By Mary Ellen Cagnassola
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Responding to alleged threats from its enemies, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that countries wanting to bite a piece out its territory would have their teeth knocked out by Moscow.
Putin's remarks came during a meeting with officials when he added that attempts to contain Russia go back centuries.
"In all times, the same thing happened: Once Russia grew stronger, they found pretexts to hamper its development," Putin said. "Everyone wants to bite us or bite something off us, but those who would like to do so should know that we would knock their teeth out so that they couldn't bite."
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He added that the development of Russia's military is a guarantee of the country's victory should anyone try to test their luck by claiming Russian territory.
For more reporting from the Associated Press, see below.
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The Kremlin has made the modernization of the country's armed forces a top priority amid tensions in relations with the U.S. and its allies. Russia-West ties have sunk to post-Cold War lows over Moscow's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula, accusations of Russian meddling in elections, hacking attacks, and other issues.
Putin said that Western sanctions against Russia are continuing a longtime historic trend of containing a powerful rival, citing Russian Czar Alexander III, who charged that "everyone is afraid of our vastness."
"Even after we lost one-third of our potential" when former Soviet republics became independent after the 1991 collapse of Soviet Union, "Russia is still too big for some," Putin said.
He claimed that Russia now has the most modern strategic nuclear forces compared to other nuclear powers, including such state-of-the-art weapons as the Avangard hypersonic glide vehicle.
Putin has charged that the country has succeeded in revamping its arsenals without inflicting too heavy a burden on the national economy by carefully choosing the military priorities.
He noted that Russia this year is set to spend an equivalent of $42 billion on defense, compared to the Pentagon's budget topping $700 billion.
"We have managed to support our armed forces without militarizing the state budget, and we will continue doing so," Putin said.
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