Aaron Harding: Minks and Russian Nukes: Putin decides he is willing to let Russia bleed out, and the possibility of a nuclear war creeps in
As international security expert Patrick Porter observed, Putin had decided to see his invasion of Ukraine through to the bitter end. While NATO continues to pump immense financial, technological and political support towards Kyiv, its citizens remain largely unaffected by the war, and the involvement’s cost enjoys a considerable degree of popular support.
Putin’s investment in the ‘special military operation’ in terms of the sheer cost of human life, resources and international condemnation, makes securing substantial territorial gain the only way to protect his own position. Having seen the collapse of the Soviet project first-hand during the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and having witnessed the often-gruesome ends of dictators during his lengthy political career, Putin is visibly distressed by the possibility of his close circle of enablers turning against him, should Russia fail to wrestle the ‘due’ gains from Ukraine.
As Porter notes, the West is dealing with an ‘imbalance of resolve.’ Russia under Putin remains well willing to bleed for the cause, and in the context of personal fear, Putin might take this largely uncritical support of the populace and the cultist devotion of his military to conclude that the employment of nuclear weapons is his best option at this stage. He needs results, and he needs them fast.
It remains unlikely that Putin would opt for a nuclear attack akin to the US strikes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Instead, he is guaranteed to have been at least considering the use of the so-called ‘tactical nuclear weapons.’ Tactical nuclear weapons (TNW) are limited-range nuclear weapons intended for use against specific targets of military nature, in theatre. While all the members of the UN Security Council and several States not party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) hold TNWs, they have never been used in any combat situation. The theoretical limitation of their use to that against concrete military targets does not negate the enormous risk of conflict escalation they use would inevitably cause.
The insanity of this step does not render it impossible. Putin’s strategy in Ukraine had brought on nothing but suffering for his country, yet he remains committed to its objectives. His announcement of his plan to station nuclear weapons in Belarus had not been met with any particular response by NATO. However, it is the same NATO that, for years, ignored the threat of the invasion of Ukraine in the first place. In his 28th March speech, Putin emphasised that Russia will remain in full control over any nuclear weapons stationed in Belarus — in full parallel with the US control over its TNWs on the territories of its European NATO allies. For Russia, this would represent its first nuclear deployment outside of the state borders since the early 1990s.
Belarus, as well as Kazakhstan and Ukraine itself, inherited large nuclear arsenals following the collapse of the Soviet Union, and all chose to denuclearise following 1991. While the European populace remains reassured that any weapons under Minsk would not pose danger to them, the latest Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dmitry Muratov warns that the tremendous danger of this move is in its subtext: Putin has moved on to prepare to condition the Russian populace that nuclear war is not inconceivable.
Composed by Aaron Harding for Denuclearise.com
