It is claimed that the US Chief of Staff, General Mark Milley, had a meeting with Russian Chief of Staff General Valery Gerasimov last week, and the US had conveyed its request to use Russian bases near the border in operations in Afghanistan.
After the US withdrew from Afghanistan, it requested bases from many countries neighbouring Afghanistan, especially Pakistan, for its counter-terrorism operations in this country, but it has not yet found a country to use its bases in the region.
The US Joint Chiefs of Staff announced that General Milley met with his Russian counterpart Chief of Russian General Staff Gen. Valery Gerasimov in Helsinki and discussed many issues, especially the withdrawal process from Afghanistan.
Details of the meeting, which were not included in the statement, were leaked to the Wall Street Journal just before Milley and US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Some US officials, who did not want to be named, said in a statement to the newspaper that General Milley conveyed the request of the White House National Security Council to General Gerasimov in Helsinki to convey the base request to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
While the officials pointed out that Gerasimov did not make any promises on this issue, Putin claimed that during his meeting with US President Joe Biden on June 16, he came up with the idea that they could host American soldiers in Russian bases, and Milley’s offer was based on this meeting.
The US Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Department of Defense have yet to make an official statement on the matter.
By law, the United States is prohibited from doing military cooperation with Russia.