In what situations would Putin use nuclear weapons?

By Andreas Kluth

We must assume that a man like Vladimir Putin is capable of anything, including using nuclear weapons. The Russian president has made it very clear that human life is worth nothing to him unless it is his own. And there are scenarios where he might fiendishly calculate that dropping one or more nuclear bombs could keep him in power and help save his skin.

And that is because we have entered a world that, in strategic terms, is more like the Europe of the volatile early years of the Cold War than its relatively stable later stages. The effect is to discard old notions of deterrence and to increase the risk of an accidental nuclear Armageddon.

In the years after World War II, the United States knew that its forces in Western Europe were inferior to those of the Soviet Union and likely would not withstand its attack.

To compensate, the Americans planted nuclear warheads—comparatively low-yield (but of course unimaginably devastating)—on the territory of European allies. The message was that, in the event of a Soviet attack, NATO could drop some of these on the battlefield to ensure victory.

However, as the nuclear arms race progressed, the Soviet Union caught up and “strategic” weapons became more conspicuous. These are larger bombs that can be launched, for example, on intercontinental missiles from one’s country to the opponent’s. They would wipe out entire cities at once.

As apocalyptic as it sounds, this balance of terror has so far saved us from nuclear war. A metaphor illustrates this well: the West and the East are represented by two people in the same room, waist-deep in gasoline. Each has a certain number of matches but neither lights them because they would both go up in flames. Fittingly, this impasse was called Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD).

However, in the two decades of Putin’s rule, the strategic landscape has changed again. In a sense, he has returned to the immediate post-World War II situation, but with the roles reversed.

Now it is Russia that suspects that its Army is inferior to NATO’s in a conventional war. Therefore, it is Putin who is making up for that weakness by threatening to use tactical nuclear weapons to win battles or wars that initially do not go well for him. If an oxymoron works better, this approach is called “escalate to ‘de-escalate’”.

To that end, Russia, which is nearly on par with the United States in strategic nuclear weapons, has gained a 10-to-1 advantage in tactical weapons. It has about 2,000, while the United States has only about 200, half of which are stationed in Europe.

Putin has already hinted several times that he could draw on his prodigious arsenal if NATO crossed its red lines. And because he confuses his own fate with that of his country, he tends to interpret any threat of personal humiliation or regime change in Moscow as such.

Let’s just say that the Ukrainians—who are fighting heroically against surprisingly incompetent Russian invaders—are close to victory. Or that a Russian hypersonic missile is diverted to Poland, a member of NATO. Or that the West gives weapons to Ukraine. Any of these turns could make Putin fear his imminent demise and opt to escalate the conflict.

His first attack would show intent. He might drop a low-yield bomb in an empty forest or the open sea, just to show that he means business. As a next step, he could bombard a specific enemy weapons depot, military base, or battalion; in any case, not yet an entire city.

Putin would thus signal his determination to see it through to the end, betting that the United States and its allies will not retaliate in the same way. In his mind, he would be trying to figure out the deception of the West. Cold War leaders in both camps knew they couldn’t win a nuclear war. If Putin ever takes a shot, it’s because he thinks he can win it.

But would he win? NATO, and especially the United States, must now prepare for heartbreaking decisions after a first Russian attack. Should the West detonate its own low-yield nuclear bomb to show resolve? What would follow for both parties from that point forward?

Once the launch of these weapons, the deadliest in all of human history regardless of their performance, begins, the risk of misunderstandings, errors and accidents skyrockets. An attack “limited” from one side will just feel cataclysmic to the other. And the missiles are so fast that the other side would have only a few minutes to respond. The temptation to execute would arise.

Long before the nuclear age, a bibliophile Prussian officer who had witnessed the Napoleonic battles gave his opinion on the war. Carl von Clausewitz captured the inherent tension between generals trying to keep war limited and war trying to become absolute, ending in the total destruction of one or all parties.

The imperative, Clausewitz concluded, is always to align tactics and strategy. “War is nothing but the continuation of politics by other means”, he wrote in his most famous (and often misunderstood) phrase. He meant that only the kind of war should be fought that makes the resulting peace tolerable. Pray that there are people left in Moscow who understand this.