In addition to nuclear use meeting a specific objective for Russia, there also needs to be a conviction in Moscow that the outcome in terms of international response would be manageable. The most direct and serious countermeasure would be a reciprocal nuclear strike on Russia itself. But heavyweight Russian commentators have expressed ‘99 per cent’ confidence that the US would not respond in kind to a tactical nuclear strike, and assess that ‘nobody in or around the Kremlin believes the Western powers will strike a nuclear attack on Russia if it uses a nuclear device in Ukraine’.
This means that it is essential that all countries – not only Western powers – should seek alternative means of deterrence of nuclear use; either through undermining Russian confidence that there would not be a nuclear response, or through conveying greater conviction that a non-nuclear response would be of sufficiently destructive or incapacitating effect that there was no subsequent doubt that launching a nuclear strike had been a catastrophic error. And the warnings of consequences have to be more credible than those made before February 2022 in efforts to dissuade Russia from launching a fresh invasion of Ukraine – since those warnings were self-evidently discounted by Putin.
It must be made clear in entirely unambiguous terms that any use of nuclear weapons, whether tactical or not, in Ukraine or beyond, would bring consequences that would be devastating not just to Russia but to Putin personally.
In particular, it must be made clear in entirely unambiguous terms that any use of nuclear weapons, whether tactical or not, in Ukraine or beyond, would bring consequences that would be devastating not just to Russia but to Putin personally. Given Putin’s understandable tendency to disregard Western words and be guided instead by Western actions, the clarity in messaging must be reinforced by discernible indicators of preparedness to follow through on it.
Instead, however, public statements by Western leaders including President Biden have not been worded in a manner that is likely to convince Russia that the response will be sufficiently damaging to outweigh any conceivable gains. Writing for the New York Times in May 2022, Biden stated that the US response to nuclear use would be ‘severe consequences’. Then, in September, asked in a television interview for a specific message to Putin on use of nuclear weapons, Biden replied: ‘Don’t. Don’t. Don’t. You will change the face of war unlike anything since World War II.’ In light of previous comments by Putin about the probable outcomes of nuclear war – and the more disturbing aspects of Russia’s so-called ‘death cult’, characterized by the idea that a ‘purifying apocalypse’ is something to be embraced – this could even serve as an incentive, and a means of bringing about the historical destiny for Russia that Putin has repeatedly described.
A further unscripted comment by Biden, at a Democratic Party fundraising event in early October 2022, that Putin was ‘not joking’ about potential use of nuclear weapons and that this presented the world with ‘the prospect of Armageddon’, provided another example of mixed messaging from Washington. Sceptics concluded that Biden was once again showing his susceptibility to Kremlin narratives that the threat of nuclear war was real and substantial, while optimists countered that he was likely to be signalling to the Kremlin that the consequences of nuclear use would be catastrophic. But the key outcome of his
off-the-cuff remark was confusion; and if even Biden’s closest Western observers were confused, Putin will have stood even less chance of receiving and understanding the right message.
Indicators
Throughout the intense speculation over Russia’s nuclear posture based on what Putin says, there has been relatively little attention paid to what the military actually does. Western intelligence chiefs have repeatedly reported, after fresh nuclear scares in response to rhetoric from Moscow, that no real preparations to change nuclear posture have been detected.
Russia is also unlikely to order a nuclear strike without at least some effort to deliver a final warning to the West, and to prepare the information space for delivery of Moscow’s narratives during and after the attack. This means that there are a number of potential indicators for possible nuclear use that can be deduced from observation of Russian information behaviours.
It is unlikely, although not impossible, that a nuclear strike would be ordered in the context of Russia’s lingering habit of referring to its war as a ‘special military operation’ which by definition is supposed to be limited in scope. This would present both doctrinal and conceptual contradictions. An effective admission that Russia is in fact engaged in a major war – or even a substantial regional one – would remove this obstacle and thus marginally reduce the unlikelihood of a nuclear strike.
Other indicators would include more substantiated justifications for a strike. Putin’s speech of 30 September 2022, claiming the annexation of four Ukrainian regions, included a long-expected reference to nuclear use by the US in 1945 as a ‘precedent’. This reference could potentially be followed up with arguments that Russia now faces a similar challenge: looking for a route to war termination that avoids substantial casualties among its own military forces. Continued framing of the US nuclear strikes on Japan as either standard practice, or as a US precedent that justifies other countries in doing the same, would suggest that Russia is preparing domestic and world opinion for a strike of its own.
A change in the content of, or medium for, delivery of nuclear threats would also be an indicator of a potential change in Russian intent. Possibilities could include a change from general intimidatory language by Putin himself to a specific and tangible threat; or a change in source, where specific language crosses the boundary from state media and propagandists to formal statements by Putin or by senior military leaders. One example of this came in Putin’s ‘state of the nation’ address to the Federal Assembly on 21 February 2023: this time, the nuclear threat was oblique, and grounded in the language of military doctrine, instead of the explicit bombast heard on previous occasions. Putin referred to a plan by Western powers ‘to grow a local conflict into a global confrontation,’ continuing: ‘This is how we understand it and we will respond accordingly, because this represents an existential threat to our country.’ Observers attuned to Russian doctrinal language around ‘existential threat’ recognized that this was intended as a reference to a potential nuclear response, but at the time of writing it is not possible yet to determine whether this was an isolated instance or the start of a trend.
Given the objectives for potential nuclear use laid out above, another strong signal of increased likelihood would be signs that Putin has finally lost confidence in his ability to win the war in Ukraine. This would mean his acceptance of the inability of Russia’s military to win conventionally; of the failure of other tactics such as food and energy blackmail to remove Western support for Ukraine; and of the reality that the Ukrainian state continues to function despite sustained assaults on its critical infrastructure. The moment at which Putin feels his options are exhausted is likely to be the most significantly dangerous decision point.
Constraints
However, Russia will also be fully aware that the consequences of nuclear use are not limited to US or Western retaliation and/or countermeasures. There are a number of other inevitable significant second- and third-order effects that will be readily apparent to Moscow.
There are already indicators that countries that were ambivalent with regard to Russia’s war against Ukraine – or even supportive of Putin’s actions – may now be more hesitant in offering their backing. In mid-September 2022, for instance, at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit Putin was obliged to publicly acknowledge the ‘questions and concerns’ of both China’s president Xi Jinping and India’s prime minister Narendra Modi, telling the latter: ‘We will do our best to stop this as soon as possible.’ In the following month, a public rebuke of Putin delivered by President Emomali Rahmon of Tajikistan, speaking at the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) in Astana, Kazakhstan, was a further indicator of a shift in the power balance with Moscow.
If there is a realization in Moscow that Russia’s international authority is being undermined, it is reasonable to assume it is also understood that use of nuclear weapons by Russia would bring it down altogether. This is significant in circumstances in which Russia, having destroyed its relationship with the West, is more reliant on links with and support from other regions of the world – in particular from China, whose reaction is likely to be of most concern to Moscow. Recognition of this dependence, and its significance for Russia’s continued resilience to Western sanctions, will constitute a significant constraint on reckless actions like nuclear strikes.
There are also procedural constraints on nuclear use. Western defence correspondents have asserted that Putin is unable to order a nuclear attack on his own, and that such a command needs the cooperation of the defence minister and the chief of general staff. Kristin Ven Bruusgaard, a leading authority on Russia’s nuclear posture and thinking, notes that:
Consideration of the specific mechanism for ordering a nuclear strike is outside the scope of an open-source study; nonetheless, it is certain that, after a decision by the president, there will be a chain of orders passing down through command structures to the point of delivery. It is reasonable to assume that this will pass both through safeguards and through rational individuals. It follows that even if a strike is ordered by Putin and then fully authorized by Sergei Shoigu and Valeriy Gerasimov (respectively, Russia’s defence minister and chief of general staff), this does not automatically mean that it will be carried out under all circumstances: there are documented instances of individuals within the Soviet/Russian system going against procedure, standing orders and direct instructions to prevent a nuclear exchange.
Russia will also be aware that its own nuclear use would risk precipitating a huge increase in nuclear proliferation, and would substantially raise the likelihood of nuclear use by other countries – especially if the US and wider Western response to nuclear use is not convincingly devastating for Russia. The only rational response by other nations around the world to Russian nuclear use in the context of the war in Ukraine is for them to acquire their own capacity for responding in kind in order to maintain deterrence. Russia has no desire to see an increasing number of smaller countries developing nuclear capabilities, with the profound destabilization this would entail. There is a parallel with the development of cyber capabilities globally, where Russia expressed significant and apparently genuine concern over the spread of advanced capabilities and the threat to strategic stability this entailed. Uncontrolled nuclear proliferation would be an even more disturbing prospect for Moscow, especially after a precedent for use under non-existential circumstances had been set.
Russia will be aware that its own nuclear use would risk precipitating a huge increase in nuclear proliferation, and would substantially raise the likelihood of nuclear use by other countries.
Finally, probable Russian recognition of the effectiveness with which the threat of nuclear escalation has constrained Western backing for Ukraine also implies recognition that if that threat is realized, those constraints will disappear. Nuclear use in Ukraine would most probably remove all hesitation in supplying any and all weapons systems to Kyiv, as well as overriding any disincentive for them to be used to carry the fight to Russia itself. To the extent that perceptions of Russia’s current military incapacity – and hence vulnerability to deep cross-border attack from Ukraine – are shared in Moscow, this in itself should provide a substantial deterrent to rendering the war a ‘no holds barred’ contest by means of a nuclear strike.
Wild cards: Putin and reality
All of the above conditions need to be considered with the caveat that they assume President Putin is able to make a rational choice based on an objective assessment of his and Russia’s situation. They do not take account of the possibility of Putin being obsessed and/or delusional, or of him simply not receiving a clear or accurate picture from those around him of world events and the progress of his war. Neither is it impossible that this problem is exacerbated by Putin’s own state of physical or mental health; a reported Danish assessment contends that his personal decision-making capacity may even be impeded by medication he is taking.
Factors like these may contribute to the indicators of an increasingly wide disconnect between Putin and reality. One of the most relevant of these for considering Russia’s possible nuclear use is the way, in his address on 21 September 2022, Putin embellished the central ‘myth’ that the West wants to destroy Russia with the notion that Russia has been threatened with Western weapons of mass destruction. If there is a possibility that Putin genuinely believes some or all of the assertions he made in that speech that have little basis in fact, this presents the danger that he may perceive that he is running out of options other than nuclear use on the basis of entirely false evidence.
Distorting influences on Putin’s choices could also include isolation from military decision-making and planning. Detailed disclosures of Russia’s plans by the US and the UK in the weeks and months leading up to the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, in contrast to the last-minute orders to move for the Russian army, demonstrate that under certain circumstances Western intelligence services can have better insight into and forewarning of Russian leadership intent than Russia’s own chain of command. Such communications failures and evident disconnects within the Russian system could in turn mean that the arguments against nuclear use – in particular that it would not achieve Russian military or political objectives – might or might not be presented to Putin.
Similarly, the flaw in the idea that Putin does not need to use nuclear weapons because he gets sufficient benefits from just the threat to use them – and that these are benefits that actual use would eliminate – is that the very same calculus applied before the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. At that time, some Western powers were scrambling for means to placate Moscow in order to avert the looming invasion, but Putin was intent on invading anyway – regardless of whether this was seen outside the Kremlin as a rational step or not. There is a substantial difference between the threat of conventional escalation of a conflict that had already involved an illegal annexation carried out with relative impunity in 2014 on the one hand, and the threat of nuclear use on the other, but a number of other parallels are also already discernible. Analysts who contend that Putin would have to be mad – or ‘really stupid’ – to use a nuclear weapon need to consider that viewed from outside Russia, invading Ukraine in the first place has already met these criteria. And yet, from within the Kremlin, ordering a full-scale invasion on 24 February was a rational choice based on Putin’s priorities and the information available to him at the time. Putin miscalculated Western resolve in early 2022. However, this miscalculation was a direct result of previous Western failures to fully support Ukraine in the period since 2014, or indeed to respond firmly to other hostile Russian acts since well before then. It follows that even greater efforts are now required to ensure Putin is wholly persuaded that Western resolve would not be lacking once again should the nuclear threshold be crossed.
In short, the argument that Russia would not use nuclear weapons because it would clearly not be in Russia’s interest to do so falls down on the example – once again – of the invasion of Ukraine. This, too, appeared to run counter to Russia’s interests, but was prompted by Putin responding to an entirely different set of incentives and on the basis of a deeply flawed assessment of the situation both in Ukraine itself and regarding the probable Western response.
