Commentators in the English speaking world have speculated and threatened on behalf of Russian their use of nuclear weapons since the war began. Russia wants Ukraine intact to exploit it like the imperialist power they pretend they are not. They are not going to turn Ukraine into a nuclear wasteland.
Meh.
1/2 life is a beautiful thing.
They are not going to turn Ukraine into a nuclear wasteland.
There's a lot to consider here from a tactical perspective, politics aside.
A properly fused airburst whose yield is primarily derived from fusion is only going to have some fast fission products from the initial triggering device. Hardly the stuff of radioactive nightmares. A true tactical device - yields in the low kilotons - to take out ground forces by overpressure and shock effect isn't going to cause much, if any fallout.
The only real radiation you get will be the neutron burst from the actual fission initiator itself, whose effect is eclipsed by the heat and blast (unless it's an enhanced radiation weapon, i.e. a neutron bomb).
Granted, most "production" weapons (at least in the American arsenal) use Uranium-238 tampers for the tertiary yield, which does produce a lot of fission products, but that's on three-stage, multi-hundred kiloton or megaton weapons. Conversely, a tactical yield (ten, even five kilotons) probably doesn't even need a fusion stage and could be a pure fission device, making it relatively "dirty" by design. Again, employment is key: the commander would want to optimize for overpressure, not a ground burst, since he's not going for a buried/hardened target (like a missile silo). He's trying to destroy exposed troops/armor in the field, so an airburst and a properly calibrated shockwave is what he wants. The generation of fallout products would (theoretically) be minimal if the weapon was employed correctly.
Anyone contemplating the use of nuclear air bursts need to consider wind patterns and fallout. For example from the Google page on Ukraine wind patterns:
“What are the wind patterns over Ukraine?
In the north, east, and south, the easterly and southeasterly winds prevail, in the west – northwesterly and westerly, while in the southwest – southerly and southeasterly.”
Nuclear weapons used in Ukraine’s north, east and south would usually send fallout directly east to Russia or southeasterly to Crimea. In the southwest winds go southerly and southeasterly, so again Crimea and western Russia. So the places where Russia would most likely be able to use tactical nukes, the wind would either dust Russia itself, or the Crimea which it also wants to keep. Hopefully Putin is not so suicidal that he would use nuclear bombs, or those around him are not so suicidal they would allow him to.