From the very start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the risk of it escalating into a nuclear conflict has been a feature of much commentary about the war. From explicit as well as thinly veiled mentions of it by Russian President Vladimir Putin to the warnings of Western observers about the dangers of any direct confrontation between NATO and Russian forces, the nuclear dimension to this war has never been far from the surface.
While the risk of Russia using nuclear weapons, even absent NATO’s involvement in Ukraine, does exist, it is in all likelihood minimal. Nevertheless, the war in Ukraine underscores the role that nuclear deterrence plays in conventional engagements, as well as the need for Western policymakers and strategists to think seriously about the dynamics that creates.
The war in Ukraine is in many ways already a conflict taking place in a nuclear atmosphere. First, Russia enjoys a liberty of action to conduct major offensive operations in Ukraine in large part due to the fact that it is sheltered behind its nuclear capability. But the nuclear dimension has also been present in other ways, both subtle and obvious. In his speech on Feb. 24 announcing the beginning of the Russian invasion, Putin mentioned Ukraine’s alleged interest in acquiring nuclear weapons as one of the reasons for the operation. Belarus’ constitutional referendum on Feb. 27, which allowed for the deployment of Russian nuclear weapons on Belarusian territory, also raised eyebrows. And Russia’s military operations near Ukrainian nuclear power plants raised fears of an incident involving radioactive material.
Finally and most prominently, of course, Putin has played the nuclear card since before the invasion even began, including multiple explicit and implicit references to Russia’s nuclear deterrent as well as his televised decision on Feb. 27 to change the readiness level of Russia’s strategic forces.
As early as the joint press conference following his meeting in Moscow with French President Emmanuel Macron on Feb. 7, Putin warned against a scenario in which, having joined NATO, Ukraine felt emboldened to try to retake Crimea militarily. In such a case, he went on, “the European countries will automatically get drawn into a military conflict with Russia,” which he pointedly described as “one of the world’s leading nuclear powers … superior to many of those countries in terms of the number of modern nuclear force components.” As if to remove any doubt about his meaning, he concluded that this would risk a conflict in which “there will be no winners.”
When announcing the operation against Ukraine, Mr. Putin also made a point of recalling his country’s nuclear capabilities in thinly veiled terms, saying “there should be no doubt for anyone that any potential aggressor will face defeat and ominous consequences should it directly attack our country.” He supplemented this exercise in what strategists call “general deterrence” by warning any states seeking to thwart Moscow’s plans “that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history.” This was an expression of “immediate deterrence,” using a vocabulary worthy of former U.S. President Donald Trump.
Even if the risk that Russia will use nuclear weapons in the current conflict remains minimal, the war in Ukraine should encourage reflection on the role that nuclear deterrence plays in conventional engagements.As a result of these pronouncements, the televised broadcast on Feb. 27 of Putin’s order to change the readiness level of Russia’s strategic forces was part of an already largely nuclearized context. But it nonetheless attracted the world’s attention. The terms Putin used to describe the move—raising Russia’s nuclear forces to the level of “special combat regime”—immediately gave rise to multiple interpretations, with the most alarming of them suggesting that the strategic forces’ readiness posture had been significantly elevated. That alarm was exacerbated when Russia engaged in unannounced exercises of these same forces immediately thereafter.
Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu subsequently explained that in practice, the decision would simply increase the number of personnel serving permanently in the headquarters of Russia’s strategic forces command. But while that favors a rather benign view of the decision, it’s fair to wonder if the initial confusion over the alert status of these forces was caused deliberately.
Even if that isn’t the case, however, Putin was certainly aware that he would raise questions and even anxieties with his public remarks, drawing parallels to former U.S. President Richard Nixon’s Vietnam War-era “madman theory,” which consisted of deliberately giving the impression that he was ready to “push the button” in order to put pressure on Hanoi.
Fortunately, none of the three Western nuclear powers fell into Putin’s trap. While on the eve of the invasion, France reminded Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that NATO is a “nuclear alliance,” the message from Macron to France’s armed forces following Putin’s stunt on Feb. 27 merely instructed the military command to maintain France’s “permanent postures,” with no mention of the word “nuclear.” Open source reporting also confirmed that France’s navy sent an additional nuclear-armed submarine, or SSBN, on permanent patrol, but there was no official or public announcement of any change in the country’s strategic force posture. On the U.S. side, STRATCOM indicated that it had not recommended any change in posture, and the Pentagon postponed a previously scheduled ballistic missile test, in order to avoid even the appearance of it being a response to Putin’s announcement.
While the possibility of a nuclear escalation can’t be ruled out, it nevertheless remains unlikely for a number of reasons, beginning with Russia’s declared nuclear deterrence doctrine, which has raised the country’s nuclear threshold from what it was in the 1990s and 2000s. The 2020 doctrinal text considers four possible thresholds for nuclear use: launch on warning, in the case of an incoming nuclear attack; a nuclear or other WMD attack against Russia or its allies; attacks, whether nuclear or conventional, leading to paralysis of the Russian command and control system; and a conventional attack that would threaten Russia’s very existence. And while large-scale Russian exercises have involved numerous dual-use capabilities—and are frequently accompanied by parallel strategic force exercises—there do not appear to be any recent examples of overtly simulated use of theater-level, or tactical, nuclear weapons during these exercises.
At present, none of the situations specified in the doctrine seems applicable to the current conflict. However, Putin might have a rather broad definition of what a threat to “the existence of Russia”—a criterion reiterated this week by Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov—could mean. In his speech on Feb. 24, Putin seemed to indicate that Western policy was already posing a risk to the “very existence” of the Russian state. Referring to what he called the U.S. and NATO’s “policy of containing Russia,” he stated, “For our country, it is a matter of life and death, a matter of our historical future as a nation. This is not an exaggeration; this is a fact. It is not only a very real threat to our interests but to the very existence of our state and to its sovereignty.”
However, Putin’s public statements seem to have been primarily intended to impress and even frighten public opinion in the West, and leading experts on Russian nuclear strategy, such as Olga Oliker, have argued against falling for the Kremlin’s “nuclear bluff.” Moreover, it seems that Moscow’s current procedure for engaging the use of nuclear forces is partly inherited from the Soviet system, which depended on a collective decision. So while the Russian president is the only official authorized to order a nuclear launch, carrying out that order seems to require the approval of the defense minister and perhaps that of the chief of staff of the armed forces.
Nevertheless, even if the risk that Russia will use nuclear weapons in the current conflict remains minimal, the war in Ukraine should encourage reflection on the role that nuclear deterrence plays in conventional engagements. Western nuclear doctrines believe in a form of “defensive sanctuarization” by which, in a confrontation with a nuclear-armed state, the West’s nuclear deterrence will neutralize that of the adversary, limiting any conflict to the conventional realm. But if Russia’s nuclear capability turns out to be the main obstacle to direct intervention by Western countries in support of Ukraine, as now seems to be the case, it would call into question this principle’s validity. In more practical terms, it would also have significant implications for the lessons China might draw when it comes to the U.S. commitment to the defense of Taiwan.
Finally, the war in Ukraine will have an impact on nonproliferation and arms control efforts moving forward. Whether or not it accurately applies to Ukraine, which never had operational control of the nuclear arsenal it inherited after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the perception that, once again, a state that has given up nuclear weapons is under attack is likely to grow. The implications for North Korea are obvious, but it could also be the cause of much reflection in Iran, as well as, perhaps, in Saudi Arabia, among others.
As far as arms control is concerned, it is difficult to see how the U.S.-Russian dialogue on “strategic stability,” which was meant to follow up on and perhaps expand the New START agreement Moscow and Washington agreed to renew last year, can be resumed any time soon. Moreover, a deployment of Russian nuclear weapons in Belarus, if it happens, would change the picture considerably. On the surface, it would belie Moscow’s position that all foreign nuclear weapons should be withdrawn from Europe, but it could also put the Kremlin in a better negotiating position when it comes to “non-strategic” weapons that are not covered by existing U.S.-Russian nuclear agreements.
The war in Ukraine has sent shock waves across Europe and the world, not least among them the reawakened fears of nuclear war between Russia and the West. While the threat of nuclear escalation remains low, the conflict has already demonstrated the complex role nuclear deterrence plays in conventional conflicts, with implications for security in Europe—and beyond.