By Eric Vandenbroeck and co-workers

The atomic option

While we earlier mentioned that the Russian doctrine calls for a rapid force-deployment into the zone of simmering conflict, overwhelming the adversary with force and squashing the conflict, thus presenting the United States and NATO with a fait accompli.1 Of course, in the case of Ukraine, it didn't work.

With its modernized weapons arsenal, Russia can mount significant combat power while degrading U.S. warfighting capability by employing novel electronic warfare, anti-satellite, and cyber capabilities against U.S. forces.2

Russia’s Sarmat test underscores the need to modernize US nuclear triad. The launch represents a notable milestone in Russia’s ongoing nuclear modernization designed to hold the American homeland at risk.

 

The “Unthinkable” Thinkable: Armaggedon

Any advantage that Putin may perceive is more likely to provoke his aggression, as is now the case with Ukraine, rather than decrease his appetite for restoring the losses that Russia has incurred in the aftermath of the collapse of the USSR.

Putin’s new military doctrine reserves a special role for Russia’s nuclear forces in wartime. Unlike the Cold War, when nuclear weapons were primarily psychological weapons intended for deterrence, today, Russia tests and plans to use nuclear weapons to achieve military victory.

Russia has the largest nuclear arsenal among the nuclear states, and Putin has ensured that it is kept in good shape.

Russia is the only country that can devastate the U.S. homeland by destroying numerous targets. However, Moscow has no plans to launch a surprise nuclear attack on America, nor does it expect one from Washington. Instead, the Kremlin anticipates that a local or regional conflict may escalate into an atomic scenario should it, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said on 22 March 2022. perceives that its regime is threatened.

There is no question that Russia is preparing for a nuclear conflict with the United States and NATO. Will this conflict be deterred or fought? If this existential threat to the U.S. homeland and civilization is to be deterred, U.S.intelligence and national security need to understand the mindset of their strategic opponent: Vladimir Putin.

In December 2014, the National Center for State Defense was established. 60 It is a wartime structure similar to Stavka VGK (Stavka Verkhovnogo Glavnokommandovaniya), the Soviet command and control center from which Comrade Stalin commanded the armed forces of the USSR during World War II. Putin’s Stavka coordinates the activities across all Russian armed forces to ensure permanent combat readiness. It also includes a 24/ 7 watch center, which monitors the security environment for intelligence indicators to identify potential hot spots. Based on intelligence data provided by Russian military intelligence, the GRU.

 

The KAL-007 incident

KAL-007 got tragically off course but didn’t know it. It was shot down, killing everyone on board, because the Soviets perceived it as a “spy plane.” This tragic accident was a result of the “Soviet concern for border security[’ s] escalating to paranoid intensity by August 1983.” The accident happened within the context of deteriorating U.S.-Soviet relations. “Soviet tempers boiled over in April of 1983 as a result of a U.S. naval exercise in the Sea of Okhotsk. By Soviet accounts, the U.S. Navy flew bombing runs on April 4 that penetrated deeply into Soviet airspace in the militarily sensitive Kuril Chain area and led to an Andropov-issued shoot-to-kill order.” 3

What is revealing is that at no time did the Soviets try to identify the aircraft they had shot down.

What is equally alarming is that the NSA analysts at Elmendorf, Alaska, who intercepted the Soviet tracking of KAL-007, may have had the opportunity to preempt the tragedy. They didn’t do so because they assumed the Soviets were “practice tracking.” Although one analyst was convinced that it was “actually valid tracking” and not a practice, he was overruled by a “Group Senior Coordinator,” so the incident wasn’t reported up the chain.

What we have here is an illustration of two diametrically opposed mindsets -  the Soviet “worst-case scenario” and the American “best-case scenario” -  both contributing to the misinterpretation of the situation, leading to a tragedy that could have been averted.

To avoid a catastrophe, it is imperative that we understand our strategic opponents. Even if we don’t plan on going to war with them, we must remember that war may choose us. Tragically, there is an inadequate understanding within the Intelligence Community of how seriously Putin’s Russia thinks about and prepares for a kinetic conflict with the United States.

A concern that Putin may cross the threshold of America’s patience and resolve. He is convinced that Russia can out-escalate America to win the conflict because Washington doesn’t have the guts to stop Moscow’s moves. 

 

The nuclear option

The concern is that Russia is possibly preparing to expand war because Moscow has concluded that Washington seeks its destruction. And while the following will have no remediate consequences it also might contain a warning  Russian plane violated Sweden's airspace as NATO application looms.

Putin has threatened to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine. The threat was just reiterated by Foreign Secretary Sergei Lavrov.

More important only hours ago Russian forces held drills this week simulating nuclear-capable strikes close to European Union borders, the Russian Defense Ministry has revealed.

Members of the Baltic Fleet held war games Wednesday to “deliver mock missile strikes with the crews of Iskander operational-tactical missile systems” in Kaliningrad, the press service of the Western military district said in a statement. The drills, held near the borders of EU-member states Poland and Lithuania, come amid increasingly unhinged attempts by Kremlin mouthpieces in Russia’s state-run media to sell the idea that a nuclear strike is inevitable.

RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan last month said it is “more probable” Russia’s war in Ukraine will end in a nuclear strike than Vladimir Putin simply backing down.

On Russia’s state-owned Channel One, Russian lawmaker Aleksei Zhuravlyov and TV host Olga Skabeyeva went even further, openly discussing the prospects of Moscow lobbing nuclear missiles at the United Kingdom, Germany and France.

Top Kremlin Mouthpiece Says Russia Has No Choice but to Use Nuclear Weapons

Putin himself has hinted at nuclear strikes, telling lawmakers last week that Russia will unleash “lightning-fast” retaliatory strikes if anyone dares “to intervene in the ongoing events” in Ukraine. “We have all the tools for this, things no one else can boast of having now. And we will not boast, we will use them if necessary. And I want everyone to know that,” he said.

While the Russian Defense Ministry statement on Wednesday’s war games didn’t explicitly mention simulated nuclear strikes, Iskander missiles, with a range of around 300 miles, are known to be capable of carrying nuclear warheads. From Kaliningrad, Western Ukraine, Poland, the Baltic States, and even parts of Germany would be within striking range.

Putin has already announced that his “deterrent forces,” which presumably means nuclear weapons, have been raised to “combat ready” status. Vladimir Putin could view the prospect of defeat in Ukraine as an existential threat to his regime, potentially triggering his resort to using a nuclear weapon, the top US intelligence official has warned. Whereby Russian military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer stated that Russian President Putin has already moved nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles into the field. The concern is that if Putin feels cornered, and that his strategy in Ukraine is failing, he could use tactical nuclear weapons as a “game-changer” to break a stalemate or avoid defeat. If desperation drives Putin to do this, what would be the implications?

 

Conclusion

Russian state propagandists on their media resources calculate how long it takes for nuclear missiles to hit European capitals. They talk about it publicly, openly. They tell how to detonate nuclear explosives in the ocean to wash away everything in the British Isles with a radioactive wave. They prepare infographics, that is, they are serious about it. They boast that Russia can destroy any state leaving only ‘nuclear ashes’. Moreover, ‘nuclear ashes’ is their quote, which they repeat like a mantra.

Why is this happening? This is a feeling of impunity, they are accustomed to the fact that business ‘as usual’ has always returned to the relations of all states with Russia.

 

Footnotes of p.1,2,3, by sending an e-mail to ericvandenbroeck1969@gmail.com

 

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