NATO said on Thursday it was launching its largest exercise since the Cold War involving some 90,000 troops, rehearsing how US troops could reinforce European allies in countries bordering Russia and on the alliance's eastern flank if a conflict were to flare up with a "near-peer" adversary.

"These exercises are another element of the hybrid war unleashed by the West against Russia," Grushko told RIA. He added that an exercise of this scale marks the final and irrevocable return of NATO to the Cold War schemes, when the military planning process, resources and infrastructure are being prepared for confrontation with Russia.