SSince the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a pattern has repeatedly emerged: President Vladimir Putin emphatically but vaguely threatens to use nuclear weapons, then his spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, appeases, referring to Russia’s military doctrine. This envisages the use of nuclear weapons in response to a similar attack or one with other weapons of mass destruction, and in the event that conventional aggression threatens the “existence” of the Russian state.
What such a threat could look like is not precisely defined. That leaves room for questions like that of a state news agency that, as soon as Putin had last Sunday evening rated the explosion on the bridge between Russia and the annexed Ukrainian Crimea as a “terrorist attack”, asked Peskov whether Russia is now using its “nuclear potential”. will. “No,” Peskov replied. “That’s a completely wrong question.”
The nuclear threat is a dual instrument for Moscow. On the one hand, it is helping to stir up fears of further escalation in the West and deter opponents from supplying Kyiv with longer-range missiles, combat aircraft and tanks. On the other hand, Russia wants to continue to be perceived as a responsible “superpower”.
“There can be no winners in a nuclear war,” Putin said, for example, in a welcoming address to participants at a conference on the Non-Proliferation Treaty in the summer. (The fact that Russia’s 2014 aggression against Ukraine, which gave up Soviet nuclear weapons in exchange for security guarantees, creates incentives for nuclear arms build-up is a taboo subject in Moscow.)
Putin’s spokesman puts every threat into perspective
Another negative side of the threatening landscape becomes clearer to the extent that the situation for Russia in Ukraine deteriorates: A too violently threatening, erratic-looking Putin could also appear to those around him as a threat to their own security and increase their nervousness. “We go to paradise like martyrs, and they just die,” Putin said four years ago about Russia and its opponents when asked about the dangers of a nuclear war.
It is doubtful that he would repeat the much-quoted sentence today. The seemingly nonchalant attitude to the nuclear apocalypse it expresses contradicts Putin’s well-documented concern for his well-being. But there remains concern that Putin, who overtly identifies with Russia, may be stretching the threat to its “existence” in dire straits.
Especially since he has made statements that Russia still has a lead in development over the United States when it comes to certain nuclear weapons. In his speech on the February 24 attack, Putin also spoke of “a number of the latest types of weapons” in which Russia has “certain advantages”. What is meant above all is the manoeuvrable supersonic glide missile Avangard, which is intended to secure Russia’s second strike capability.
“Whoever tries to obstruct us, let alone threaten our country, our people, must know that Russia’s response will be immediate and will have consequences for you unprecedented in your history,” Putin said back then. One is prepared for all developments, “all necessary decisions” have been made, “I hope that I will be heard”.
Soon after, in interviews with American broadcasters, Peskov referred to the military doctrine and denied that Putin had threatened to use nuclear weapons if third parties got involved in the conflict: nobody intends to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, they have enough resources, third parties who interfered, to “punish”.
“This is not a bluff”
In his Sept. 21 speech on “partial mobilization,” Putin said “our country’s territorial integrity is being threatened” and that “all means at our disposal” will be used “to protect Russia and our people.” “It’s not a bluff.” Putin’s words had more weight against the background of the annexation of further Ukrainian territories: would he now use tactical nuclear weapons if Kyiv continued the successful counter-offensive?
On September 30, Peskov again referred to the military doctrine, in which the exact wording was “very important”, obviously the formula of the threat to the “existence” of the Russian state. Putin himself indirectly threatened nuclear weapons in his annexation speech that same day, when he interjected about the American atomic bombing of Japan in 1945: “By the way, you set a precedent.”
When asked about a possible “nuclear escalation” in Ukraine, his spokesman always calls for “responsibility” and accuses the West of “practicing nuclear rhetoric” in which one “does not want to participate”. However, Putin’s propagandists and political officials, such as Dmitry Medvedev, deputy president in the chair of the National Security Council, or Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, who are calling for the use of tactical nuclear weapons against Ukraine, took part in this.
Peskov also referred to Kadyrov’s push on military doctrine that “other considerations” are inadmissible. Putin himself refrained from making nuclear threats in his recent appearance, in which he on Monday described the launching of dozens of missiles into Ukraine in retaliation for the “terrorist attack” on the Crimean bridge: “tough answers” would follow any new “terrorist attacks” that “correspond to the level of the threats” posed to Russia. That sounded conventional.