The threat of the top leadership of russia to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine due to the failures of its army remains a top topic in the information space. US President Joe Biden said that the risk of a global “nuclear apocalypse” is the highest since the Caribbean crisis of 1962. He noted that the use of small-capacity tactical weapons could quickly get out of control and lead to a global catastrophe.
❓Will putin really dare to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine? And what will happen if the worst happens?
❗Most military analysts in the West consider this scenario unlikely for the following reasons:
🔸If putin really counted on tactical nuclear weapons, he would not have used mobilization as an unpopular way in russian society to correct the situation at the front.
🔸The use of tactical nuclear weapons does not give putin any guarantee of winning this war, but will only bring a temporary operational effect.
☢️In order to completely change the situation from a defensive to an offensive one and seize the territories that are officially annexed by russia, the front units have to use hundreds of nuclear charges only in the first wave of the attack. The main problem will be the lack of skills of military units to attack after nuclear strikes and the inadequate number of radiobiological protection suits in warehouses. Also, given the nature of hostilities in Ukraine, large-scale gatherings of Ukrainian troops, both in defense and offensive, are rare, which negates the military sense of using tactical nuclear weapons.
🔸The course of the war is largely determined by the fact that Ukraine has international support among the nuclear countries of the “first world”, for which the use of nuclear weapons is a demonstrative challenge. putin certainly understands that NATO will respond to a hypothetical nuclear attack on the territory of Ukraine with such high-precision strikes on the centers of deployment of nuclear weapons carriers in russia, after which it will be impossible for russia to win this war on the battlefield.
☝️ J. Biden’s latest statements signal to putin that russia’s transition to the use of tactical nuclear weapons will lead to a reaction from NATO countries, from launching missile and air strikes on russian forces to direct confrontation.
🔺For example, American Senator Sam Nunn advocates “horizontal escalation” – if russia hits Ukraine with a nuclear cruise missile launched from a ship, the response will be the immediate sinking of this ship.
🔸 Western politicians and experts do not confirm the retaliatory use of NATO nuclear power to avoid an exchange of nuclear strikes between russia and the United States. Such a strategy gives the West room for maneuver and forces the kremlin to count on the probability of the worst-case scenario. But any escalation brings the world closer to the threshold of full-scale nuclear war.
🔸The kremlin’s preparations for a nuclear attack have not started yet, otherwise Western intelligence would have noticed them with a high probability. Since non-strategic nuclear charges are not on combat duty, but are in special storage facilities, their commissioning will require preparatory work. Almost all experts agree that it is impossible to hide these preparations.
Therefore, the rhetoric of putin, russian officials and their propagandists about the possibility, and in some cases, the necessity or even the inevitability of a nuclear attack on Ukraine or its allies, rather indicates a demonstration of determination to increase the degree of nuclear threat until Ukraine and the West agree to terms, that will satisfy russia, than about the readiness of practical use of tactical nuclear weapons.
However, the vast majority of experts agree that although the risk of the kremlin using non-strategic nuclear weapons against Ukraine is currently low, the threat of a nuclear strike is not just putin’s bravado. Since the possibility of launching a nuclear attack on a non-nuclear state is provided for by russia’s military doctrine, the probability of putin’s corresponding order cannot be “zero”.
☢️ What will happen if the decision to use tactical nuclear weapons by russia is still made?
❗ All experts are of the same opinion that the main purpose of the first hypothetical nuclear strike on Ukraine is to demonstrate putin’s determination in principle to use such weapons.
☝️According to the former chief nuclear policy specialist of the USA and, until 2019, Deputy Secretary General of NATO Rose Gotemuller, the most likely will be a “demonstration” detonation of low-power nuclear munitions capable of “instilling terror only in the hearts of Ukrainians and their allies” in the Black Sea or on a Ukrainian military facility. If the persuasiveness of an explosion over a deserted area seems insufficient to putin, the next targets may be political, economic and military targets (non-nuclear power plants, administrative (political) centers, civilian airports, road and railway bridges, ports, key economic facilities, important components of defense industrial complex, mass media and information facilities).
