I've been reading a lot of stories about the upcoming nuclear war that will be triggered by Putin's loss of a conventional war in Ukraine. I'm not convinced.
A lot of the support for these views are from talking heads on various news and news adjacent media sources. But the reality about the talking heads chosen by those sites is that they're chosen to increase clicks and ratings, not to bring forward realistic analysis. So I take their utterances with a great deal of salt.
First, I think it's unlikely that Putin will get enough buy in from the military to actually launch nuclear weapons. There's not a button on his desk that launches Russia's nuclear arsenal. He has to send a message to the military telling them to launch, and (more importantly) who to launch at. The more targets he chooses, the more push back there will be. While it's possible that he might be able to convince the military to use a very small number of nuclear weapons in Ukraine, it it highly unlikely that he would be able start a full blown launch it all attack at the Western World.
But far more likely would be a full blown conventional attack on Ukraine's nuclear power plants. It's still a scary situation, but he could claim he didn't cross the red line of a nuclear attack. There are four nuclear power plants in Ukraine. Assuming that the attack would create Chernobyl level destruction, this would make about 4,000 square miles of Ukraine uninhabitable for quite a while. You can compare that to the total size of Ukraine, 233,000 square miles. Horrific, but not the end of the country.
(Of course, there is the question of whether they can recreate Chernobyl with much more modern and safer designed plants.)
So what would the responses of the West be?
Let's go back in history. What was the original target of tactical nuclear weapons? The scare story for NATO was the massive armored assault by the USSR through Germany and into all of Europe. The reality is that it is hard to take out a tank. And it's even harder to take out a bunch of them. So the idea was that they would launch a tactical nuclear bomb at locations where the USSR bunched up the tanks due to terrain, etc.
But even when this was the plan, there were issues with whether or not it would work. The biggest problem is that (for the West) using a nuclear weapon was a political decision, not something left up to the battlefield commanders. This meant that the decision to nuke the tank column would have to take place in Washington. And politicians don't generally respond quickly. So there was a serious question as to whether NATO would be able to respond fast enough to actually destroy columns of tanks, or if the tanks would have spread out by the time the decision was made to actually use the nuclear weapon.
Luckily, we never got to find out if this would work.
Technology moves on. Artillery shells are now guided. Tanks and vehicles are now vulnerable to convention arms from a long way away.
This became apparent during the Kuwait War, when Iraq discovered that their vaunted tank columns could be easily decimated (or worse) by the United States. When the Kuwait War was over, it also became apparent that there was no battlefield case for tactical nuclear weapons.
I remember an editorial cartoon from the Kuwait War that had a sign on the Iraqi border saying something to the effect of “Welcome to Iraq, home of the third largest army in the world.” Third was crossed out, replaced with fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, etc. My Google skills can't find this cartoon anymore.
Assuming anyone in NATO was paying attention, this also applies to the current situation.
Assuming that the West decides to respond to the destruction of the nuclear power stations and the corresponding damage, or to a limited nuclear strike on Ukraine, there is no need to use nuclear weapons during this response. (Can't promise anything about a desperate Russian response.)
It has become apparent that Russia's convention military cannot defend against a conventional attack from the West. We do not need to use nukes to destroy Russia's ability to project power into NATO countries. Nor is it necessary to conquer Russia.
Using conventional munitions, we could destroy every strategic asset within hundreds of miles of the border without actually sending any people across the border. And given the limitations of Russian logistics, this would effectively end their offensive capabilities across their European borders. All without using any nuclear weapons. (I'm going to assume that we wouldn't use chemical or biological weapons at all. Ever. Period.)
But should we do this as anything other than a last resort? I would say no. The benefits of such an action is, in most cases, outweighed by the cost of such an action. It could only be justified if Russia decides to up their game to the use of nuclear arms.
The result of such an action would be devastating to the Russia people. Those strategic targets also also responsible for feeding the Russian people. Electricity is needed to keep them alive during winter. Etc.
It's also likely that a decimated Russia state would create a power vacuum both within Russia proper and along its borders. Even if NATO nations didn't use the opportunity to expand their borders, there are several other nations which would look at this as an opportunity to settle old scores. (Kos has already written about two such flash points that have turned hot recently.) The human cost of this destabilization would be high.
Once upon a time, many conservatives bought into the Neo-Con view that the role of the United States was to (forcibly, if necessary) convert the world into a series of liberal democracies. And obviously, those new liberal democracies would all look to the United States as their leader. The reality is that the United States is really bad at nation building. (It is quite possible that no nation is good at nation building.) And that being a liberal democracy, or even a semi-free state, does not automatically result in being an ally to the United States. But this view is seductive. It is easy to say that other countries need to do things the way we think is best. Sometimes the full blown Neo-Con delusion. Sometimes only in limited spheres.
While it would be possible to severely curtail the ability of Russia to extend force beyond their borders, the follow up action of enforcing our system on the people of Russia should be ruled out from the start. Let them find their path. (This doesn't mean that we shouldn't provide humanitarian aid, just that we should be very careful about what strings we attach to that aid.)
It is still possible that Russia will try to go the M.A.D. route. But I don't think that we need to respond in kind. And I suspect that the Generals and others in the chain between Putin's desk and the silos will stop him from carrying it out.
Perhaps I'm being optimistic. But our focus on nuclear weapons has blinded us to the possibilities that improved conventional weapons has put on the table.