Fear Not Nukes Kremlin's Effective Weapon

One can never dismiss nuclear threats as a bluff. Especially when you deal with unpredictable leaders like Putin who has isolated himself from the outside world and has decided to break up the world order as we know it. We must take such threats seriously. There are reasons that indicate Putin’s nuclear threats amount to a bluff.

First of all, Putin’s interest per se is not in using nuclear weapons. His intention is to disrupt the world order and be accepted as a serious player. The ultimate goal is to deter the West from helping Ukraine to win this war. He has been successful in achieving this goal thus far.

Putin’s geopolitical bottom line is keeping the West in a strategic limbo of not allowing Russia to be seriously defeated. On that score he is extremely efficient in achieving this goal so far. Majority of Western politicians, as well as majority of Russian opposition leaders have accepted the notion that defeated Russia is a worse outcome than the current Russian imperialistic policy.

Putin may be accused of being detached from reality, but there is clearly a method in his actions. He remains a rational actor who refuses to accept any rules. He knows that his nuclear strategy of intimidation only works until the actual use of nuclear weapons. The real weapon is a threat that inspires fear in the West. This weapon would be lost if the nuclear weapon was actually used.

The second reason why nuclear threat is a bluff, is Putin’s personal interests. Putin knows that his decision to use nuclear may well trigger his own demise – either through external action or by an internal coup. Russian ruling clan is afraid of an all out nuclear war and would be motivated to remove him. Russian people are also afraid of nuclear war. The belief that Russia is at real war with the West is one of the big internal achievements of Putins propaganda over the last two decades.

Third, international opinion - Russia will lose support on international arena if it uses nuclear weapons. Russia is not yet fully isolated, yet it would be if nuclear weapons were used.

Fourth, intelligence – looks like NATO has more intelligence about Russian nuclear weapons, their location, status, and readiness to use than Russia would like to accept.

Even if we dismiss the above – there is no chance that a NATO country would be the target of nuclear escalations. Why would Putin risk activating NATO on full scale? The least response would be sinking all Russian fleet as well as all nuclear launching sites.

What is odd is that Ukrainians who theoretically have to fear most of nuclear escalation are not afraid of provoking Putin anymore. (They were until February 22nd, 2022 by the way.)

At the same time. USA and Germany which face extremely low probability of being attacked by Russia appear to be paralyzed by fear of removing military constraints on Ukraine to defeat Russia.

Above all it is naïve to think that peace can be achieved through this half-hearted approach that is steeped in fear. For real peace to be achieved the West must neutralize the fear – the strongest enemy weapon so far, and to help defeat the aggressor.