Russian authorities at the highest levels keep telling the U.S. that they're serious about using tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine — note: "tactical" nuclear weapons are ... nuclear weapons — and U.S. analysts keep unseriously closing their ears.
This week, following up on President Putin's "this is not a bluff" threat, former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, now deputy chairman of Putin's security council, reiterated that Russia is willing to use nuclear weapons to defend Russia's newly acquired states in eastern and southern Ukraine, adding that this is "certainly not a bluff." (Reuters.)
"Let's imagine that Russia is forced to use the most fearsome weapon against the Ukrainian regime which had committed a large-scale act of aggression" — on its own sovereign territory, mind you — "that is dangerous for the very existence of our state," wrote Medvedev on Telegram. Such as act would fall under long-standing Russian military doctrine, and if carried out, continued Putin's lackey, no problem, because the West would not intervene: "[The] demagogues across the ocean and in Europe are not going to die in a nuclear apocalypse."
Like Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin enjoys advertising to the world what actions he might take, as he openly did, for instance, in his runup to invading Ukraine. And of late, his higher mobilization has been that of dispersing his mouthpieces to assure the world that he's dead serious about nuking his neighbor.
One prominent public intellectual and U.S. analyst of Russian affairs is The Atlantic's Tom Nichols, a former Naval War College professor. He asks, "How worried should we be?" But his answer is offered beforehand. It's embedded in his column's title, "Russia's Nuclear Threats Are All Putin Has Left" — implicit emphasis on threats. Writes Nichols:
"I still believe that Russian use of a nuclear weapon is unlikely. This is only an informed guess, because my expertise on Russia does not extend to the interior of Putin’s skull. But Putin has almost certainly contemplated the high probability that using a nuclear weapon could bring about the end of his rule faster than any of the bungled decisions he’s already made. This is not because global nuclear war would break out — although any use of a nuclear weapon runs that risk — but because a nuclear attack on Ukraine could provoke a collapse of the Russian regime itself."
Nichols' argument is one of peculiar logic. Going further, I'd say it's downright farcical. He merely circles back on his initial contention in a kind of tautology: to wit, Putin won't use nukes because that would end his rule because using nukes would end the Russian regime. But as Louis XIV was the French regime, Putin is the Russian regime. Thus Nichols' premise is – voila! — his following conclusion.
Much of the rest of his column is somewhat insufferable. He reminds us that he has advised against direct Western military action in Ukraine, citing his March 2022 Atlantic column — insufferably titled "Stay Calm, America" — in which he casts superior wisdom upon the weak-minded neurotic sort. "In recent days, I’ve heard various proposals for Western intervention, including support for a no-fly zone over Ukraine from former NATO Supreme Allied Commander General Philip Breedlove and the Russian dissident Garry Kasparov, among others."
Nichols now finds he must re-explain things to feeble-headed NATO commanders and war-gaming geniuses. "But emotions should never dictate policy," he writes as he facepalms before the preceding, excitable types. Nichols is mansplaining to men; he's lecturing such tremendously rational minds as Breedlove's and magnificently logical minds such as Kasparov's.
Nichols also asserts that "the entire world would coalesce against Putin, including China," if he were to use a nuclear weapon on Ukraine. This, if nothing else, will prevent Putin from doing so, says Nichols. But if anything else, given President Xi's recent cold-shouldering, Putin would be more inclined to use nukes, just to show Xi and the world that he is still his own man.
After noting each reason he can think of to argue rather decisively the "unlikelihood" of a Russian nuclear strike, Nichols, at the end, undoes it all by writing that "Putin might think that a nuclear bomb is his only option. Whether anyone would stop Putin from giving this order, or whether the Russian high command would carry it out, is anyone’s guess."
Nichols' guess is no. Mine is 80:20 yes. But I won't insult you by explaining that my guess is grounded in intellectual composure, whereas yours, whatever it is, most "likely" lies in emotional instablity.
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I should have added, which I'm adding now, that generally I like Nichols' writings. But this one I found, well, insufferable.