As Russia’s remarks about the use of nuclear weapons change, many experts believe that Vladimir Putin is not ruling out the possibility of a nuclear war, the New York Times reported on the 16th (local time).
Russia is threatening direct retaliation as western military aid expands amid a major war in Ukraine between Russia and NATO. The Russian government is showing a sense of urgency.
As a result, nuclear strategists and former US officials are warning that, although not yet large, the risk of a direct clash between the two sides is growing and, in some cases, a nuclear war.
Earlier, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, “We have entered the realm of possible nuclear war.”
Leaders of both camps have been preparing for nuclear war and announcing the nuclear doctrine, even though they do not consider nuclear war. Nuclear experts are stressing that fear can lead to uncontrolled misjudgment and a synergistic effect of provocations and unintended consequences.
The war in Ukraine is the most dangerous since the Cuban missile crisis, and in some ways could be more dangerous, experts say.
A large number of defense-focused NATO forces are gathering near the Russian border, and the Russian forces struggling in Ukraine are very vulnerable. As Putin, increasingly paranoid, faces economic collapse and domestic unrest, it’s conceivable that a West conspiracy to get rid of him is underway.
Russia has said that military aid, including weapons provided by the West to Ukraine, constitutes an act of war and could attack NATO convoys. Last week, Russia launched a missile attack on a Ukrainian military base near the Polish border.
Ulrich Quinn, a nuclear strategist at the University of Hamburg in Germany, said: “The probability that a nuclear weapon will be mobilized is extremely small, but it is not completely absent,” he said. It can happen,” he added.
The Russian government is showing off its nuclear force. It may not be entirely empty. The possibility of using nuclear force was suggested through recent policy documents and wargame scenarios that Russian war officials fearful of NATO intervention could use to neutralize NATO intervention with a single nuclear attack. It is a gamble that former Soviet leaders rejected.
It is impossible to predict the outcome of a nuclear attack in advance. According to a recent Princeton University evaluation using various indicators, such as the war plans of both sides, 34 million people would die within a few hours if a nuclear attack was followed by a strategic weapon such as an intercontinental ballistic missile.
Alexander Vershbau, who served as NATO’s deputy secretary-general from 2012 to 2016, said Western leaders believed Russia’s plan to use nuclear weapons was not empty, and that an accident or mistake could be mistaken for a war by Russia. As Putin judged the Russian military’s struggle in Ukraine a crisis of survival, “that risk has grown tremendously in the last two and a half weeks.”
Tensions in the West since Russia’s annexation of the Krum Peninsula in 2014 have put Putin in place to enact a policy that allows the use of nuclear weapons against threats threatening “Russian survival.” It has been strengthened in such a way that the nuclear war tripwire can be easily operated.
In 2017, the Russian government published a doctrine that vaguely stated that it could “show readiness and resolve to use non-strategic nuclear weapons” in case of major conflict. Experts have interpreted this to mean a single nuclear attack.
The following year, Putin said that Russia could use a nuclear warhead “within seconds” of being attacked. He raised concerns that a nuclear attack could be launched if border disputes were misdiagnosed as war.
A 2020 Russian government document further expanded the terms of a nuclear attack. It is said that an attack using drones, etc., could trigger a nuclear attack by Russia.
These policies were made for problems that the former Soviet leaders never cared about. Unlike the Cold War, there are concerns that NATO could quickly and decisively win a conventional war against Russia.
As a result, Russia believes that it can wage a limited nuclear war and, through it, can win. Russia has at least 1,000 small “non-strategic” warheads and hypersonic missiles capable of pre-emptive strikes across Europe before the West responds.
But Russia’s military strategists continue to debate the issue of defining the scope of an attack that can defeat NATO without escalating the war. Worrying about the possibility that it’s like a needle’s eye. Either way, Russia has the potential to launch a nuclear attack.
“The escalation between the US and Russia could easily lead to a nuclear war,” said Dmitry Gorenburg, a Russian military policy analyst.
Russia also seems to think the NATO-Russian conflict has already begun.
Russia’s strategic doctrine was created in part out of concerns that the West would create economic and political chaos in Russia prior to its invasion.
Samuel Charup, head of Russian foreign policy at the Rand Institute, said the “nightmare has already begun” for Putin as the economy collapsed and backlash increased.
Under this circumstance, there is a possibility that Russia may misunderstand NATO’s military augmentation deployment in Eastern Europe and strengthening support for Ukraine as an attack that requires Russia’s nuclear policy.
In a situation where the atmosphere has become so vulnerable, a miscalculation such as one side’s brute force attack or provocation triggering retaliation could force Russia to launch a nuclear attack without going through a few steps.
Putin has already said that direct Western intervention in Ukraine would trigger a Russian nuclear retaliation. Under such circumstances, Western aid to Ukraine is testing its limits.
“The problem is that we don’t really know what the limits are,” Gorenburg said.
Quinn said domestic politics could also make the situation worse. If Russia goes beyond its limits, such as using chemical weapons, US leaders could face strong pressure to retaliate beyond what Russia expects.
In the United States, many politicians are demanding direct intervention, such as establishing a no-fly zone. It is claiming that the US also has nuclear weapons, which can prevent Russia’s nuclear retaliation.
However, if a no-fly zone is established, it may be necessary to attack air bases and air defenses in Russia that are aimed at Russian defense. Analysts warn that the rapid spread of these attacks could lead Russia to believe that NATO is trying to advance into Moscow, giving Putin a nuclear strike as a last resort.
Christopher Chivis, a former US intelligence officer working in Europe, recently said that “all of the dozens of wargames the US and its allies have played.” If Putin is in a limited war with NATO or loses in Ukraine, it is because of the West that he could launch a single nuclear attack. wrote that it was predicted.
In fact, the problem is that Putin himself does not know where the ban is.
Nuclear war, no matter how limited, carries with it the escalation risk that strategists say, “If you do not give up your nuclear weapons, you will be used.” Both sides know that a nuclear attack alone will annihilate Europe’s military power and all its nuclear weapons, rendering it undefensible. Accordingly, both sides believe that a preemptive strike is important. Even in the case of disputes due to misjudgment.
Recent advances in short-range missile technology have forced leaders to decide within minutes whether to launch a nuclear weapon. This greatly increases the pressure to preempt a wider range of attacks based on limited information.
Two war simulations conducted by the US at the end of the Obama administration assumed that Russia would launch a nuclear weapon once in an accidental clash between NATO and Russia.
At the time, the Defense Department leaders insisted on nuclear retaliation in the first simulation. However, White House official Colin Carl, a civilian, insisted that Moscow be isolated diplomatically and did so. Carl is currently the Deputy Secretary of Defense.
However, the second simulation is supposed to be nuclear retaliation by the United States. The reason was that it was difficult for the US itself to predict how it would respond in such a situation.
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