Probably still holds true today.
Not likely for the next couple of years. Our current president wouldn’t shoot back.
Probability of war: 11 percent
Probability that one or both sides will use nuclear weapons, conditional on war: 18 percent
Probability of nuclear war between US and Russia: 2 percent
"To the extent that there was broad agreement among my sources, it was that peace is still much likelier than war: The scenarios for war all involve several overlapping events, such as a cross-border provocation and an accidental midair collision. But they stressed that the odds of a war, while remote, are no longer negligible, and are real enough that the world should take them seriously and respond accordingly.
"The atmosphere is a feeling that war is not something that's impossible anymore," the well-placed Russian analyst Fyodor Lukyanov told me, describing a growing concern within Moscow's foreign policy elite. "A question that was absolutely impossible a couple of years ago, whether there might be a war, a real war, is back. People ask it."
"When you consider the stakes of nuclear war, even 2 percent odds seem way too high"
Lukyanov's assessment was representative of what I heard in researching the story: a feeling, a question, a fear hanging in the background like a storm cloud. What he could not offer me, what no one I spoke to could really say for sure, is a rigorous assessment of precisely how likely this was. It was high enough that people should be concerned and take it seriously, but how much higher than that, no one could say.
That didn't satisfy Jay Ulfelder, a political scientist who specializes in political forecasting and instability, and who runs an excellent blog. He set up a two-question survey, pushing it out to a couple of online political science expert communities. The first question asked respondents to estimate the odds that that the US and Russia would go to war in the next four and a half years. The second asked for the odds that, if such a conflict occurred, one or both sides would use nuclear weapons.
Ulfelder took the first 100 responses and ran them through some statistical analysis (you can read more about his methodology here). Here is the aggregate assessment he found:
Probability of war: 11 percent
Probability that one or both sides will use nuclear weapons, conditional on war: 18 percent
Probability of nuclear war between US and Russia: 2 percent
Ulfelder cautions that his survey is not particularly scientific (he called it "rinky dink" in a later email exchange) and that we shouldn't put too much stock in it, though he points out that the results about track with those from a much more rigorous 2014 William & Mary survey of 2,000-plus experts on the likelihood of war.
While none of my sources ventured anything as specific as a numerical probability, for what it's worth these estimates track with the sense I got from speaking to them. So we now have the William & Mary survey, Ulfelder's survey, and my research all roughly lining up. That's not conclusive, of course — you're never going to get a conclusive assessment for something as complex and multilayered as an unintended escalation to major interstate warfare — but the consistency of the data so far seems to suggest there is something there.
So what do these numbers mean? Is an 11 percent probability of war and a 2 percent probability of nuclear war a lot? On the one hand, that seems pretty small — a 1-in-50 chance of nuclear war. On the other, that's significantly higher than other things we consider serious threats; it's twice the odds of dying in a car accident, for example. And when you consider the stakes of a nuclear war between the two great nuclear powers, even 2 percent seems way, way too high.
In looking at those numbers, I think back to a formula that every international relations student learns in the first week of undergrad: Threat equals intent multiplied by capability. In other words, you figure out how threatening something is by multiplying its intention to hurt you by its capability to hurt you.
There's no such thing as intent when it comes to accidental escalations to nuclear war. But you can substitute that 2 percent probability of occurrence for "intent." That's a small number, but when you multiply it by the "capability" of major nuclear war, which potentially includes millions of dead or even the literal end of the world, it looks more significant. To me, it looks alarming."
More likely, an Iranian suitcase bomb delivered in the USA by an ISIS agent
The U.S. Is presently weak under the Clown in Chief.Even so,I don’t think Putin is that stupid to attack the U.S.with ICBM’s.He’s Crazy buy not crazy enough to want the destruction of Russia.
Adolf Putin will not stumble into war if we put up a united front of strength to stop his adventures. He knows his military is weak and rusted, a nothing Ukraine is for the most part holding the line with almost no heavy weapons. He will bluster and posture but he will not lead Russia to destruction.
If two nations were to engage in nuclear war, I believe it would be between neighboring countries with large population disparities. I’m thinking Pakistan/India or Russia/China.
I’d rather have a nuclear war with ISIS. Too bad about the fallout.
Not much point in grabbing the Ukraine if it’s already been incinerated.
I would be much more concerned about a nuclear war with Iran where the leadership truly believes it is their religious duty to bring about Armageddon.
Probably still holds true today.
It would take two unstable, egomaniacs to push the button...oh, wait.
Crazy talk!
1. Our strategic forces and nuclear arsenal are a mere shadows of themselves compared to the Cold War, and I strongly suspect their reliability is highly questionable.
2. Russia and China have been continually moderizing and upgrading their strategic weapons systems and forces. What have we done?
3. You have to have a 'National Command Authority' that is decisive and willing to fight back. 0bama and his yes-men, panty-waist "generals" don't fit that criteria.