Zelensky is very clear "We do NOT DO NUKES" and asks us not to spread this false message - and other nuclear war fact checks

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You can get a first idea of this blog post by reading the section titles and looking at the graphics which highlight key points. Then drill in to any section of special interest.

This has my nuclear war fact checks from the longer post:

Helping Ukraine win is a path to peace not war - it wants nothing from Russia's vast territory - as Russia escalates its rain of bombs on civilians - Ukraine hits only military targets in Russia

Zelensky: “We are choosing NATO NOT NUCLEAR WEAPONS” - and he meant joining NATO AFTER THE WAR

This is another example of clickbait misreporting. Zelensky said Ukraine chooses NATO NOT nuclear weapons.

This was MISREPORTED in Western media as Zelensky telling Trump that Ukraine will either join NATO or get nuclear weapons.

You could hardly be further from the truth than that. Zelensky asked reporters not to spread this false message but sadly they continue to do so

TEXT ON GRAPHIC

NATO members are not at war.

In NATO countries, people are all alive, thank God!

And that is why we choose NATO and not nuclear weapons.

We are choosing NATO.

What Zelensky really said: “not nuclear weapons”

By “choose NATO” he means AFTER THE WAR IS OVER

MISREPORTED as (NOT WHAT HE SAID) “I told Donald Trump that Ukraine will either have nuclear weapons or join NATO!”

You can see some of this misreporting by a google search of that sentence FALSELY attributed to Zelensky - maybe a mistranslation by someone?
See: “I told Donald Trump that Ukraine will either have nuclear weapons or join NATO!”

It was a hypothetical.

He said:

Either Ukraine will have nuclear weapons and then it will be a defense for us.

Or we should have some kind of alliance, and apart from NATO we do not know any functioning alliances today

…

NATO members are not at war.

In NATO countries, people are all alive, thank God!

And that is why we choose NATO and not nuclear weapons.

We are choosing NATO.

So they miss out the bit about “We are choosing NATO”

Here is a larger part of his speech so you can read it in context:

TRANSLATION:

So how can we believe in this document?

[The Budapest Memorandum where the nuclear states US, UK and Russia all agreed to supply whatever Ukraine needs to protect itself against an invasion if it gave up its nukes to Russia]

And how can we trust all the partners who guaranteed the protection of our territorial integrity and sovereignty?

The answer is very simple.

Does it work? No, this document does not work.

[Because Russia invaded Ukraine and the US and UK have not yet given Ukraine enough to prevent the invasion and of course Russia didn't even try as it was the invader]

So in general. All these agreements did not work out.

Which of these big countries, all the nuclear powers, were affected? All of them? No, only Ukraine.

Who gave away the nuclear weapons? All of them? No, only one. Who? Ukraine.

Who is at war today? Ukraine.

And so it turns out that in a conversation with Donald Trump, I told him it works out this way.

What is the solution?

Either Ukraine will have nuclear weapons and then it will be a defense for us.

Or we should have some kind of alliance, and apart from NATO we do not know any functioning alliances today.

The NATO countries are not at war today.

NATO members are not at war.

In NATO countries, people are all alive, thank God!

And that is why we choose NATO and not nuclear weapons.

We are choosing NATO.

END TRANSLATION

You can listen to it in Ukrainian with English titles by Dmitri (WAR TRANSLATED) here:

Ukraine joined the non-proliferation treaty in 1994 and kept to it with regular monitoring. The main change since early in the war is that

• early in the war Ukraine wanted to sign treaty with security guarantees outside of NATO e.g. with UK and USA.

• Now Zelensky says only joining NATO can keep them safe once the war is over

Zelensky was asked to clarify and he said again that Ukraine does NOT want nukes emphasizing: “We don’t do nuclear weapons”

TEXT ON GRAPHIC

Q. Mr President you just made it clear at the EU Summit that the question of nuclear weapons would arise for Ukraine if it cannot become a NATO member.

So in this context can you tell us how long it would take for Ukraine to build a nuclear bomb?

And a question to the Secretary General would you understand [that] Ukraine [can] build a nuclear Bomb if it cannot become a NATO member

A. Sometimes we create problems for ourselves and now you are beginning to do that.

We never said that we are preparing to create a nuclear weapon.

I said that when Budapest memorandum was signed by very honorable very powerful nuclear countries it said that Ukraine gives nuclear weapons [back to Russia] and Ukraine will have promises from these very respectable countries including Russia China United States that we will have our secure territorial integrity and sovereignty.

...

After that Putin began this occupation [of Ukraine] not once but ... two times during the last 10 years.

This means that it's not a very good umbrella for our security.

That's why I said I don't have an alternative except NATO.

That was my signal.

But we don't do nuclear weapons. Please don't spread these messages.

— Zelensky [rewritten slightly for fluency]

NATO Secretary General: And Ukraine will be in NATO and until that happens we will make sure that Ukraine has everything it needs to prevail .

See video here

Ukraine joined the non-proliferation treaty in 1994 dismantling the third largest nuclear arsenal in the world after the US and Russia.

A successor of the former Soviet Union, Ukraine acceded to the NPT as a non-nuclear weapons state in December 1994. This meant not only relinquishing the right to develop nuclear weapons in the future, but also physically dismantling and removing the world’s third-largest nuclear arsenal that Ukraine had inherited from the Soviet Union: 1,240 nuclear warheads arming 176 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) including their extensive launch control infrastructure, 700 nuclear cruise missiles arming 44 strategic bombers, and nearly 3,000 tactical nuclear weapons, including artillery shells, gravity bombs, and mines.

. Ukraine and the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

It keeps to it with regular monitoring.

QUOTE STARTS

• By 1996, Ukraine transferred all Soviet-era strategic warheads to Russia.

• Ukraine received extensive assistance to dismantle ICBMs, ICBM silos, heavy bombers, and cruise missiles from the U.S. funded Cooperative Threat Reduction Program. ICBM silos were destroyed by 2002, ICBMs were dismantled or transferred to Russia, and heavy bombers were eliminated by 2001.

• Former President Yanukovych announced at the 2010 Nuclear Security Summit that Ukraine would remove all of its HEU by 2012. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed in March 2012 that all of the HEU had been transferred to Russia.

• …. Ukraine remains committed to the NPT regime.

. Nuclear Disarmament Ukraine

The main shift in their position is that early in the war Ukraine wanted security guarantees outside of NATO e.g. with UK and USA.

Now Zelensky says only joining NATO can keep them safe once the war is over. As he explained, it wants something stronger than security guarantees. It wants to be part of NATO.

From its side, NATO has already committed to Ukraine joining NATO.

QUOTE STARTS

4. Will Ukraine join NATO?

Yes. NATO member states (called ‘NATO Allies’) agreed at the 2008 Bucharest Summit that Ukraine will become a member of NATO, noting that its next step would be to submit an application to the Membership Action Plan (MAP), a NATO programme covering political, economic, defence, resource, security and legal reforms of aspirant countries. At the 2023 Vilnius Summit, Allies removed the requirement for Ukraine to pursue a MAP, which will change Ukraine’s membership path from a two-step process to a one-step process. At the 2024 Washington Summit, Allies stated that they will continue to support Ukraine on its irreversible path to NATO membership, reaffirming that they will be in a position to extend an invitation for Ukraine to join the Alliance when Allies agree and conditions are met.

. NATO's response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine

Zelensky in the Sky News interview did NOT suggest only part of Ukraine joins NATO - only a hypothetical temporary arrangement like West Germany - and NOT his own plan which will be worked out with Trump

This is a much misunderstood interview on Sky News.

1. It is Zelensky's answer to people who propose a ceasefire without adequate security arrangements, clearly NOT his own Victory plan.

2. Ukraine has to join NATO in whole not part.

3. Temporary area under NATO protection to end hot phase.

4. Does NOT say he'd cede any land to Russia during negotiation.

5. Does NOT say how he'd get the rest of the land back but presumably by leverage over Russia in some way.

6. Never says he'd cede any land to Russia

7. It's rather similar to when West Germany joined NATO

8. But once again it's NOT his Victory plan and I think it is more like brainstorming and to help people understand the context for his own plan.

it is totally hypothetical. Ukraine needs to be offered this by other countries and nobody is suggesting it. It is NOT his victory plan.

He said that many countries have suggested a ceasefire but so far none have suggested any way to do it that would be safe for Ukraine.

Ukraine will NOT join NATO until after the war is over. The idea here is a ceasefire where part of Ukraine gets NATO protection without becoming fully a member of NATO. So a kind of interim stage half in half out. There is precedent for this. West Germany had disputed territories when it joined NATO.

But it would be pretty tricky to do this with Ukraine. Because - what if fighting starts up again? How do they handle that?

I think this is more Zelensky drawing out the issues with a ceasefire so that people can see it is not very realistic.

He does have a solution, his Victory plan. He is open to other ideas but a ceasefire has lots of problems if you try to work it through.

He says the only SAFE way to do it, which NOBODY HAS YET OFFICIALLY SUGGESTED is

1. some temporary arrangement is made that lets the part of Ukraine already controlled by Ukraine have the full protection of NATO after the ceasefire.

2. this stops the hot stage of the war.

3. Ukraine does NOT recognise he occupied territories as Russian.

4. Ukraine has to apply to join NATO as a whole not only in part.

5. Then they negotiate over the rest later

In those negotiations he does NOT say that he would negotiate them away it's the other way around he would negotiate to make them part of Ukraine too.

But this is ALL HYPOTHETICAL. It is his answer to people who suggest a ceasefire.

He says Okay you offer a ceasefire but how would that work? He says without an arrangement like this, any ceasefire would be very dangerous for Ukraine.

Also, this is NOT his victory plan. His victory plan has top secret elements which he has not shared publicly.

He is saying, okay you offer a ceasefire but how would that work? When Ukraine can't trust Putin and Ukraine can't trust anyone to give security guarantees except NATO because it had strong security guarantees

already from the UK, Russia itself, the USA, and weaker ones from France and China to prevent any country invading them.

Only 20 years later in 2014 all those guarantees completely failed to stop Russia invading Crimea. And again in 2022. While they look at Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania not one fighter jet or tank between them - and they are safe because they are part of NATO.

So NATO seems to be the only game in town here. So a ceasefire is only safe if it somehow is guaranteed by NATO.

That is what he says. Once again this is NOT his victory plan. It is also NOT what he will propose to Trump when they negotiate. It is just his answer to people asking for Ukraine to agree to a ceasefire.

TRANSCRIPTION

[Translation from Ukrainian, starting from 22:04]

No-one has offered us to be in NATO with just one part or another part of Ukraine. That is for one fact.

The fact [proposal?] is that it is a solution to stop the hot stage of the war because we can just give the NATO membership to the part of Ukraine that is under our control.

Yes it could be possible but no-one offered.

The invitation to join NATO must be given to Ukraine within its internationally recognized border.

You can't give the invitation to just one part of a country. Why? Because thus you would recognize that Ukraine is only that territory of Ukraine and the other is Russia.

So legally by law we have no right by law to recognize the occupied territory as territory of Russia.

And here we must not make any mistake. But if we want to stop the hot stage of the war we should take under the NATO umbrella the territory of Ukraine that we have under our control. Then Ukraine can take back the other part of its territor diplomatically.

This proposal has never been considered by Ukraine because no-one has ever offered that to us officially.

We can't by law recognize Ukrainian territory under the occupation of Russia as Russian. That is impossible. That is against the constitution of Ukraine.

A lot of different countries proposed a ceasefire to us. The question is, a ceasefire where.

The second point is if we fix a ceasefire [how do we have] guarantees that Putin will not come back.

Yes immediately the part of Ukraine [covered by the ceasefire needs to be in NATO] otherwise how can we go to a ceasefire? So for us it's very dangerous.

The reason it is so dangerous for Ukraine is the risk that Russia would use the ceasefire to fortify its borders with Ukraine, re-arm, build lots of missiles, rebuild its army - and then break the ceasefire agreement with a surprise attack like its first surprise attack on Ukraine to take more of Ukraine.

They already did this twice, in 2014 and in 2022 and so could do it again.

Zelensky seems to be talking about the “West German” model for NATO membership.

Here is a summary of it

Quote from Stoltenberg: "When there is a will, there are ways to find the solution. But you need a line which defines where Article 5 is invoked, and Ukraine has to control all the territory until that border."

The Financial Times noted that discussions about a "West German model" for Ukraine have been going on in expert circles for over a year and a half. Dan Fried, former US Assistant Secretary of State for Europe, and Kurt Volker, former US Ambassador to NATO and Donald Trump’s Special Envoy for Ukraine, are among those who have argued for it.

In an interview with a Czech media outlet, Czech President Petr Pavel said he did not believe Ukraine's regaining of control over all the territories within its internationally recognised borders was a prerequisite for seriously considering its NATO accession.

"If there is a demarcation, even an administrative border, then we can treat [that] as temporary and accept Ukraine into NATO in the territory it will control at that time," he said.

…

Sarotte believes that Ukraine's "partial" accession to NATO, following the West German model, is a feasible scenario for a conditional victory. This arrangement would grant Ukraine protection, freedom, and a chance to develop while keeping Russia isolated. This outcome is preferable to waiting for Kremlin ruler Vladimir Putin to abandon his ambitions regarding Ukraine or for Russia to achieve further military successes.

Some analysts caution against seriously considering the West German model for Ukraine, arguing that, unlike in the past when the borders were recognised by both parties, the current situation in Ukraine sees daily shifts in the front line. Both Ukraine and Russia still want to change the status quo, and some of the more cautious NATO members may still be reluctant to extend Article 5 guarantees to Ukraine.

West German model for Ukraine's NATO membership is discussed in West – FT

There are some issues with this though. Timothy Ash raises some issues here:

Germany was divided along clear lines agreed by the victorious second world war allies. Anglo-American forces actually withdrew to those lines from territory they had initially occupied in 1945. There are no agreed lines in Ukraine.

From the start, there were large numbers of western boots on the ground in West Germany. In Ukraine, there are currently no acknowledged western boots on the ground (although quite a few sneakers).

East Germany was heavily Sovietized but still a separate state. It remained, as I can testify from personal experience, very German. The Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine, by contrast, are being brutally Russified. Putin claims them as new provinces of the Russian Federation. The probability of a future Russian leader returning these territories to Ukraine through a peaceful negotiation, as Mikhail Gorbachev did East Germany to the west, is not high.

. OPINION: Only NATO Can Secure a ‘West German’ Future for Ukraine

But Zelensky also makes very clear in this interview that he is NOT talking about any proposal of his own.

He says that he needs to talk to Trump first after he is inaugurated and until then there won’t be a real plan.

He needs to work directly with Trump because if others around him are involved it will destroy communication with Trump.

He can’t do that until Trump; is inaugurated but he has shared information with Trump and he is thinking over it.

So he will work out the plan with Trump in a series of meetings after Trump is inaugurated.

TRANSCRIPT

[starting from 12:30]

Zelensky: With Trump I want to work with him directly because there are different voices from people around him and that's why we not to [have] anybody around to destroy our communication, it will be not helpful and will be destructive and we have to

we have to try to find the new mode

… I want to share with him ideas and I want to hear from him from him his ideas

Have you spoken to him yet?

Zelensky: … in September when I was in New York we had conversation it was very warm good, constructive but it was mostly not with small details but with Putin you can't be without details. …

It was very good me meeting and it was an important first step.

Now we have to prepare some meetings I don't know how many we will have but until we will have the real plan where Ukraine is strong.

…

Q. But is there a basic plan of what you think Mr President Trump

Zelensky: We don't know the details from our plan or future plan of … President Trump

I said to him some things which I think we have to understand

• who is Putin

• what he really wants

We have to be very strong

Then of course we have our our peace plan mhm and it was based on peace formula and the lot of things it been done by the way 100% all the meetings with dozens of countries we finished in November as I said that the plan will be ready

So the plan is ready that's very important how's it been received

… we finished with the plan after [my meeting with him

… I think he's thinking about a lot of things our team shared some things with his team

… I've got details from the American intelligence

He doesn't have all the rights until he's not in white house so I think he's learning the situation now.

It's good that he's learning

… I think that we need to prepare for some meetings before we will find some common understanding of the situation

Ukraine does NOT want its Soviet era nukes back! Bizarre suggestion of unnamed officials that makes no sense

Then to add to this, a recent New York Times op ed suggested that some unnamed US officials have suggested giving nukes to Ukraine AFTER THE WAR ENDS.

But whoever those officials were, they must have been at a low level in the administration and remarkably misinformed as what they suggested is bizarre and impossible.

Here is a fact check by the Kyiv Post:

What exactly did the officials say?

A New York Times article published on Thursday, Nov. 21, titled “Trump’s Vow to End the War Could Leave Ukraine With Few Options,” discussed Western options to help Kyiv defend itself ahead of Donald Trump’s return to office.

In one paragraph, the publication said unnamed officials “suggested” that US President Joe Biden could return the nukes Ukraine relinquished in the 1990s under the Budapest Memorandum. Here’s the full paragraph:

“Several officials even suggested that Mr. Biden could return nuclear weapons to Ukraine that were taken from it after the fall of the Soviet Union. That would be an instant and enormous deterrent. But such a step would be complicated and have serious implications.”

As such, it was merely a suggestion made by unnamed officials, not Biden himself. Moreover, Washington does not possess the nukes Ukraine gave up in the 1990s, which would render the option impossible.

. FACT-CHECK: Is Biden Returning Nuclear Weapons to Ukraine?

Then to add to that as we just saw Zelensky most emphatically does NOT WANT NUKES. The Ukrainian people wouldn’t want them either for the obvious reason.

It would also be a blatant violation of the non proliferation treaty. It is an ABSURD suggestion.

Ukraine when it joins NATO will automatically join the NATO nuclear umbrella

Even then, it is highly unlikely that NATO wants to position them so close to Russia.

And next to impossible that Ukraine wants to host them on its soil.

This is a good example of how sensationalist stories develop - from Zelensky says “Ukraine chooses NATO and NOT nuclear weapons” to “Biden will give nukes to Ukraine before he leave office! (NOT)

This is how this story has developed over the last week or so

1. It started with Zelensky saying he told Trump Ukraine chooses NATO and NOT nuclear weapons.

2. By some bizarre transformation that led to journalists reporting FALSELY that he threatened Trump to develop a nuke if he couldn't join NATO which makes no sense as Ukraine has already been invited to NATO and does NOT want nukes.

3. This led to experts speculating about how quickly Ukraine could build a nuke, based on media misreporting of this story about Zelensky saying Ukraine would NOT develop nukes. Very strange. Here is an example:
   . EP74: [WON’T HAPPEN[ Ukraine will just build a nuclear bomb in 6 months

4. Zelensky told journalists to stop spreading this false message saying Ukraine does NOT do nukes. But they kept writing stories.

5. It then morphed to that BIZARRE claim in that NY Times article that unnamed officials in the Biden administration were discussing trying to get Putin to return all of Ukraine's nukes to Ukraine AFTER the war is over which makes UTTERLY NO SENSE. Either NY Times got it wrong or they spoke to low rank remarkably uninformed officials. It is hard to see how anyone could believe Putin would agree to return Ukraine's nukes to Ukraine. OR for Ukraine to want them back.

6. That then finally morphed to a FALSE claim that Biden is going to give Zelensky nukes DURING the war before he leaves office first shared by Zero Hedge and the conspiracy theorist Republican representative Marjorie Taylor Greene in a tweet

That was then spread as Russian propaganda and taken up by the Western sensationalist press.

Finally, Putin’s spokesman Peskov responded to those rumours and that led to headlines like this in Reuters:

• Russia condemns "irresponsible" talk of nuclear weapons for Ukraine

There never even WAS any talk of nuclear weapons for Ukraine.

The truth is that

1. Ukraine does NOT want nukes now or ever as Zelensky repeatedly emphasizes.

2. The US would never for a moment consider sending nukes to Ukraine and Zelensky would also refuse a gift of nukes from ANYONE.

3. Ukraine DOES want to join NATO - only AFTER the war is over.

Russia’s Sarmat ICBM is just a replacement for the Ukrainian made Voevoda ICBM with shelf-life through to 2023 - but it keeps blowing up

Deploying does NOT mean any plans to use them. All their older ICBMs are ALREADY deployed. And -the main reason that Russia wants to develop a new nuke now is because it depended on Ukraine to service its older generation ICBMs.

1. it is a replacement for the Ukrainian built Voevoda ICBM which is only guaranteed to work through to 2023

2. naturally enough Ukraine is not going to help Russia maintain or build ICBMs any more.

3. It seems Russia finds it hard to build a new ICBM by itself as they keep exploding, with only one successful launch so far, a problem they need to solve.

4. Having lots of warheads on one ICBM makes it less rather than more flexible.

Ukraine built them when it was part of the Soviet Union and still has the expertise and the components and maintenance contract to maintain them. Ukraine had a contract to extend the shelf life of the Voevoda ICBM up to 2014, but broke off that contract when Russia invaded Crimean in 2014, leaving Russia without anyone with the skills to service its older model ICBMs. In 2018 the Russians launched a Voevoda ICBM and confirmed it had a shelf life of another 5 years which takes you to 2023. But they don't know how to service it.

So they build a new ICBM, the SARMAT is the replacement. But it keeps blowing up on the launch pad, and has only had one successful test so far.

ALL ICBMs have multiple warhead capability. The SARMAT has more warheads than most - but the US hasn't built one like this because it doesn't see the point. They have the same number of total warheads on all their ICBMs but putting them on fewer ICBMs like Russia is doing gives less flexibility.

Russia will need to solve this problem of exploding Sarmats some time soon. It's ICBMs likely can last a few more years but are not guaranteed to continue to work beyond 2023.

For details see:

BLOG: Russia's Sarmat (Satan 2), nuke capable ICBM, is a nothingburger - a deterrent - nothing to do with the war - announced in 2018 - deployment delayed from 2022 because of issues with test flight - same nukes on fewer ICBMs - not clear what point is

Stories about bunkers are about deterrence for conventional attacks in some ex Soviet Union countries that have lots of bunkers like the ones Ukraine uses to protect itself in Ukraine

This is NOTHING to do with Biden's decision! This is them carrying out a plan they decided on in June. Note - being prepared for an attack is part of DETERRENCE.

The idea is that by showing to any potential adversary that you are strong you deter them from even thinking about attacking you8.

QUOTE The key points of the plan were agreed at a conference of senior officials in June, and a special group is now looking into it, the spokesman said.

. germany-starts-drawing-up-list-of-bunkers-amid-surging-tensions

That story goes on to talk about how Russia could build up to be able to challenge NATO by 2030.

This is a rather implausible scenario where after the Ukraine war ends Russia continues in a war economy focusing on building more missiles and weapons when there is no war to fight over rebuilding its economy. It would then be like North Korea a weak economy with much of its funding going into the military.

It's possible but even then it still would only be able to get back to the strength it had at the start of 2022, but without the vast stockpiles from the Soviet Union.

It wouldn't really be a serious adversary for NATO so long as NATO continued to modernize and stay ahead. Simply because modern weapons development is expensive and it doesn't have the GDP to compete.

And again - just as in 2022 and more so then the whole point is to continue to make sure Russia would NOT attack NATO in 2030.

It wouldn't really be a serious adversary for NATO so long as NATO continued to modernize and stay ahead. Simply because modern weapons development is expensive and it doesn't have the GDP to compete.

And again - just as in 2022 and more so then the whole point is to continue to make sure Russia would NOT attack NATO in 2030.

This is not about nukes. If they were worried about nukes they would tell everyone how to protect themselves from fallout and they aren't doing that.

And - the former Soviet Union countries like East Germany, Ukraine, Russia of course and many others already have vast numbers of these bunkers.

The Soviet Union built vast numbers of fallout shelters which Russia surely already has. In the Ukraine war the Ukrainians shelter from the Russian bombs in shelters from the Soviet Union built to withstand nuclear bombs. They are deep underground.

. Gimme Shelter: Ukrainians Make the Most of the Soviet Underground

But the German ones are meant for conventional attacks and they don't say who from. They are meant to protect from conventional explosions.

You do NOT need a bunker for protection from fallout - a movie trope only

As for fallout - despite the movies you do NOT need a bunker for protection from fallout. You do NOT need air filtration either. Fallout is heavy dust, it's not floating in the air. Dust light enough to float in the air wouldn't fall to the ground but would be spread far and wide and by the time it reaches the ground has lost most of its radioactivity.

Back in the cold war we all knew this. Amost nobody knows today. That fallout is heavy dust, easily visible, falls to the ground, dirt that you can brush off - and that as it hits the ground it is already getting far less radioactive, a tenth of its original radioactivity after a couple of hours, and most radioactivity is gone in 48 hours.

If the authorities thought there was a real risk of a nuclear war we would be told these things as we were in the cold war when I was a child.

There have been numerous nuclear tests, about once a month when I was a child, in remote places where they harmed nobody.

And bigger nukes are NOT more radioactive. Hydrogen bombs fuse hydrogen to helium with NO RADIOACTIVE FALLOUT FROM THE HYDROGEN. The only radioactivity is from the much smaller uranium trigger for the bomb.

The biggest nuke ever exploded, the Tsar Bomba was in a remote part of Russia, but it was an air burst and so didn't even leave a crater and nobody was hurt. Also it was designed to minimize radioactivity - the explosion was nearly all hydrogen fusing to helium, You could have visited the test site immediately after the explosion with almost no risk.

. Tsar Bomba - Wikipedia

Most nukes do produce significant fallout - but only in the direction the wind blows. And if it is an airburst the radioactivity is almost all gone in 2 weeks.

So yes it IS possible to protect yourself from fallout. You do NOT need a nuclear bunker. Indeed unless you are in the direction of the prevailing winds you won’t even get any fallout. If you are you need to stay inside well away from any heavy dust that falls from the sky for at least 2 days and by then you can expect rescuers to be on the scene already telling you what to do.

They aren’t telling us these things - almost nobody knows them - so they can’t think there really is a significant risk. At least they can’t think there is enough of a risk that we need to know how to stay safe if there is a nuclear attack.

BLOG: Most people don’t know: fallout is HEAVY dust - NOT fog - falls to the ground after 15 mins - and fallout gets MUCH less radioactive in hours - so you CAN protect yourself - if authorities thought there was a real risk we’d be told these things

We would ALL KNOW THIS if there was a real risk of a nuclear war.

TEXT ON GRAPHIC

You do NOT see these instructions on the news because there IS NO REAL WORLD WAR RISK

We were ALL sent this in the cold war.

NOBODY is sent it today.

Our governments do NOT assess ANY risk of a world war.

These instructions would save millions of lives in a nuclear war.

If you are outside the epicenter and stay away from the heavy dust that falls from the sky you don't get radiation sickness.

Radioactivity is mostly gone in 2 days, most of what's left in weeks.

When I was a child we all read this and knew what to do.

Now almost nobody knows except older people because we DON'T NEED TO KNOW.

Because there is NO LONGER ANY REAL RISK OF A NUCLEAR WAR.

It's bluffs, clickbait, sensationalism and exaggerations.

Graphic from: Protect and survive : this booklet tells you how to make your home and your family as safe as possible under nuclear attack

For more on this see:

DRAFT: Why we do NOT risk a world war from: Ukraine, the Middle East, China, North Korea, or anywhere else in the world - next to impossible - MID EDIT AND MUCH TO DO

Putin can’t win a war with nukes - the opposite - all-out war would end with his people rising against him and NATO taking over Russian skies

That map shows what happens if Russia fires ALL its nukes at the USA.

TEXT ON GRAPHIC

No way Russia does this.

If Russia launched ALL its nukes it could make the areas on orange radioactive for a couple fo days, some lingering for weeks, worst over in hours.

Focus of largest humanitarian operation ever

Anyone indoors will be much safer and can leave their house after 2 days.

There is no fallout outside the orange areas - fallout is just heavy dust.

It’s impossible for Russia to win a war by using nukes like this.

The areas outside the fallout plumes don't get any radioactivity.

The areas within them lose most of the radioactivity in 2 days and most of what's left in 2 weeks.

So, a nuclear war would have only a small effect on the world population. Even if all of Russia's nukes were impossibly dropped on the USA then that would reduce the population by less than 190 million out of 7.8 billion or less than 2.5%. If the USA response was similar it would still be less than 5%. And it would NOT make the world uninhabitable.

And meanwhile, NATO would continue to be far far superior to whatever Russia has even if Russia impossibly did a sudden unexpected first strike with all its nukes.

Russia doesn’t even have one nuke for every US and UK airbase never mind the destroyers, fighter jets, bombers etc.

This can also help people to be less scared of nukes. For some reason many seem to think that Putin would want to live out his life in a bunker with the rest of the world nearly all dead including most Russians - and would prefer that to having to give up on adding Ukraine to the Russian Federation.

It doesn't make sense, no sane person would do that. Also from what we’ve seen here, it doesn't match his character AT ALL as someone who is averse to taking any risks.

But anyway - it is based on a movie fantasy. In reality even if he launched a full-scale nuclear war, then 95% of the world population remains including most of Russia and of NATO and including NATO's military capabilities.

In reality we also now know that NATO would respond with conventional and unconventional non-nuclear methods to more rationally stop Putin launching more nukes.

If Putin used nukes against NATO, he has nothing like enough nukes to stop NATO from fighting back. Never had in the Cold War either when NATO and the Soviet Union were near equals in technology. But Russia is a much weaker economy than the Soviet Union and it also has the problems of corruption siphoning a fair bit of its defence funding away into the pockets of Putin’s oligarch friends.

We found from the Ukraine war to most people’s surprise that NATO’s technology from the 1980s is still vastly superior to what Russia has. If Russia had anything like NATO’s capability it wouldn’t be stuck moving one mile a week in Eastern Donbas but would have got control of the entire Ukrainian air space on day 1 of the war.

TEXT ON GRAPHIC:

Geneva Protocol II from 1977

Must NOT target

- civilian populations

- civilian objects

- cultural objects

Ratified by all NATO countries except USA

USA in practice complies without ratifying.

US had Soviet cities as targets in 1956

- long before Geneva Protocol II

Never any possibility of toal destruction just of large numbers of casualties

- nukes can't destroy a country

- neither NATO nor the Soviet Union ever had anything like enough nukes to destroy the other side to the extent they can't fight.

This is IMPORTANT as it means PUTIN CAN'T DEFEAT NATO WITH NUKES No country ever had first strike capability.

The conventional NATO military would remain and be far superior to Russia after any exchange of nukes.

Putin would LOSE if he used nukes.

Nukes ONLY WORK AS A DETERRENT to prevent another country invading by threatening to use nukes if they do.

Under Trump and Biden, the US no longer will respond to nukes with nukes.

It more sensibly responds by using sleeper agents, conventional weapons, hacking, special ops etc to stop Russia firing more nukes.

USA and Russia do NOT have a M.A.D. doctrine (Mutually Assured Destruction)

Likely NEVER had such a doctrine though te 1950s doctrine had some similarities.

Today the USA would more rationally act to prevent Putin launching more nukes and Russia would LOSE, he couldn't stop NATO taking over Russian airspace.

So, whatever happened, NATO would survive and would be still vastly superiro in conventional terms to Russia.

Ordinary Russians as well as Putin's colleagues would no longer see him
as a strong man to protect Russia after such catastrophic misjudgement.

The main question would be whether he would be assassinated or spend the rest of his life in prison.

For details see

SECTION: Not in the world of M.A.D (Mutual Assured Destruction)

in:

DRAFT: Why we do NOT risk a world war from: Ukraine, the Middle East, China, North Korea, or anywhere else in the world - next to impossible - MID EDIT AND MUCH TO DO

That can help people see he is never going to do this.

He manages to make his bluffs about nukes seem FALSELY - MORE convincing even with NO PREPARATION TO USE NUKES and bluffing ABOUT ONCE A MONTH

He bluffed about a nuclear war on average about once a month for over 2 years. Anyone else could only do that bluff once or twice or a few times with diminishing credibility.

But Putin seems to make it more and more convincing to our people each time he does it. Mainly through words.

No actual preparation to use nuke AT ALL. Sabrina Singh, Pentagon spokesperson says they see NO PREPARATION TO USE NUKES and they have not raised their own response level

Singh says it is just the rhetoric we've seen before.

TEXT ON GRAPHIC:
Is the Pentagon concerned about nukes or changed alert level?

A. We see NO signs of Putin preparing to use nukes and have NOT CHANGED OUR ALERT LEVEL.

Has world war III began?

No. This is just the US as one of 50 or so countries supporting Ukraine’s defence capabilities.
[my short summary for autistic or panicking readers]

Graphic shows title section for “No signs Russia is preparing to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, Pentagon says” (story in the Kyiv Independent) and transcript of Pentagon press briefing saying the same thing.

See my:

Fact checking CLICKBAIT - NOT in world war - Pentagon see NO RUSSIAN PREPARATIONS to use nukes - NO REASON to change USA's posture - air raids in Kyiv normal - Nordic booklets updates not about nukes

Robert Walker

·

20 Nov

To get a first idea of this article just look at the graphics and read the section titles, then you can read any section of special interest to go into it in more depth

Read full story

A completely predictable pattern. Yet people fall for the bluff over and over.

When he loses his preoccupation will just be - how to present it as a “win” to his people

So what will he do when he loses?

Well, in Russia he has complete control of the State Media. So he can convince them far more easily than he can convince us - of just about anything.

He can easily convince the Russian people that black is white - that Russia losing in Ukraine is actually a successful "special operation" to denazify Ukraine.

So I wouldn't worry about Putin.

It's not the job of Ukraine or its allies to ensure tha Putin doesn't lose this war.

Indeed that's more of his propaganda. He has managed somehow to convince the general public amongst Ukraine's allies that Putin must not lose this war.

He manages to convince us that somehow we are safer in a world where Putin gets to keep part of Ukriane after an illegal invasion.

He certainly has the "Gift of the Gab" as they put it.

QUOTE the ability to speak easily and confidently in a way that makes people want to listen to you and believe you:

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/gift-of-the-gab

But that is all it is. He can make you believe things that are false. It is not true.

And for some reason the Western media don't fact check him.

But that is his "out" here.

If he is losing he won't think

"Shall I out of complete madness attack NATO".

He will be thinking

"What can I do that is 100% guaranteed to persuade the Russian people that this is a win and that I am still a strong president protecting them".

Never any risk of a world war - and our leaders know this or they would say what to do

This is nothing new, it was similar with the F-16s, with the ATACMS when first delivered to Ukraine in fall 2023, the air defences in the fall of 2022, HiMARS in spring 2022, the Challenger tanks from the UK in spring 2023, and many more.

There is NEVER any real risk of a world war.

There WAS a real risk in my childhood during the cold war. But not today. You can tell that partly just by the way that governments are NOT advising citizens how to stay as safe as possible in a nuclear war as they did when I was a child.

Ask anyone in their 70s or older and they can likely still remember some of the instructions for how to be as safe as possible if nukes fall. We all knew it back then. But today's young people don't know this because they don't need to.

That is how safe it is today.

I have this article I'm working on and this may be a good time to finish it to help people consolidate their understanding that we do not risk a world war.

It may be useful already

DRAFT: Why we do NOT risk a world war from: Ukraine, the Middle East, China, North Korea, or anywhere else in the world - next to impossible - MID EDIT AND MUCH TO DO

Ukraine wants to join NATO after the war is over because it sees that even the weakest of countries are safe once they join NATO

Eventually, AFTER THE WAR IS OVER, Ukraine does want to join NATO and it would then be under NATO's nuclear umbrella.

This is because Ukraine sees that Russia attacked them, when they

• already had dozens of tanks and fighter jets

• a security assurance from both the USA and UK at the time of the invasion

• peace promises from Russia

• security assurance even from Russia under the Budapest memorandum.

Meanwhile,

• tiny Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania don't have a single fighter jet or tank between them

• but are all part of NATO.

That is the obvious reason why Ukraine wants to join NATO. They see that it is the only method out there that has

• a proven success record in preventing invasion by Russia.

So they want to JOIN NATO AFTER THE WAR IS OVER and once they do that they will be safe and Russia can NEVER do this again.

SEE ALSO

Also

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