Posted on 02/27/2022 2:33:27 PM PST by Kaslin
In 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait in a naked war of territorial aggression. The next year, the US and an allied coalition intervened under the auspices of the United Nations Security Council, repulsing the Iraqi invasion. Today, as Russia is engaged in a similar aggressive war against Ukraine, there is no similar American effort in the offing — even as Ukrainian leaders have pleaded for Western assistance.
There are many dissimilarities between the situations in 1991 and 2022, but the biggest one is this: Saddam Hussein, rather famously, did not have nuclear weapons. Vladimir Putin has approximately 6,000 of them. And that makes all the difference.
Both before the invasion and afterward, the Biden administration has consistently ruled out the deployment of US troops. “Let me say it again: Our forces are not — and will not — be engaged in the conflict with Russia in Ukraine,” the president said in a Thursday address. Despite the warnings of American involvement from commentators on the Trumpist right and “anti-imperialist” left, there are no signs of this policy changing. Nuclear weapons are the chief reason why.
The logic of mutually assured destruction that defined the Cold War still works, to some degree: Russia’s arsenal makes any direct intervention in Ukraine riskier than any rational American leader could tolerate. In a sense, then, Russia’s nuclear weapons make it less likely that the conflict will kick off World War III.
But in another sense, Russia’s nuclear arsenal also helped create the conditions where Putin’s invasion could happen in the first place.
In 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait in a naked war of territorial aggression. The next year, the US and an allied coalition intervened under the auspices of the United Nations Security Council, repulsing the Iraqi invasion. Today, as Russia is engaged in a similar aggressive war against Ukraine, there is no similar American effort in the offing — even as Ukrainian leaders have pleaded for Western assistance.
There are many dissimilarities between the situations in 1991 and 2022, but the biggest one is this: Saddam Hussein, rather famously, did not have nuclear weapons. Vladimir Putin has approximately 6,000 of them. And that makes all the difference.
Both before the invasion and afterward, the Biden administration has consistently ruled out the deployment of US troops. “Let me say it again: Our forces are not — and will not — be engaged in the conflict with Russia in Ukraine,” the president said in a Thursday address. Despite the warnings of American involvement from commentators on the Trumpist right and “anti-imperialist” left, there are no signs of this policy changing. Nuclear weapons are the chief reason why.
The logic of mutually assured destruction that defined the Cold War still works, to some degree: Russia’s arsenal makes any direct intervention in Ukraine riskier than any rational American leader could tolerate. In a sense, then, Russia’s nuclear weapons make it less likely that the conflict will kick off World War III.
But in another sense, Russia’s nuclear arsenal also helped create the conditions where Putin’s invasion could happen in the first place.
In 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait in a naked war of territorial aggression. The next year, the US and an allied coalition intervened under the auspices of the United Nations Security Council, repulsing the Iraqi invasion. Today, as Russia is engaged in a similar aggressive war against Ukraine, there is no similar American effort in the offing — even as Ukrainian leaders have pleaded for Western assistance.
Political scientists call this the “stability-instability paradox,” the notion that nuclear deterrence has had the paradoxical effect of making certain kinds of conventional warfare more likely. Russia can be relatively confident that the United States and its allies won’t come to Ukraine’s defense directly, because such a clash carries the threat of nuclear war. This could make Putin more confident that his invasion could succeed.
Putin himself has suggested as much. In his speech declaring war on Wednesday night, he warned that “anyone who would consider interfering from the outside” will “face consequences greater than any you have faced in history” — a thinly veiled threat to nuke the United States or its NATO allies if they dare intervene.
“This is about the clearest evidence I have ever seen for the stability-instability paradox,” Caitlin Talmadge, a professor at Georgetown University who studies nuclear weapons, writes of Putin’s speech. “Putin’s behavior suggests that revisionist actors [can] use their strategic nuclear forces as a shield behind which they can pursue conventional aggression, knowing their nuclear threats may deter outside intervention.”
The nuclear balance between the United States and Russia, one of the Cold War’s defining features, is coming back to the forefront of international politics. We can only hope that things don’t get scarier from here.
Nuclear weapons are the only weapons humanity has yet devised that, deployed at scale, could swiftly wipe out our entire species. The risks of conflict between two nuclear-armed powers are so great that virtually any rational leader should, in theory, seek to avoid one.
This is especially true of the United States and Russia, who together control an estimated 90 percent of the world’s nuclear warheads. The issue is not merely the size of their arsenals but also their structure — both countries have robust “second strike” capabilities, meaning each can sustain a devastating nuclear first strike from the other side and still retaliate. The US and Russia maintain second strike capabilities in part through the so-called “nuclear triad”: bombers armed with nuclear bombs, submarines equipped with nuclear missiles, and land-based missile launchers.
The result is that neither the US nor Russia can hope to “win” a nuclear war. Even if one nation struck first, decimating major military bases and population centers, the other would still be able to launch a devastating nuclear counterattack on their enemy’s homeland from (for example) submarines out to sea. The only way to win is not to play.
This appears to be the reason the Biden administration has been so adamant on avoiding any kind of involvement in Ukraine; the risks of any direct intervention are far too high.
Conventional warfare between nuclear powers does not necessarily escalate to nuclear conflict: see the 1999 Kargill conflict between India and Pakistan, the 2018 battle between US special forces and Russian mercenaries in Syria, or the recent border clashes between India and China. But the risk of such a conflict escalating to nuclear use is always there, especially if one side believes that vital national interests or its very survival is at stake.
For Putin, the Ukraine war seems to fit the bill. A significant US or NATO intervention in the conflict would, by sheer fact of geography, pose a threat to the territorial integrity of the Russian homeland. Were it to turn the tide of the war in Ukraine’s favor, Russia could very conceivably use its nuclear arsenal against its NATO enemies.
“Their nuclear strategy envisions possible first use if they are losing a conventional conflict or facing an existential threat,” Nick Miller, an expert on nuclear weapons at Dartmouth University, explains.
We have no guarantee that deploying US troops to Ukraine would, in fact, lead to nuclear warfare. But the risks would be high, very likely exceeding the most dangerous moments of the Cold War, like the Cuban missile crisis. There are scenarios where you could imagine an American leader launching a conflict with a nuclear power — if it was necessary to protect the US homeland, for example — but defending Ukraine, which isn’t even a formal US ally, simply isn’t one of them.
Some leading scholars look at the logic of deterrence and conclude that nuclear weapons are actually a good thing for the world. This “nuclear revolution” theory, most commonly associated with the late political scientist Kenneth Waltz, holds that the spread of nuclear weapons will spread peace by expanding deterrence. The more countries can make aggression unthinkably risky, the less likely war will become.
The evidence for this theory is spotty. While nuclear deterrence does seem to have played a role in preventing the Cold War from turning hot, examining other cases — including smaller nuclear armed states like India, Pakistan, Israel, and North Korea — leads to a much more complicated picture.
The stability-instability paradox is one of these complications. In its most classic form, the paradox argues that two countries with nuclear weapons can be more likely to engage in small-scale conflict. Because each side knows that the other doesn’t want to risk a wider war given nuclear risks, they can feel more confident engaging in smaller provocations and assaults. What looks like nuclear stability actually breeds conventional instability.
Ukraine is not a nuclear state, but the NATO alliance has three of them (the US, Britain, and France). Because NATO states don’t want a wider war with Russia, one that carries a risk of a nuclear exchange, they’re less likely to intervene in a conflict they might otherwise join. Putin knows this; his public threat to use nukes against any intervening country suggests he’s counting on it.
So what we’re seeing is a kind of twist on the classic paradox: Putin is relying on nuclear fear to allow him to get away with invading a country (Ukraine) that a nuclear-armed third party (NATO) might otherwise want to defend.
This dynamic is familiar from the Cold War; it’s in part why the Soviets could send troops to Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968 to suppress popular anti-communist uprisings without real fear of Western intervention.
Because Putin’s check cleared Joe’s offshore account.
Because they’re already there.
Didn’t biden say he wouldn’t mandate the vax too?
Regardless, I’m not interested in US boys dying for Ukraine.
Honestly, I agree. Joe was paid off via Hunter Biden and the oligarchs. More cash will come. This author is partially correct, the nuclear war Spector is there, and it’s a grim reaper for us all.
The US has to stay out physically. That doesn’t mean we can’t pull the same stuff the Russians have done other places, including arming Ukraine.
I suspect the first people bitching about a draft to fight in Ukraine will be the people DEMANDING that we send troops to Ukraine.
“Regardless, I’m not interested in US boys dying for Ukraine.”
Agree, with the exception of the Soy Boys. They demanded this war, let them fight it.
US troops in Ukraine would be the one thing that would most tamp down any growing dissent and opposition to the war in Russia.
Don’t be surprised if Putin’s troops try some sort of false flag involving the US flag to try to keep up support for the war.
Don't assume their gender.
Our troops are needed at the Southern border.
“Our forces are not — and will not — be engaged in the conflict with Russia in Ukraine,”
So if this drags on and NATO continues to resupply armaments across the Ukraine border, they expect Russia will just continue to allow this without putting a stop to it? Seems to be rather wishful thinking.
Get someone else to jump into their fight. We have our own issues right here with ultra corrupt SOB’s calling the shots as they create policies only our enemies love and support.
We’re at war right here at home.
As rabidly pro-war as Biden is, he and Obama act as Putin’s concierge.
As long as Bush League Republicans dominate the GOP there will never be US troops defending our border.
I do believe Putin might use nukes at his age given he went all in. Unfortunately I also believe Joe will make the wrong choice.
To be fair, we did the same in Iraq. Russia might had been in a position to help Iraq but they couldn't do it just like we are not able to do the same in Ukraine.
The Democrats do have a bunch of left over maga hats and confederate flags atifa and BLM didn’t use
I bet they send um to Russia
0bama won’t allow it.
And he’s running Biden.
You got that right. They sure are needed there.
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