Russia’s new nuclear doctrine is sabre rattling - only for an attack that threatens the Russian Federation - they know Ukraine defending itself is never any threat to Russian sovereignty
This is just yet more saber rattling. Now that Ukraine has used the ATACMS Russia will likely soon shut up and forget about all this. It will NOT do anything because the only purpose in all this is to try to get Biden to reverse his decision to let Ukraine use ATACMS against Russian targets in Russian territory.
Nukes would NOT do anything to stop Ukraine using these missiles. The opposite. Ukraine would likely get EVERYTHING it asked for and more as that would turn Russia into a rogue state that everyone has to try to stop by any methods possible.
Putin ALREADY told the world about the change in September. Back then, Russia also clarified it is only about attacks that attempt to overthrow the Russian Federation.
It had to do that.
Like all nuclear doctrines it’s a deterrent. Russia DOES NOT WANT TO USE NUKES because they know all that happens if they use them is they lose.
They introduced it a month ago but it is about an absurd impossible scenario. They already said that their nukes are a deterrent not just for nukes but also against a conventional threat that threatens the future of the Russian Federation.
They just spelt out that this includes an attack by drones and missiles by a non-nuclear power that threatens the future of the Russian Federation. Since no non-nuclear power would even try to overthrow the Russian Federation it is just done for show and it is clearly meant to intimidate Ukraine and its allies.
But Peskov clarified that a drone attack by Ukraine on Russia doesn't count as an attempt to overthrow the Russian Federation
Which makes the whole thing pointless
Duly noted.
[Paraphrase: Putin's press secretary Peskov says Russia's new nuclear doctrine does NOT apply to massive drone attacks by Ukraine]
Peskov (Putin's press secretary):
…
“Frankly speaking, there is no need to appeal too much to this document”
TEXT ON GRAPHIC: After drone attack with 125 drones by Ukraine.
Anton Geraschchenko:
Putin’s spokesman Peskov explained that massive drone attacks on Russia are not grounds to use Russia’s new nuclear doctrine.
Duly noted.
[Paraphrase: Putin's press secretary Peskov says Russia's new nuclear doctrine does NOT apply to massive drone attacks by Ukraine]
Peskov (Putin's press secretary):
“Frankly speaking, there is no need to appeal too much to this document”
————-
Annotations:
Ukraine’s strikes are defensive - war ends when Russia leaves.
Putin’s aims with his bluffs are simple: to put a spoke in Ukraine’s wheels - NOT to attack NATO.
No way Putin ever uses nukes or attacks NATO. Just sabre rattling.
Document is yet another bluff: - no way that Ukraine defending itself EVER threatens Russia itself.
There is no way Ukraine defending itself EVER threatens the Russian Federation.
All Russia has to do is to leave Ukraine and the war is over. So it is NO THREAT to the Russian Federation and there is nothing Ukraine even CAN do that would threaten the government of Russia.
When Russia said “a nuclear war can’t be won and should never be fought” they weren’t making a promise they were just stating the obvious.
Russia and China have repeated it since the Ukraine war. This is from Tass, Russian propaganda but it is a good source on what Russia itself has signed:
QUOTE STARTS
Russia and China are convinced that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be unleashed, according to the Joint Statement on Deepening the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership of Coordination for the New Era signed by Russian and Chinese Presidents, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, on Tuesday after their talks in Moscow.
"Stressing the importance of the joint statement by the leaders of the five countries, which possess nuclear weapons, on the prevention of a nuclear war and an arms race, the sides once again state that there can be no winners in a nuclear war and it must never be unleashed,"
Unlike other weapons nuclear weapons lose their value if they are ever used.
It would make ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE for Russia to use a nuke in response to Ukraine exercising its legitimate right to self defence against an invader under the UN charter by using one more missile type from the US to attack exactly the same types of targets it already targets with other US missiles hitting targets in Russia, and with this very same missile in Crimea.
That is NOT A THREAT TO THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION AND HAS NEVER BEEN A THREAT.
And remember
the only purpose of nukes is to deter.
if a country uses nukes it LOSES its deterence.
That’s because this changes the objective of all other countries which then becomes to do everything they can to stop this rogue nation ever using nukes again. Including China and India.
There is no way either of those could support Russia using a nuke in response to a short range 300 km ballistic missile with a CONVENTIONAL half ton payload used in self defence.
Putin’s small change in his nuclear doctrine is just sabre rattling. Putin is just trying to put a spoke in the wheel of supplies of weapons to Ukraine and has zero interest in attacking NATO.
It outlines lots of conditions where they might use nukes, incredibly vague. Even the expansion of NATO would count, or a drone attack by Ukraine on Russia.
11. Aggression against the Russian Federation and (or) its allies parties of any non-nuclear state with the participation or support nuclear state is seen as their joint attack.
However it does still have this clause:
III. Conditions for the transition of the Russian Federation to the use of nuclear weapons
18. The Russian Federation reserves the right to use nuclear weapons weapons in response to the use of nuclear and/or nuclear weapons against it and/or its allies. (or) other types of weapons of mass destruction, as well as in the event of aggression against the Russian Federation and (or) the Republic of Belarus as participants Union State with the use of conventional weapons,creating a critical a threat to their sovereignty and/or territorial integrity.
From Ukraine’s Kursk oblast incursion it’s clear that another country temporarily occupying part of Russia is not seen automatically as a critical threat to Russia’s sovereignty or territorial integrity. There is no way that Putin will attack NATO so what this war has really done is to demonstrate lots of things that are NOT seen as critical threats to Russia.
The ISW says:
A Russian insider source claimed on November 19 that Kremlin factions disagreed on the changes to the nuclear doctrine, with one faction arguing for the new nuclear doctrine to define clear "red lines" to deter the West from taking specific actions unfavorable to the Kremlin and another faction calling for the creation of a strategically ambiguous nuclear doctrine "in the fog of war" to prevent the West from being able to predict the Kremlin's response to specifications.
These reports, taken in the context of the Kremlin's continued reliance on vague threats of nuclear escalation without following through, suggests that Russian officials lack a clear understanding of where the Kremlin's actual "red lines" lie.
So they are saying it is so vague it might as well not be a doctrine.
However I’m not sure because of that section on “critical threats to sovereignty”.
The USA doesn't have a doctrine.
It has a position of deliberate ambiguity, it won't tell potential adversaries when it will use nukes.
The Russian doctrine is moving that way. I think it is meant to sound scary to help Putin with his bluffs and that's about the only purpose of it.
But the “critical threats” to sovereignty does give some clarification. Whatever that means it’s clear that Ukraine by defending itself against an attack does NOT pose any critical threat to Russian sovereignty.
It's nothing to worry about anyway whatever it means. Putin won't use nukes.
It never makes sense to.
No Putin does NOT have to do ANYTHING and DOESN’T do anything because he just lied when he bluffed
Putin has set NUMEROUS red lines in the past. When Ukraine's allies cross those red lines he doesn't have ANY obligation to act. Because he just lied when he made those bluffs. When the red line is crossed he pretends he never said anything.
Typical responses after a red line is crossed:
Hides it from the news in Russia as long as he can.
Rubbishes whatever Ukraine just got. E.g. says the F-16 cost too much and are just a waste of money. Says Russia has far better systems than the HiMARS.
Claims that Russia has already destroyed many of the systems before they even get to Ukraine sometimes. In some cases these are wooden decoys built by the Ukrainians - e..g Russia has destroyed dozens of wooden imitation HiMARS system which they claim are the real thing.
Most common - no response. He just never mentions the system again. Never refers to his previous bluffs.
Right now he continues to bluff because Ukraine hasn't yet used ATACMS against targets in Russia.
As soon as they actually use them any bluffs are useless so he will then switch to one of those responses.
Try looking at it like this:
Would it make sense for Putin to try to find an excuse to use nukes against NATO? Obviously not, ever.
Would it make sense for Putin to bluff to try to get the US to tell Ukraine not to fire its most powerful intermediate-range missile at Russia?
Yes obviously.
So they are bluffs.
Nonsense “Pants on fire” claim by Putin that ATACMS need US soldiers to input the coordinates - these are export versions of the satellite - US soldiers don’t need to give coordinates to Singapore or the UAE - or Ukraine
The ATACMs are NOT fired by US personnel and Ukraine does NOT need to get coordinates from the USA. Ukraine has its own "People's satellite" as well as observation drones. Remember Ukraine is ALREADY hitting targets throughout Western and Central Russia with its own missiles. It does NOT need the US to supply coordinates.
And it is obvious these missiles can't require US participation to fire them because the US sells them to countries around the world such as Singapore say. There is NO WAY that Singapore or the UAE bought missiles from the USA that required US participation to launch them.
It is a nonsense argument. Putin "Pants on fire" lies that sadly were published in the Western press without any corrections or comment. I cover that here:
Russia is INCREDIBLY VULNERABLE to the NATO weapons - even the 1980s technology cruise missile the Tomahawk
The USA are not likely to send Ukraine the veteran 1980s technology Tomahawk cruise missiles with a range of over 2,400 kilometers and a payload like the ATACMS.
The US uses these against the Houthi rebels in Yemen for instance.
Any NATO country would have access to these on day 1 but Ukraine’s allies feel they are too powerful for Ukraine.
Ukraine uses similar weapons with a much shorter range against Russia in Crimea (such as the UK Stormshadow and its own Neptune) and Russia is unable to stop them.
TEXT ON GRAPHIC
Range of the US tomahawk cruise missile with a half ton payload like the ATACMS, travels at nearly 1000 km / hour, range 2,400 km.
Proven ability to get through Russia's S-400 system
With the current state of Russian air defences, teh US could sink the entire Russian Black Sea fleet in a few hours but doesn't give this capability to ukraine.
TEXT ON GRAPHIC: Russia's air defences are so degraded that Ukraine is able to fly microlights through them without getting shot down.
Replace pilot and passenger by explosives and remote control, and you have a drone that can evade the Russian air defences and bomb a Russian oil refinery 1000s of kilometres from Ukaraine.
Yet Russia claims FALSELY it can "escalate" and win a war against not just Ukraine but NATO as well. Just bluffs and bulls**t.
Graphic shows the A-22 microlight - a small Ukrainian civilian microlight plane with just enough payload for the pilot plus one passenger. Aeroprakt A-22 Foxbat . Replace pilot and passenger by explosives and remote control and you have a drone that can evade the Russian air defences and head off and bomb a refinery deep in Russia.
If Ukraine had the Tomahawk, then given how vulnerable the Russian warships have been since it sunk the Moskkva, Ukraine could sink the Russian ships anywhere in the Black Sea.
Russia would no longer have a Black Sea fleet the day after Ukraine got the missiles. But the US would be too worried about giving Ukraine that capability.
But even more so none of its airfields or command centers or munitions depots or fuel depots or munitions factories would be safe from Ukraine right up to 2,400 km from the front line.
Ukraine doesn't have the slightest interest or the capability to take over Russia. All it is doing is defending itself. If Putin's army leaves Ukraine the war is over.
The Russians know this and they are just using empty threats to try to get Ukraine's allies to stop supplying an important and effective missile system which would slow down or even halt Russia's slow one-mile-per-week advances in Ukraine and make it harder for Russia to conduct
the war crimes of destroying Ukraine's civilian electricity grid
the war crimes of directly targeting civilian buildings with glide bombs.
And if Putin did use a single nuke against NATO, goodbye to his Black Sea fleet on day 1 not from nukes, from conventional explosives.
I don’t think many in the West realize quite how devastating it would be to Putin to lose his Black Sea fleet. This is why Ukraine sees the Tomahawk cruise missiles as a big lever it could use in negotiations with Putin.
TEXT ON GRAPHIC
Russia’s Black Sea Fleet is of huge national pride to the Russians. Ukraine has already sunk its flagship and a third of its ships with the ATACMS, stormshadows and its own native Neptune but most have retreated out of reach to the far side of the Black Sea.
If Ukaine had the Tomahawk cruise missile it could sink the entire fleet - gone from the Black Sea for the first time since it began in 1783
A major lever for negotiations with Russia from a position of strength.
Black Sea Fleet - just before the start of the Crimean war of 1853-6
They would have control over the Russian air space by the next day with their F-35s. The objective of almost the entire world, China and India included would be to make sure Russia never uses its nukes again. There is no way that China or India could endorse Russia if it used a nuke in response to Ukrainians attacking military targets in Russia with US-supplied weapons.
There is just NO WAY that the risk-averse Putin does such a dumb thing or that his generals obey him if he does.
There is just so much clickbait sensationalist BS in the Western media about this, and when you look at it, then the actual permission is nothing.
I talk about this some more here, about how just the Tomahawks would be a big lever that Ukraine could use in negotiations with Putin because his fleet is so vulnerable to them.
From what he says Zelensky seems reasonably confident that Trump isn't likely to do what Biden did - to give permissions for various systems - but only after a lot of saying no and then finally yes.
As an example we now know that NATO could easily sink Russia's entire Black Sea Fleet in a few hours. with a few dozen Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from as far away as the Mediterranean. More on that below.
This is real life, not a movie. This is to help you understand that they are real people. Though they are ruthless and seem not to care much about the lives of their soldiers, they are very risk-averse themselves.
This is how the Institute for the Study of War puts it:
TWEET “Putin is a very risk averse individual. He is extremely calculated, and he oftentimes really prefers not to make urgent, rash political decisions that would specifically impact the health of his regime,” said ISW’s Russia deputy team lead @ KatStepanenko
So given that Putin is so risk averse - why did he attack Ukraine? Because he thought it was ZERO RISK.
He was so sure of his plan he never told his generals about it in advance.
TEXT ON GRAPHIC
Putin is "A VERY RISK AVERSE INDIVIDUAL" (ISW).
So why did he invade Ukraine? He thought it was ZERO RISK.
He planned to - take Hostomel airport on day 1. - land tanks and take over Kyiv government next day. - take over Ukraine in 2 weeks. Then this happened.
Debris from destroyed Russian helicopters Putin had no plan B.
Putin was so sure of this plan devised by spied he kept it secret
There is NO WAY Putin could think using nukes is ZERO RISK no matter what his spies say.
There is NO WAY that Putin could think that using a nuke would be risk free. It doesn’t matter what the spies might tell him he is not going to believe that.
So he won’t do it.
Indeed he would have to lose his ability to reason to use nukes against NATO.
TEXT ON GRAPHIC:
Is this is my general?
Is this a flowerpot?
This is how insane Putin would have to be to actually use nukes.
His generals would need to be deluded in the same way, not able to reason coherently or distinguish imagination from reality.
He is capable of coherent rational thought and understands that nobody can win in a nuclear war.
He has nukes as a deterrent
How nuclear deterrents work. One of Queen Elizabeth’s bodyguards. His job was to keep her safe. NOT to go around starting fights with people around her, which would make her very unsafe A nuclear deterrent is like a bodyguard He kept her safe by just standing there and doing nothing, alert to any trouble
As for NATO leaders, then to use a nuke in peace time goes against the law of armed conduct and would be a major war crime. A US general who received such an order from the president would be required to refuse the order and have no hesitation in doing so.
Whatever happens there is no way that Russia attacks NATO
This is why Admiral Radakin said that there is no way that Russia attacks NATO.
Admiral Radakin’s main point is that Russia is
more dangerous
but less effective
than they realized before the war started. By preparing in a strong way, they make it impossible for Putin to attack NATO.
See also my quote from General Radakin her
e
Text: The biggest reason that Putin doesn’t want a conflict with NATO is because Russia will lose. And lose quickly.
[Plus bullet points below]
These are some of his points from the speech - just reformatted as bullet-points and slightly rewritten to make it clearer, e.g. repeated the word NATO for clarity.
Any Russian assault or incursion against NATO would prompt an overwhelming response.
NATO can draw on 3.5 million uniformed personnel across the Alliance for reinforcement.
NATO’s combat air forces outnumber Russia’s 3 to 1 –
NATO would quickly establish air superiority.
NATO’s maritime forces would bottle up the Russian Navy in the Barents and the Baltic,
NATO has four times as many ships and three times as many submarines as Russia.
NATO has a
collective GDP twenty times greater than Russia.
total defence budget three-and-a-half times more than Russia AND China combined.
The biggest reason that Putin doesn’t want a conflict with NATO is because Russia will lose. And lose quickly
Putin expected to take between 3 days and 3 weeks.
to subjugate Ukraine’s population.
to take about two thirds of Ukraine’s territory.
to stop Ukraine joining NATO and the EU.
Putin failed in ALL these strategic objectives.
Its Air Force has failed to gain control of the air.
Its Navy has seen 25% of its vessels in the Black Sea sunk or damaged by a country without a Navy and Ukraine’s maritime trade is reaching back to pre-war levels.
Russia’s Army lost nearly 3,000 tanks, nearly 1500 artillery pieces and over 5,000 armoured fighting vehicles.
To pose a realistic threat to NATO’s Eastern flank within the next 2-5 years, Russia will need to
reconstitute her tanks and armoured vehicles,
rebuild her stocks of long-range missiles and artillery munitions and
extract itself from a protracted and difficult war in Ukraine.
[This doesn't mean Russia would attack. This is after the war is over and NATO would always be far stronger than Russia. He means back to how it was in 2022.]
I am not saying that Russia is not dangerous
But at the same time it is also significantly less capable than we anticipated following its disastrous illegal invasion into Ukraine.
And it faces an even stronger straitjacket with the introduction of Finland and Sweden into NATO.
Recent talk of a Britain that is undefended, and an Armed Forces chronically imperilled, is way off the mark.
There are always challenges in running a large organisation that conducts worldwide operations and is as sophisticated as our modern military.
These kinds of challenges apply to militaries everywhere. But
we have the finest people and some of the best equipment.
If you need to talk to me about something it is often far better to do so via private / direct messaging because Quora often fails to notify me of comment replies.
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I do many more fact checks and debunks on our facebook group than I could ever write up as blog posts. They are shorter and less polished but there is a good chance you may find a short debunk for some recent concern.
Then on the Doomsday Debunked wiki, see my Short Debunks page which is a single page of all the earlier short debunks in one page.
I do the short debunks more often but they are less polished - they are copies of my longer replies to scared people in the Facebook group.rough Ukraine and will do so no matter what its allies do to support Ukraine.
If Ukraine do use American weapons, surely it's American personal that have to get the coordinates for the weapon to be used? So wouldn't that mean in hindsight that America is bombing Russia?
So to be clear, they changed it from a threat to the existence of Russia to any attack that threatens their sovereignty?
If Ukraine do use American weapons, surely it's American personal that have to get the coordinates for the weapon to be used? So wouldn't that mean in hindsight that America is bombing Russia?