Nuclear Chicken is Overrated

To understand the conventional thinking as to why Putin will not use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, you need only ask: why should he?

Biden argues that Putin is irrational, a madman of sorts, pressed into a corner facing imminent defeat in Ukraine—and, with that, the likelihood of regime change.

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But nothing could be further from the truth. Putin is not facing “defeat” in the Ukraine, as territory trades hands, and can retreat to stable pre-invasion lines in the Donbas and elsewhere with little more than egg on his face—nothing close to defeat. If you’re interested in what defeat looks like, see Kabul 1989 or 2021.

As for regime change, Putin owes nothing to whatever Russian public opinion exists around him, and his pals in power, the so-called oligarchs, have (minus a yacht or two) plundered mightily off sanctions, which have driven up prices for Russian energy exports.

The primary reason to avoid a nuclear escalation is that it would bring the U.S. or some subset of NATO “boots on the ground” deeper into the Ukrainian war zone, and this is something Putin would fear. Indeed, depending on how much force is applied, it could lead to a full-on “defeat” in Ukraine.

The U.S. and NATO have been preparing to fight Russia on the plains of Ukraine for some 70 years (the fall of the Soviet Union, terrorism, Iraq, etc., notwithstanding). In such a war, the 19th Artillery duels that characterize the current conflict would be replaced by endless U.S. precision air strikes. Imagine American A-10s, or even B-52s practically at the edge of space, tearing into those long Russian columns. About the last thing Putin wants is to fight NATO directly over chunks of the Ukraine, instead of by (weaker) proxy.

With those arguments dismissed, we look to the battlefield to see the role a nuclear escalation would play. Looking back at the historical use of nuclear weapons (solely by the United States, of course) Putin has roughly four options.

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One would be a demonstration nuke, say a sea-level low-yield blast outside Odessa designed to rattle the windows, maybe shut off the lights, but otherwise do little harm. As the U.S. concluded late in the Second World War, demonstrations effectively prove you lack resolve, not that you are committed to nuclear war. Plus, the mere use of the nuke likely pulls the U.S. into the conflict with nothing gained by Russia.

Second would be a nuclear attack against a large concentration of Ukrainian troops. Apart from irradiating the territory he hopes to conquer, Putin could achieve something similar, close enough for government work, with an extreme massing of artillery and airpower. A big boom to clear a path, but without the U.S. coming in as an aftereffect. Why go nuclear when the same outcome is available via conventional weapons?

Third would be a leadership-decapitation strike based on good intelligence that would eliminate President Zelensky. This one presumes a) near-perfect intel

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