The Russian War and the Specter of Nuclear Conflict

June 2024
By Daryl G. Kimball

Since Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his massive, illegal and brutal attack on Ukraine in early 2022, he has occasionally threatened to use nuclear weapons against anyone who might interfere. The result is an increased risk of nuclear war between Russia and NATO in ways not seen in the post-Cold War era.

After strong international criticism of his nuclear rhetoric in the weeks and months after the invasion, Putin reversed his threats in 2023. But last month he publicly authorized field exercises intended to demonstrate Russia’s potential use of sub-strategic nuclear weapons against NATO or Ukraine. . The exercises were held in Russia’s Southern Military District, which includes Russian territories bordering Ukraine and Ukrainian territory seized by Moscow.

If nuclear weapons are used in this or any other conflict between nuclear-armed adversaries, there is no guarantee that the fighting will not quickly become an all-out nuclear conflagration. As US President Joe Biden warned in 2022: “I don’t think there is such a thing as being able to easily use a tactical nuclear weapon and not end up with Armageddon.” The Group of 20 countries also underlined the dangers in joint statements in 2022 and 2023, saying the use of nuclear weapons and the threat thereof are “inadmissible.”

Putin’s henchmen claim that the Russian nuclear exercises are a response to statements by French President Emmanuel Macron that NATO should not rule out sending ground troops to Ukraine, and to statements by British Foreign Secretary David Cameron that Ukraine could use weapons supplied by the West to attack targets in Ukraine. Russia.

European leaders’ instinct to do more to help Ukraine is commendable, and renewed Russian attempts to use nuclear coercion to block such aid are not surprising, but both risk escalation that could lead to a wider European war and a potential nuclear catastrophe.

Given the stakes, the international community must pursue an approach that reduces tensions, increases dialogue, and resists those who threaten to break the nuclear taboo.

As U.S. and European leaders continue to supply Ukraine with the weapons it needs to fend off Russia, they must carefully tailor and coordinate their military support to avoid escalation. So far, the Biden administration has wisely designed its military aid packages and provided increasingly sophisticated weapons to help Ukraine defend itself in a way that does not invite Russian attacks on U.S. or NATO troops or territory.

US and NATO leaders should continue to refrain from making rhetorical threats of nuclear retaliation, avoid provocative nuclear exercises, and avoid mirroring counterproductive Russian moves, such as the forward deployment of Russian sub-strategic nuclear weapons in Belarus.

The United States could help strengthen the legally binding negative security guarantees for many non-nuclear weapon states against nuclear attack by finally ratifying the protocols to three treaties on nuclear-weapon-free zones covering the South Pacific, Africa and Central Asia, which are languished in the Senate for more than a decade. Through the Conference on Disarmament, the United States could also join China to begin negotiations on a global treaty that would provide negative nuclear security guarantees to all non-nuclear weapon states.

Equally important, the world’s non-nuclear majority must stand up more strongly against nuclear threats from Russia or any other state. In 2022, states parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons issued a major statement noting that “any use or threat of use of nuclear weapons is a violation of international law.” They also “unequivocally condemned all nuclear threats, whether explicit or implicit and regardless of the circumstances.” Russia was not mentioned in the statement, but the message was clear.

One joint statement is not enough. Whenever a nuclear-armed state attempts to engage in nuclear coercion, as Russia does, it is in the self-interest of all states to condemn such threats and demand that violators refrain from provocative actions.

Resuming the suspended dialogue between Russia and the US on nuclear risk reduction and arms control is crucial to prevent nuclear miscalculations and competition. Non-nuclear weapon states could help by urging Moscow and Washington to fulfill their Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Article VI disarmament commitments by entering into talks on a new nuclear arms control framework agreement before the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in 2026 expires.

Any states concerned about nuclear escalation could also urge the NPT’s five nuclear-weapon states to express support for the 1973 Soviet-U.S. Agreement to Prevent Nuclear War, which requires states to refrain from nuclear threats and, in times of increased risk of nuclear weapons, conflict, “engage immediately and do everything possible to avert this risk.”

So far, the 79-year-old taboo on the use of nuclear weapons has endured, but the world cannot take it for granted. Tragically, the end of Russia’s war against Ukraine is nowhere in sight. To maintain and strengthen the consensus against the use of nuclear weapons and the threat thereof, we must maintain pressure on those who might try to break the nuclear taboo.