Playing Poker with Nukes

Was Putin serious when he threatened the use of a tactical nuclear weapon in the Ukraine war? (In case you wondered, a “strategic” nuclear weapon is long range – intercontinental – and usually with far more destructive power, whereas a “tactical” one is short range and with lesser power. But even a tactical one is more powerful than the one dropped on Hiroshima).

 

It's impossible to know for sure, obviously. As an Indian who has heard periodic threats of various Pakistanis at various rungs of their government and military on exactly this topic, I don’t remember anyone losing any sleep over such threats. But in this case, it is the US which has to decide whether to take the threat seriously, not India.

 

Is Putin getting desperate enough to actually thinking of using one? Or is he just bluffing, as a way to force NATO to consider if Ukraine is worth the risk of setting off a nuclear war? On the other side, remember how Trump had trashed the Europeans over NATO – he accused them of not contributing enough, he cried foul that the US carried too much of the workload of NATO. That had pissed off Europe. Is Biden cynically using Putin’s threat as an opportunity to make Europe see the need to continue with NATO, to bring them back to the fold, to convince them that Trump’s statements are now overturned?

 

All that is my guessing. Julian Borger’s article cites what happened during Obama’s war gaming of “a Russian use of a tactical nuclear weapon”. From 2016. The outcome of that war game was split – one set in Obama’s team felt they needed to respond militarily, otherwise their allies in Europe would lose faith, and it would embolden Russia to go even further. The other set was against a nuclear response – they preferred a strong conventional response.

 

But even those who favoured a nuclear response didn’t agree on where the US would drop its nuke? If they dropped it on Russia, all out nuclear war between the US and Russia was certain. The alternative was to drop it on a Russian ally like Belarus – but that didn’t feel right either.

 

Too inconclusive? That’s real life for you. In any case, Borger points out that Ukraine is different from that Obama’s war game on one key aspect – that war game involved Russia dropping a tactical nuke on a NATO member, whereas Ukraine isn’t. Does that reduce America’s inclination to feel obliged to respond?

 

No easy answers here. And Biden doesn’t (can’t?) tell what the US response might be. So we will only hear endless views on what may/may not happen in any step of this entire scenario, starting from whether Putin was serious or bluffing.