Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine's minister of internal affairs, shared a video on Monday 9 December where analysts on Russian state TV issue a direct threat to France and Britain.
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In the video, Vladimir Solovyov, a Vladimir Putin ally and pro-Kremlin propagandist is seen calling for a preemptive strike rather than a counterstrike on France, Newsweek reports.
Macron supplies the tanks and we give them a preemptive strike against France as a party to the conflict.
A preemptive strike is a surprise attack on an enemy that is planning to launch an attack on you.
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This comes as French President Emanuel Macron has told his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy that France would be providing light AMX-10 RX armoured combat vehicles to help the war effort against Russia, VOA reports.
The AMX-10 RX is a light tank model that the French military has been using since the 1980s and is now being phased out.
Meanwhile, President Macron has been pushing with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to provide Ukraine with modern heavy battle tanks, such as the German-produced Leopard tank. This would likely give way to other European countries providing heavy tanks of their own, Politico reports.
France no more
Andrey Gurulyov, a retired Russian military commander and a Russian Parliamentarian, is seen on the video claiming that France in a way is already a party in the conflict so it should be destroyed:
[if France begins to] to harm openly, fearing nothing then it is a recognized party in the conflict.
There should be no France. There was France and now there is no France. Would anyone be upset about that?
Gurulyov also claimed that Russia has enough ammunition and is able to destroy both France and Britain.
Sources used:
-Newsweek: ‘Russian Analysts Threaten Macron With Missile Strike: 'Should Be No France'
-VOA: ‘France to Deliver Light Armored Vehicles to Ukraine’
-Politico: ‘France and Poland push Germany to send Leopard tanks to Ukraine’