In the course of the Ukraine War, Vladimir Putin, Russia’s dictator, has from time to time hinted that he is prepared to use nuclear weapons. There is a tendency to downplay this. Many believe these are idle threats. When I hear this sort of talk I am reminded of the words of the late Helen Szamuely, “They mean it!” she would say. Having been partially educated in Moscow Szamuely knew what she was talking about. Not that we need her wise words. Just before the war, Mark Steyn interviewed his old boss, Conrad Black, on GB News. Black opined that Putin’s sabre rattling was “Kabuki theatre” or some such. As we now know, it wasn’t. He meant it.
But whether he means it or not we should at least be prepared.
What would he do first? Would he, for instance, use a tactical nuclear weapon to eliminate Ukrainian forces in front of him? Or we he indulge in nuclear blackmail: surrender or Kiev gets it? And what does the West – by which I suppose I mean the United States – do? If it’s a tactical nuke I suppose it could offer to supply Ukraine with tactical nukes of its own. But how keen would Ukrainians be to nuke their own territory? If it’s the blackmail option, does the West really threaten a nuclear response? Would such a threat be credible?
In the Cold War I was never particularly worried. I knew that if the Russians dropped the bomb on us we would drop the bomb on them. And I knew that the Russians knew that, so they wouldn’t. Now, things are not so clear.
Update 2/5/22
It’s very difficult to argue with Niall when he says, “The logic of deterrence is as valid as ever it was. The more the west radiates a will to react, the less likely Putin is to act. And the best way to radiate a will to react is to have the will to react.”
Also, thank you to Subotai Bahadur for his lengthy comment in which he points out that the nuclear club – both official and unofficial – is likely to get quite a bit bigger.
If he were to use a small tactical nuke against massed Uke forces it could be argued as a legitimate tactic of war. I’m not saying that it would be so, just that he could make that argument. On the other hand, hitting Kiev or any other city would be an attack against a population center with significant civilian casualties, and would probably be used as a justification for the West to get actively involved.
Either case would be a very bad move on Putin’s part. Given the taboo about the use of nukes, it would be seen as the desperate act of a madman. I don’t like to contemplate what might happen if he were to use nuclear weapons.
In the European theatre, Russia has approximately 200 times the number of tactical nukes in its inventory than all NATO countries put together. This is why simulations in which NATO directly confronts Russia always lead eventually to the use of strategic nuclear weapons and at least one billion people dead.
I suspect *tactical* use of nukes may prove less decisive than people expect. If they nuke Kyiv, all bets are off.
The problem with all of this is escalation. As soon as one nuke is dropped, tactical or not, you’ve reached a turning point where it becomes easier to justify sending more or alternately NATO responding in kind.
Once the nukes start flying, you become more worried about them destroying yours before you can launch them. The big red button becomes a hair trigger.
In war games, it’s very difficult to stop once you start and then you’re billions dead and a century or more of progress goes down the pan.
Russian warmonger TV hosts aside, I’m guessing the Russian elites not bound to Putin understand this. Just because Putin is dying doesn’t mean they’re going to allow him to take them with him to Hell.
But is Putin dying? Are we now pretty sure about that? He is definitely “terminal”?
More to the point, it would actually BE the desperate act of a madman. But that doesn’t preclude it happening.
Perhaps we fool ourselves in trying to define how a rational Putin will act, and in limiting our structuring of our strategies based on that assumption of rationality.
Just because an idea is scary and anathema doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be considered and countered. We need to be prepared for such things. You don’t try to out-think a rabid coyote, because it’s not really thinking. You just end it ASAP.
He seems to be suffering from the shakes pretty bad, which suggests something neurological in nature (possibly Parkinson’s disease?), but they’ve tried to keep it off the TV as much as possible, even reusing old footage with poorly photoshopped changes to try and pass it off as recent.
Telegram channel General SVR reports that Putin is scheduled to undergo “routine surgery” at some point in the near future which he’s been putting off because of the situation in the Ukraine.
This may not relate to the neurological problems, but rather for suspected abdominal cancer, for which he’s repeatedly seen an oncologist.
But we’re playing Soviet-style Kremlinology once more.
Is Putin going to die any time soon? Probably not, even if the reports are true, abdominal cancer can be treated (albeit not cured) and Parkinson’s is degenerative not sudden.
We’ve had sick-and-dying Soviet leaders hang around long past their sell-by date (Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko) without them being ousted or make any material difference on the Soviet affairs, so the likelihood is that the same will continue with a sick-and-dying Putin.
If Putin is determined to be serious about letting the nukes fly to tend wounded Russian egos among the elite, that might change rapidly though, presumably why Putin’s paranoid about being assassinated.
Probably right about that one.
I have a simpler question for our specialists.
As is known, the US (a.k.a. NATO) built two bases, one completed in 2016 in Romania and one (soon to be completed) in Poland. The US asserted that these bases are purely defensive in character. They contain (so the US says) early warning and detection systems against missiles, and also atni-missile interceptors. Putin says, plausibly, that the bases might well contain also attack weapons such as cruise missiles, even nuclear tipped ones. Putin says no one invited Russia to inspect the installations and make sure they are only defensive. Putin claimed they are a menace to Russia and demanded they be removed. Which is a reasonable claim. In defense matters you cannot rely on verbal assurances. (He, of course, objected to the prospect that another such facility will be built in Ukraine).
Here is the question:
Suppose Putin launches a salvo of conventional cruise missiles and destroys one or both these bases. Then he declares that any retaliation against Russian territory will be answered (possibly) by nuclear weapons.
What does the US do then? More sanctions? Does it go to a possibly nuclear war against Russia?
@Jacob – The problem becomes not that Russia has attacked a US base hosted in one or more European NATO members, but rather that in so doing Russia has triggered Article 5 of the NATO Treaty.
While the US would (in principle) be justified in a unilateral “measured retaliatory response” such as striking an equivalent number of Russian bases on a quid-pro-quo basis, it is more likely that they would recognise that Article 5 had been triggered and confer with NATO allies before doing so, since the likelihood is that escalation would be in the European theatre. I’d imagine the Europeans would be a bit pissed if the USA started acting unilaterally from European NATO hosted bases, justified or not.
Kind of the whole point of collective defence.
I agree that it is time to consider the possibility of a nuclear attack on Ukraine.
An act of desperation, of course: Putin is on record as saying that Ukraine is part of Russia, in fact it is a fictional partition of Russia.
A nuclear attack on Ukraine would therefore be a nuclear attack on Russia, on the basis of the Putin doctrine.
Normally, a solution could be for POTUS to declare that the US would regard a nuclear attack on Ukraine as a nuclear attack on the US.
But if Biden said that, Putin would laugh it off.
Donald “I’ve got a bigger button on my desk” Trump would be the right person to respond to Putin’s sable-rattling. Lacking that, the west is possibly making do with stuff like the “of course, this has no particular significance” story about there being both a US and a French sub in Faslane at the moment, in the hope that internet conspiracy sites will react by saying things Putin is not quite sure he can disbelieve. What you reward you get more of; we won’t become safer by making concessions over anyone’s nuclear sabre-rattling.
Putin felt safe to start this because the west looked weak. It may be just our media’s chauvinism, but he seems to be doing some hating-on-Britain just at the moment. (Perhaps the UK complicates his calculations a bit. Plus Boris and his ministers are not mincing their words about Vlad.) I fear there is not much point discussing what ‘the west’ should do when that so obviously is very weakly correlated with what Biden(‘s handlers) would do. But since Patrick has asked, then, just for the record, I’ll state my view FWIW. The logic of deterrence is as valid as ever it was. The more the west radiates a will to react, the less likely Putin is to act. And the best way to radiate a will to react is to have the will to react.
I doubt that is going to happen. The US has been reluctant to support a NATO enforced no-fly zone over Ukraine, justifiably in my opinion, since it would drag US/NATO forces into direct engagement with Russian forces and make the possibility of nuclear exchange more likely.
Far better and far less dangerous to fight a proxy war through the Ukrainians. Not so much for the Ukrainians, obviously, but they’ve been dragged into this war on their own territory more by Russian aggression, than US action or inaction.
Historical precedents of major powers guaranteeing a retaliatory response haven’t been good either. Look at what happened with Poland and Great Britain in 1939.
I agree. The logical deterrence of Mutually Assured Destruction still applies and has force in terms of preventing a deliberate full-scale nuclear response, but Putin could launch a few tactical nukes…
If Putin does (threaten to) nuke Kyiv, is it worth a nuclear exchange, or should the West abandon the Ukraine? Should the Ukraine surrender before it gets worse?
Threads, if you’ve not seen it.
Ok Dave, and then he threatens to nuke Warsaw. Then Bucharest. Then Berlin. Then Copenhagen. Then Amsterdam. Is there a point wr actually stand and fight?
I honestly don’t know when to stand and fight.
20 years ago I’d have said “bring it on” over Kyiv.
These days I’ve got more to lose (kids).
In 1939 the British government could decide that victory would be expensive but worth the cost.
The West could probably come off less badly than Russia in a nuclear exchange.
Perry, how many European cities are you prepared to have nuked over this?
Hitler’s intention (once Poland had made it plain it would not become a German client state) was always to conquer Poland in 1939 to ensure a quiet Eastern front in 1940 while he was defeating France and the UK, which he did to ensure a quiet western front while conquering Russia in 1941. While he would have preferred to fight each war separately, so would have been pleased if we’d left Poland to her fate in 1939 and waited our turn to be attacked in law as well as in fact, not declared war in 1939, he was always going to do those conquests and in that order (and that fast if he could not do it even faster, which he wished to). Mein Kampf indicates that in outline and the German records of the early war period are very clear indeed. So while our guarantee did not deter Hitler from attacking Poland, the lesson from that bit of history is that we should have gone to war over Czechoslovakia in 1938. (And the lesson from that is that either nothing as bad as this thread is talking about will happen now, or else – if they see analogies between then and now – maybe historians of the future will suggest we were foolish not to have challenged Putin more strongly much earlier.)
As relevant as ever – salami tactics.
Niall:
IIRC Donald is on record as saying that he told Putin (privately of course) that he would hit Moscow if the Russian army invaded the Ukraine. Trump also said that Putin thought he (Donald) was being funny, to which he (Donald) replied: all those beautiful golden domes? gone!
My guess is that this is not an utter lie, at worst an exaggeration of what Trump actually said; and that it was not an utter bluff, just a signifier that he would have made Putin regret his actions.
Trump should be taken seriously, but not literally.
We have reached a point – with an arguable madman running one of the worlds’ nuclear powers and actively threatening the world with them – where the only remaining sure solution is to kill Putin.
Who else in Russia would step into his shoes and carry out his threats?
That may be true, bobby
The issue about letting Putin using nuclear weapons and not retaliating extends well past the Ukraine.
What would stop the Iranians torching Tel Aviv? Or rather, the Israelis torching Tehran to get in first? Pakistan and India is another touch point.
If Kim of Korea thinks that he can fire a nuke or two without suffering Armageddon in return, well, I think he probably would.
There is one and only one way to react. Each device in the Ukraine is matched with exactly one of the same type. If they deploy a device on the Ukrainian army, then the Russian army gets one in return. If they nuke Kiev, the Kaliningrad gets one back.
I would prefer if it were possible to retaliate by invading Russia conventionally and punishing the regime that way. But we know that would be the way to start a general conflagration.
If you let the use of nuclear weapons go unchallenged, then they WILL get used. Until they become common.
The NATO powers will not need to discuss the response — they will have agreed on it many years ago. And they will have told Russia exactly what that response will be.
That’s up to Vlad. Seems to me it is all or nothing.
Given that Putin and his circle seem to regard the UK as Enemy Number One right now, might there not be a possibility that they choose both their moment and their target for a nuclear escalation at least partly for symbolism and dramatic potential? I refer to the upcoming Platinum Jubilee celebrations at the beginning of June.
Imagine the scene. London thronged with crowds and bunting. The Royal Family lined up on the balcony. The cameras relaying the scene to a global television audience of a billion or more – and then, without warning, a brilliant flash of light engulfs the scene for a second or two before the screens go blank…
Speaking from this side [the US] of the Atlantic, with a slightly different viewpoint, and having written on various naval, military, and political matters in different places under another name over the last few decades, allow me to toss in something that is usually a given in MAD strategy.
There is an assumption in that strategy that both sides’ leadership cadres are taking matters with the utmost seriousness they deserve and they have the knowledge and training to do so. Further, that each side’s leadership cadres has their own nation’s interests foremost, and that they have the backing of their nation based on their perceived legitimacy as the leader and representative of that nation.
With all due respect, I have seen discussion here worrying about whether Putin meets those criteria for Russia. Might I offer that Joseph Robinette Biden, and/or whoever is actually turning the crank for him, almost surely fails all those tests. Nobody knows what will be the basis of any American [and therefore indirectly NATO] response to a Russian first use of nuclear weapons. It is noted that the American Left, and the European Left [which is largely in power in Europe] are not known for accepting reality or consequences for their actions or inaction.
I suspect that on our side, the current regime will do anything to avoid having to do anything in such a case, fully protected by our UniParty and our media. It is going to really not be pleasant to be either Ukrainian or any Europeans downwind. Europeans are going to have to button their codpieces and get ready to deal with a deadly world.
Strategic deterrence, and as a subhead the concept of smaller powers NOT developing their own nuclear forces, is based on the assumption of MAD. Which is about to be disproved.
What I expect as a first reaction, assuming things do not go TANGO UNIFORM immediately, is that a number of powers who are rationally suspected of having quietly developed their own nuclear weapons will go public. Outside of the known nuclear powers; I expect that the ROK, Japan, Taiwan, Brazil, and maybe others will declare their status. Just from that, and in the wake of the breakdown of MAD until it becomes reality again, things will get a lot more complicated.
Toss in that no one will be able to believe in collective security or depend on the greater powers to stand up for them regardless of promises. The incentive then will be for smaller non-nuclear powers to develop a counter-value deterrent of their own, including delivery means, with its exact nature being determined by the perceived threats they face and their capabilities.
Knowledge and technology have spread vastly since not only 1945, but even since 1979’s VELA incident where it is a strong possibility that a coalition of non-nuclear powers did in fact test a device. I am not a physicist, nor do I play one on TV. But using open source references about a foot and a half to my 8:00 position as I sit, I could probably come up with a theoretical design for a gun-type device that would work. There are a LOT of real physicists around the world, a lot more than in 1945. And transporting such a device over thousands of miles is now a technological trifle. It may not be as fast as an ICBM, but a counter-value weapon does not have to be as fast or as accurate. The gateway will be the ability to access, refine, and fabricate sufficiently pure fissionable material. That gateway is a lot wider than it was in 1945.
So there will be a second wave of new nuclear powers, purely as a matter of national survival. And noting that different cultures do not think alike, there will be slips in calculations as they view their threats. Those slips will have consequences.
I am not offering these thoughts with any pleasure. I have grandchildren I would like to see grow up.
Subotai Bahadur
Fair enough. But if the invasion of Ukraine in 2022 is your Poland 1939, when was the equivalent of the Sudetenland / Munich crisis of 1938?
Because, even if you restrict yourself to post-Soviet Russia, time and again it’s the same salami-slicing attacks in the same enclaves, Abkhazia, Transnistria, North Ossetia-Alania, Donetsk People’s Republic, Luhansk People’s Republic.
Which one of these “quarrels in far-away countries, between people of whom we know nothing” should NATO have gone to war over?
Which incursion into a shitty little enclave should set the nukes flying?
In fairness, designing a Uranium weapon was never the issue, that is simple enough, it was always about the difficulty of refining the Uranium ore into weapons grade via isotopic separation. The result is an unwieldy device that is hard to deliver in anything less than a small freight container.
If you’re a small state actor then it takes a great deal of determination and technical assistance from an actual nuclear power (even if it’s just some nuclear scientist(s) gone rogue) to get things up and running, but once you’re there, baring Israeli strikes or the end of Apartheid, there’s no going back.
I’m pretty certain that there are several states on the verge of nuclear capability, even if they’ve not actually undertaken a test yet (the Vela incident demonstrated that even minuscule tests could be spotted), but given provocation from their strategic enemies think now is a good time to step over the line…just in case.
Pretty sure Iran is in that position and probably a few others.
When the first modern nuke gets detonated in anger against opposition forces all previous bets are off.
That’s the essence, isn’t it? Deterrence doesn’t really work as a marginal game; it’s a line drawn in the sand. You can’t let the other guy step over it “a little bit” – that’s just drawing the line someplace else.
And if you don’t have a line you aren’t playing the deterrence game. That may be good or it may not be, but deterrence successfully kept the world from self-destructing for more than half a century. If the leaders of the nuclear nations were going to try a different approach now I sure wish they weren’t so comically inept. Biden couldn’t organize a cookie bake-off unless he thought there might be sniffable Girl Scouts involved, and Putin reminds me of Gru, without the heart of gold.
We are screwed.
There is a 2014 article that makes that exact point. Re-reading it is frighteningly prescient.
“Salami Slicing” and Deterrence
Not to go all Tom Clancy, but what a time for an interested third party to detonate the freight container nuke they’ve had sitting in a subbasement in Kiev for a few years.
Muddy the waters, send the world into a panic, and give that third party a shot at bettering their world position.
Would anyone, at this point, argue for restraint, and urge us to not blame Putin?
There are just so many possibilities for feints within feints in this scenario.
I would have thought that there is a reasonable case for just handing Ukraine 50 or so short to medium range nukes, and let them decide what the appropriate response is. They only gave up their share of the Soviet arsenal on the understanding that Russia, the USA, and (I think) the UK guaranteed their security. That contract has been well and truly breached, so a few dozen nukes would seem just compensation.
Yes, Prime Minister on salami slicing.
Quite relevant to the current situation.
A question for the ages…
All commenters here can’t think of no historic precedent other than Hitler. (Where’s Goodwin’s law?).
Here is another precedent.
Concerning NATO fighting (with nukes or without) for Ukrainian freedom and territorial integrity.
As you maybe know, 8 East European countries have been occupied by force and badly oppressed by the USSR from 1944 to 1990. The West, the US and NATO did absolutely nothing toward freeing or helping these unfortunate people. There were at least three major revolts by local people, brutally put down by Russian tanks. The mighty NATO did nothing.
What makes Ukraine different? What makes it more deserving of NATO help and possibly sacrifice?
I’m pretty certain that there are several states on the verge of nuclear capability, even if they’ve not actually undertaken a test yet (the Vela incident demonstrated that even minuscule tests could be spotted), but given provocation from their strategic enemies think now is a good time to step over the line…just in case.
Oh, yes, there are. What is truly worrying about nuclear warfare is that Putin & Co can use this as an ultimate threat to do whatever they want via non-nuclear means because they always have that ace up their sleave. If Putin gets away with this every deranged “leader” will want nukes because it confers an immunity. Does NATO fear Putin’s clapped-out tanks? It’s knackered Su-24s? (Yeah I know they have Tu-160s and Su-34s – but how many are actually working?)… No, we fear the nukes. Rightly so. That is why the scare tactic works – because it is real.
I think there is a very real possibility of Putin “Going Samson” and I suspect the first strike will be not exactly where one expects… He’ll hit a Birmingham rather than a London.To show what he could do if nanny was out of the room.
To state the bleedin’ obvious, Jacob, Soviet occuped Central Europe was very different on so many levels. When the Prague Spring happened, there was no military & logistic infrastructure to receive NATO arms, not to mention the geography and demographics meant Czechoslovakia could not stand against Soviet Union no matter what NATO did.
The situation in Ukraine is very, very different geographically, demographically & militarily.
‘Russian warmonger TV hosts aside, I’m guessing the Russian elites not bound to Putin understand this. Just because Putin is dying doesn’t mean they’re going to allow him to take them with him to Hell.’
There is a reason why it is so hard to remove dictators from the inside. They surround themselves with people who are more fanatical than they are. Putin is definately a case in point. The only question that matters (other than Putin’s willingness of course) is, if he orders the use of a few tactical nukes, will those orders make it down the entire chain of command and be obeyed? Because once nukes are used in Ukraine, hell breaks loose.
“The situation in Ukraine is very, very different geographically, demographically & militarily.”
The only similarity is NATO’s impotence and unwillingness to fight. That hasn’t changed.
That hasn’t prevented them from egging on the Ukrainians to fight.
There you go Jacob, fixed that for you.
NATO ain’t perfect and there has been a lot of slacking and shirking of responsibility in recent years, especially from European members now feeling threatened by the Russian bear, as President Trump was right to point out during office, especially those failing to contribute their 2% of GDP to NATO military commitments.
It seems like the Russian invasion of Ukraine has stiffened NATO members resolve (and some non-NATO members like Sweden and Finland). Even the Germans are being dragged (very reluctantly) into a measure of compliance and support.
So no, I’m not going to complain. I think, all thinks considered, including the risk of nukes getting thrown about, NATO is doing okay and continuing to prove it’s worth as a force of deterrence.
Collective security is only worth a damn if those benefiting from it share in the costs – financial, political and in manpower to show their enemies (primarily Russia, but others too) that they are an effective force, not just a paper tiger.
I appreciate that others may not share that view.
Ah
The chattering blogerati have now discovered that the evil Putin will consider nuking selected targets in Yurope….
Bless
Post by a Putin bot……….Not
Hardly a revelation to me. That is why i have always supported UK having a nuclear deterrent. Also why i want to see the Russian army cut to pieces and Russia fucked in every way possible.
If we push the analogy (and I am fine with not pushing it – I was merely replying to the suggestion of Poland 1939 being an argument against), then FWIW I think we would have been wiser to challenge Putin’s invasion of Georgia in mid-2008, rather than his invasion of Crimea in early 2014. (But that was never politically likely.)
Collective security always sounds great. It failed in the 1930s for reasons inherent in it. Firstly, it requires that each individual member of the collective be willing to fight in wars for issues that may seem unimportant to it – for “faraway peoples of which we know nothing”, as John Galt appropriately quoted. The second is that it requires every small war to become, or at least risk becoming, a big war. Everyone loved the League of Nations idea after WW1, but when Japan invaded Manchuria (its first test), no-one loved the idea of actually enforcing it. Everyone loved the idea of United Nations and NATO after WWII in the abstract, but the UN achieved little and NATO’s achievements were related to its members all seeing themselves threatened by communist Russia – and the recent awakening of various members from the deep slumber that Trump reproved is also caused by the threat of Russia.
Jacob really wants Ukraine to just surrender to nice Mr. Putin and does not want to see Russia’s army bleed white on the Ukrainian steppes.
He also seems baffled that a critical mass of Ukrainians are entirely willing to stand and fight and not take his advice that it would be better to let Ukraine be abolished culturally and politically by Russia.
Bizarrely, even after all the mass graves north of Kyiv and the ones spotted by satellite around Mariupol (which may make Bucha seem almost trivial), Jacob says his views are because he wants to save lives… by urging them to either surrender to the mass murderous Russians or by having NATO cut off their supplies so they just lose the war.
Don’t be like Jacob.
Biden is about nine miles from me right now.
It occurred to me that it has been decades since I’ve had to concern myself with questions about blast radius, wind direction, cloud cover, etc., when a target is nearby.
Welcome back to the 60’s. 😉
That is the exact reverse of the situation, which is much more like the Finish winter war. When the Finns were attacked at odds of some 10-to-1 in immediate forces arrayed against them, the (also otherwise preoccupied) Britain and France did not greatly egg them on; it was the Finns who decided to make a fight of it, despite getting from the League of Nations much sympathy (and the expulsion of Russia) but very little practical help. Only after Finland surprised everyone by throwing the initial invasion back did the western allies both praise them and start thinking about how to help them (and incidentally help themselves).
Similarly, I am far from the only one to have pointed out the obvious: that western elites thought Putin would race through the Ukraine as he had the Crimea, and they would have done nothing meaningful against Putin if he had. It was they who were “egged-on” to get off the fence by the Ukraine’s unexpectedly determined and effective resistance – by Zelensky’s “I need ammunition, not a ride” and etc.
I don’t know who would have thought it sensible, at any time prior to the invasion, to plan for Putin invading the Ukraine and then getting so stuck he began rattling the nuclear sabre, and then the current west not cringing if he did. I think (optimist that I am) that Putin will not start nuclear war. I don’t feel I need much optimism to think there is no nuclear weapon pre-placed in Kiev by a third party before the war started. Which, of course, is no argument against that being the plot of a Hollywood film. 🙂
Speaking of which, is anybody in this thread familiar with common summer weather patterns in Ukraine?
If the prevailing summer winds there blow in from the Black Sea (which wouldn’t surprise me one bit), that might act as a bit of a deterrent for Putin’s nuclear urges – at least for the next several months.
@Niall:
Yes, that was my analysis as well. By not intervening with a harder line in 2008 and/or 2014 we simply supported Putin’s view that the West was weak and would do nothing about his various and continued encroachment of his neighbours. In doing so we turned the Ukraine invasion from a possibility into an inevitability, even though he’s making a dogs dinner of that.
I agree. If we did nothing (or a weak response) over Ukraine, where would we draw the line? Finland? Sweden? Belgium? The Channel? Piccadilly?
Helping the Ukrainians fight now means that we don’t end up with a closer and more dangerous fight later, down the line when we might find we have no alternative but to go nuclear to “hold the line”.
You are more optimistic than I. I have “people” in the intelligence community (military) who swear to me that there are likely few large cities that do not have such packages sitting quietly somewhere. With proper shielding, they can just sit in trucks and containers and basements for decades.
@bobby b
I’m no nuclear weapons engineer or anything close, but my understanding is that smuggling such weapons across borders is difficult and that nuclear weapons decay over time so that the probability that they will go (radioactive) ‘BOOOOM’ rather than delivering the intended almighty ‘KABLOOIE!’ increases and so you wouldn’t want such a weapon sitting around in a basement for decades without suitable technical care and attention.
You’re likely closer to that than am I. I’m doing well when I spell nuclear correctly. But I have reason to believe this gentleman when he tells me things. Which, I know, is a completely inadequate basis for argument here.
It depends how the weapons are constructed, but certainly the standard construction involves a Polonium-210 modulated neutron initiator placed in a pit at the centre of the plutonium warhead needs to be replaced every year or two and the anti-corrosion shielding of the plutonium erodes and needs to be replaced.
These are not neutral devices that can just sit in a warehouse for decades until they are triggered and require periodic specialist maintenance.
It’s also why we rotate the UK nuclear submarine fleet, with typically 2 submarines on active duty and the other 2 submarines being services or rotating their crews.
In the cold war period (before we switched to missiles) we used to keep only a relatively small number of nuclear cores actively deployed inside bombs and “War Ready”, the remainder were separate warheads, casings and initiators held at places like Aldermaston which could be assembled at short notice, but weren’t available for immediate use.
This was primarily because of the issue of active maintenance, but also because assembling and disassembling nuclear triggers was a tricky business that could easily go wrong. Far better and safer to assemble them only when their use was deemed necessary and immediate.
Active weapons had a specific life-span after which they were replaced by newly assembled weapons, disassembled; their cores reused and their assemblies serviced or replaced.
I quite see that my particular argument is irrelevant if we’re taking about a nuclear nation that, maybe starting decades ago, systematically planted bombs in major cities all over the world. However the Ukraine has been a non-nuclear power for a long time, and before that Kiev was not the capitol city of a nation, so we’re not just talking about Washington, Moscow, Peking, London and Paris (minus perpetrator’s capitol – or not, if there are multiple such perpetrators). And as the list of sites gets that long, I think the increasing risks of exposure while placing or over time or through a mole in their security services should concern the perpetrator.
I also take the point of AKM (May 2, 2022 at 2:55 am) about likely degradation of such unmaintained weapons with time. (Of course, some uncertainties surround the ones delivered via rocket.)
However I think the main point is that we need to be robust facing the dangers we know exist, so must be very robust about any merely alleged possibilities. If this were thought to be a real possibility, we could have an anti-lockdown in which the population of London all participate in an organised search for the thing. It would cost no more than lockdown did, might invade civil liberties no more than lockdown did, be healthier exercise for the participants, maybe find many a lost item and occasional thing that needed to be found, etc., and perhaps have a better claim to having a point. If conversely, we go on doing nothing about this alleged risk at home then I guess we go on doing nothing about it in foreign policy too. We could give Ukraine radar and satellite coverage good enough to know if a nuclear explosion in Kiev were preceded by some nuclear-looking weapon being fired at it.
My 0.02p FWIW. If there is any more to be known on the likelihood of this and the perpetrator(s), I am interested, but think it cannot affect anyone’s policy on the Ukraine.
“Also why i want to see the Russian army cut to pieces and Russia fucked in every way possible.”
That is a good wish.
But in the meanwhile it’s Ukraine that is fucked. Totally.
@Jacob – I think you need to quit watching Dmitry Kiselyov’s Russian propaganda TV shows. If you think Russia will attack the West with nuclear weapons (or even Kyiv) and the West will simply stand idly by then you have another thing coming.
The latest propaganda piece showing the UK washed away by a Poseidon missile is so fantastical it is laughable. It’s like a plot device from an Austin Powers movie.
What’s Putin and his cronies going to threaten us with next? A Russian version of Sharknado?
Please seek urgent help from a qualified mental health professional.
Which, of course, is no argument against that being the plot of a Hollywood film.
Alas, Bruce Willis recently retired due to a form of dementia or similar. It is a shame on many levels but I certainly don’t think we’d have the mass-hass* from the Gremlin in the Kremlin if Willis was still locked and loaded and in a suitably dirty vest.
*Short for “massive hassle” – I owe the term to Jane Hobson, Ryton Comp, c.1990. She was a Brosette. Grolsch bottle tops in her shoes, red neckerchief – the full 8.2296m. The second girl I ever kissed.
PS. JG. I am sort of banned from watching “Sharknado” movies. Until Thursday. That’s when the missus goes to her Buddhism class in Manchester. Then it’s beer, bong, nibbles and the sound up to 11. We each seek enlightenment via our own path.
As the “Iron Sky” and “Tremors” movie series also demonstrate, there is a certain indecipherable joy in watching purest medical grade schlock.
Movies which do not seek to elucidate or inform, which have no aesthetic milieu but are pure working class entertainment from start to finish.
The original “Sharknado” has that in spades (the sequels, not so much). It has no other redeeming qualities whatsoever.
Viewing is improved by a rough work week and anaesthetic levels of vodka.
All praise to writer Thunder Levin for this vision of perfection. May his passing cleanse the world.
NickM- there is a beer called ‘Enlightenment’! I’ve drunk it! (“Keep drinking” seemed to be the message.)
As for Kyiv, the Russians wouldn’t dare destroy the city, as it means so much in terms of Russian heritage! Historically, Kyiv is the cultural heartland of Russia, and was a major part of the Christianity that all Russians are taught to revere- indeed, citizens of Moscow were called Moscovites for a long time, until Rus became a cultural term that later turned into Russia.
You clearly have a higher opinion of the current Russian ruling caste than I do.
@Nicholas – While I agree with you about the cultural heritage of Kyiv, I don’t think Mr. Putin shares your sentiment. Like Perry, I suspect he would rather see Kyiv a smouldering ruin than under the flag of a free Ukraine.
JG,
I’m also banned from watching, “Snakes on a Plane”. My mother actually asked me what that was about. She also once asked me what Donne’s XIX elegy, “To His Mistress going to bed” was about. My mother was a head of English at a large secondary school.
Come, Madam, come, all rest my powers defy,
Until I labour, I in labour lie.
The foe oft-times having the foe in sight,
Is tir’d with standing though he never fight.
Off with that girdle, like heaven’s Zone glistering,
But a far fairer world encompassing.
Unpin that spangled breastplate which you wear,
That th’eyes of busy fools may be stopped there.
Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime,
Tells me from you, that now it is bed time.
Off with that happy busk, which I envy,
That still can be, and still can stand so nigh.
Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals,
As when from flowery meads th’hill’s shadow steals.
Off with that wiry Coronet and shew
The hairy Diadem which on you doth grow:
Now off with those shoes, and then safely tread
In this love’s hallow’d temple, this soft bed.
In such white robes, heaven’s Angels used to be
Received by men; Thou Angel bringst with thee
A heaven like Mahomet’s Paradise; and though
Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know,
By this these Angels from an evil sprite,
Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.
Licence my roving hands, and let them go,
Before, behind, between, above, below.
O my America! my new-found-land,
My kingdom, safeliest when with one man mann’d,
My Mine of precious stones, My Empirie,
How blest am I in this discovering thee!
To enter in these bonds, is to be free;
Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be.
Full nakedness! All joys are due to thee,
As souls unbodied, bodies uncloth’d must be,
To taste whole joys. Gems which you women use
Are like Atlanta’s balls, cast in men’s views,
That when a fool’s eye lighteth on a Gem,
His earthly soul may covet theirs, not them.
Like pictures, or like books’ gay coverings made
For lay-men, are all women thus array’d;
Themselves are mystic books, which only we
(Whom their imputed grace will dignify)
Must see reveal’d. Then since that I may know;
As liberally, as to a Midwife, shew
Thy self: cast all, yea, this white linen hence,
There is no penance due to innocence.
To teach thee, I am naked first; why then
What needst thou have more covering than a man.
I think that is reasonably explicit for the C16th*. Of course it is tragic. The lady in question is his wife who was a Catholic. That’s how we know how to pronounce the poet’s name – from a triplet he wrote – John Donne, Anne Donne, Undone.
*It always amazes me that every generation thinks it invented sex. I can think of nearly 8 billion reasons this is not the case.
Cultural heritage…
A few years ago the Saudi government demolished the house of Muhammed’s Mum. They wanted to make space for some mega hotel complex for The Hajj. Because Saudi has two things – oil and Hajj.
Not everyone has the same view on the importance of historical things.
One of my first dates with the woman I’m married to was seeing The Tempest as a promenade performance at Tynemouth. Epic setting. Ruined Castle and Priory. Spot on! Except there is a ’70s (I guess) Coast Guard Station…
We all get it wrong at times. Does it occur to you that because of the cultural and religious significance of Kyiv that is why Putin feels the need to destroy it? Afterall how can Moscow be the Third Rome (and the rhetoric from Russian State Media is getting histrionically eschatological) when Kyiv was a major centre for Christianity when Muscovites were a bunch of pagan goat-fuckers?
Every despot has sought to re-write history – it’s how they roll. Why should Vlad be different?
Anyway,
Why would Putin give a fuck about Kyiv? He didn’t about Grozny. Grozny was about the size of Liverpool.
Boris “Hello Vlad, that St. Petersburgh is a nice place. Plenty of history, especially regarding your Marxist/Leninist history. Do you know where our Trident subs are?”
“Be a shame if St. Petersburg was to have itself a little nuclear… Hacksident and ended up glowing-in-the-dark for the next millennia or so, wouldn’t it Vlad old pal?”
🙂
Quite so, Komakino, those are the terms we need to using with these utter shits.
fwiw there is now a Perun video arguing that this is all very unlikely: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxOO0hCCSk4