US can attack Russia in 2012-2015 : Russian military analyst

Moscow, Feb 23 (UNI) After 2012-2015, the US will be able to annihilate Russian strategic nuclear forces by a non-nuclear pre-emptive strike.

''I declare that the likelihood of a military threat is great as never before now,'' Mr Konstantin Sivkov, the first vice-president of the Russian Academy of Geopolitical Problems, told Interfax AVN military news agency today.

Mr Sivkov said Western military experts had recently started to talk about the possibility of attacking Russia and annexing its territory.

''Russia is supposed to be dismembered into three parts, with the Western part going to the European Union, the central part and Siberia to the US, and the eastern to China,'' he said, adding that ''This is a rough scenario''.

Russian armed forces would be unable to successfully counter an aggression, he noted.

''At present, the conventional armed forces cannot properly perform their duties in a regional war, like the Great Patriotic War, even in theory,'' he pointed out.

''Even if fully deployed, their potential is limited even in local wars. The only factor that deters the US now is the nuclear arsenal, '' Mr Sivkov said.

UNI XC MS RK1951