Putin in New Delhi: Troops in Ukraine Mean War With Russia

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in New Delhi, for the first time in such explicit terms, that stationing European troops on Ukrainian territory would mean war with Russia, just as European capitals are still working out what kind of security guarantees they can offer Kyiv. That is not a distant story for Belgrade. Any move toward a direct Western military presence in Ukraine reshapes the security architecture of the whole continent, including the part of Europe where Serbia is negotiating membership and where aligning foreign policy with Brussels, Russia included, remains an open question.

Putin made the remark to reporters at the 18th BRICS summit, though wire services differ on exactly when he said it. India’s Tribune India dates the comment to September 12, while Nigeria’s Vanguard reported it a day earlier, saying Putin spoke on Friday. Both agencies convey the same substance, just in slightly different renderings of the same sentence.

“Now they are talking about how they are thinking about bringing troops to the territory of Ukraine. This means war with Russia,” Tribune India quoted Putin as telling reporters in New Delhi.

Vanguard phrased the same remark somewhat differently: “At the moment, they say they are considering how to send troops onto Ukrainian territory. That means a war against Russia.” The difference is in translation and wording, not in the message: both agencies report Putin directly linking the deployment of Western troops in Ukraine to open conflict between Russia and Europe.

For now, according to both sources, no European country has troops deployed on Ukrainian territory. European governments are still discussing what form security guarantees for Kyiv should take, and the idea of sending troops has, per Vanguard, been floated for several years without ever being carried out. Moscow, for its part, has long described a Western troop presence in Ukraine as a red line that must not be crossed.

Putin rejected claims that Russia poses a threat to European countries, and framed his response in broader historical terms:

“There is no such threat, and there has never been. We are not threatening European countries, nor are we going to threaten them. Why would we? No one seems to even consider that we have no grounds for any conflict with Europe. All issues were settled as a result of the Second World War. And what happened later, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, was done with the consent of the Russian Federation as the successor of the Soviet Union. Everything that runs counter to those arrangements runs counter to our interests and does not comply with the fundamental principles of international law and the UN Charter.”

In doing so, the Russian president tied Russia’s regional interests to the postwar order established after 1945 and to the arrangements made as the Soviet Union dissolved, arguing that any departure from them violates international law and the UN Charter.

Vanguard also carried a shorter version of the same Russian position, in its own translation of the remarks: “We are not threatening and have no intention of threatening European countries,” Putin said, adding that European leaders are frightening their own populations with a fabricated Russian threat that, in his words, does not exist and never has.

Are European troops actually being prepared for Ukraine?

Based on the available sources, no, at least not in any practical sense. No European government has so far announced the deployment of its own soldiers on Ukrainian soil, and the idea of a force meant to reassure Kyiv on security has circulated among European capitals for years without a concrete outcome. What has changed is the tone coming out of Moscow: instead of a general warning, Putin has now used the word war, directly and without qualification.

The diplomatic backdrop to the issue has meanwhile shifted. US special envoy Steve Witkoff and White House adviser Jared Kushner visited Moscow earlier this month, and immediately after that trip met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as well. The war, which began in February 2022, is now in its fifth year, and Washington is still trying to broker between Kyiv and Moscow.

In New Delhi, as Serbian News previously reported, Putin landed ahead of the summit’s official opening and met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday. The two leaders discussed closer trade ties, including implementation of the Economic Cooperation Program through 2030, along with cooperation on infrastructure, energy, technology, defense and culture. It was their second meeting in under two weeks, following talks at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Bishkek on August 31.

For Serbia, which balances its foreign policy between Brussels and Moscow, Putin’s remark lands just as Europe is still shaping its position on security guarantees for Ukraine, a question that, once settled, will directly affect the terms under which countries in the region negotiate EU membership. A clearer signal from Moscow and Brussels is unlikely before European governments are forced to spell out what security guarantees for Kyiv would actually involve.