Moscow with German weapons… the only option left for us is to strike Berlin,” she said.
She went on to explain that a Taurus strike on Moscow would have to be prepared and executed by German service members because the Ukrainians “cannot maintain [the Taurus] or program it for flight missions.”
Responding to Merz’s comments on lifting the restrictions, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, noted that if such a decision had indeed been made, it would lead to “serious escalation” and undermine current efforts to settle the Ukraine conflict.
The previous German government, led by ex-Chancellor Olaf Scholz, had long refused to supply Ukraine with Taurus missiles, arguing that this would put Germany at risk of being drawn directly into the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
