WTH: "Armageddon," the latest on the war in Ukraine, & Putin’s options
Frederick Kagan joins the pod
The war situation in Ukraine has developed not necessarily to Russia’s advantage in recent weeks (points to all who get the reference), Vladimir Putin appears increasingly desperate, and Joe Biden apparently thinks it’s cool to talk nuclear war at a fundraiser. We asked Fred Kagan what’s up on this week’s pod. Three takeaways:
Threats notwithstanding, it’s unlikely Putin chooses the nuclear option.
Putin’s regime is showing serious cracks.
Russia can’t win. The shape of the war’s end is entirely up to Ukraine.
Anytime the President of the United States talks armageddon, it’s time to sit up and listen. Would it be nice if he did it from the Oval Office with the counsel of his national security team, and not at Rupert Murdoch’s Democratic-Party-supporting son’s house? Sure, but still, the first nuclear attack in wartime since World War II is something to be concerned about.
There’s a debate about whether Biden’s quasi-hysterical alarums deterred Putin (so says Fred) or whether it betrayed a fearfulness that may result in yet more self-deterrence from Biden (Marc). Either way, Biden does seem to have forgotten that in nuking Ukraine, Putin will also be nuking his own troops, people he calls “Russians” (in Russian occupied Ukraine), and risking radiation in Russia itself. In other words, it’s not a simple option.
The right choice now is for NATO to do its best to ensure that Ukraine wins, and wins quickly. That means an end to dithering on weapons and aid, a kick in the rear to our European allies who are even slower than we are (except perhaps the Poles), and to otherwise come down hard on Kyiv’s side. The knock-on effects of a Ukrainian victory can’t be underestimated: A blow to the axis of evil, a blow to Putin himself, and all without a single U.S. boot on the ground. The fastest road to peace is through victory.
HIGHLIGHTS
Why is Putin rattling the nuclear saber?
FK: Putin is losing on the battlefield and is not really going to be able to reverse those losses. And I think that the impact of that is beginning to dawn on him. And he was really rattled by the Ukrainian counter offensives in Kharkiv. And I think he is nervous about ability to control his own military destiny here. And so he's doing what we thought he would do, which is that as he started to lose, he would start to rattle his nuclear sabers more.
So, is this serious?
FK: Anytime you have a state that has a massive nuclear arsenal and its leader is talking about using nuclear weapons, you should take it very seriously. And at the end of the day, the only person who knows whether Putin will use nuclear weapons is Putin.
I and a lot of other Russia experts see that even within his bounded rationality, there are a lot of very good reasons why he should be extremely reluctant to use nuclear weapons. And he's shown that so far he has been reluctant even though he's done some rattling. Dany, it's also important to note that the people around him have done a lot more rattling than he actually has. His own comments are much more nuanced.
So is there a scenario where using nukes would serve Putin?
FK: Sad to say that there could be. Yes. If he became persuaded that the only way to stop a Ukrainian counter offensive from just collapsing the Russian army. And if [he] were convinced that the west would not respond decisively to his use of nuclear weapons in Ukraine, and by decisively I mean militarily. I could see circumstances in which he would decide that he needs to or that it would make sense for him to use nuclear weapons to stop the Ukrainian advance and then attempt to freeze the conflict … But he would have to be certain that the west would not undertake military reprisals because he is absolutely not able to handle Western military intervention in this conflict.
But but but… doesn’t that irradiate Russians too?
FK: So in theory, the Russian military is able to operate on a nuclear battlefield. In practice the Russian military that's in Ukraine absolutely cannot. And he couldn't get it to be able to. So any battlefield use of nuclear weapons would affect Russian troops. It would also preclude any future Russian advances into irradiated areas, which is actually in some respects more of a problem for him from the standpoint of messaging to his war hawk audience than you might imagine because it means that the Russian advances are effectively over. But yeah. This is the areas that he would be attacking are close to Russia. Russians would be affected. These are some of the reasons why I'm skeptical that he will use tactical nuclear weapons.
Is Putin in trouble at home?
FK: I always say you should estimate the chances of any given regime falling at under 0.1% because that's what history would tell you. And yet regimes fall. Putin is more vulnerable and weaker domestically than he has been since he took power. And the cracks are remarkable. We're seeing members of his inner circle attacking other members of his inner circle in public. We're seeing actually attacks starting to be directed at him from his core pro-war Russian nationalist extremist base. And this is... It's a very serious challenge and frankly I think he is behaving as if he is very scared about it
Is the future course of the war basically up to the Ukrainians?
FK: What I can tell you is that the future trajectory of the conventional war depends simply on that. If the Ukrainians have the ability to continue their counter offensives and if the West continues to lean in to supporting them with the weapons and material that they need, then the Russians will not be able to stop them conventionally and the Ukrainians will be able to push to the 2014 borders, for sure. Probably, they could take the areas of Donetsk and Donbas that were occupied in 2014. Crimea, I don't know. Crimea is so easy to defend from the Russian perspective that it's hard to tell.
Is Biden going to offer Putin an “off ramp”?
FK: In a certain fundamental sense I think it's actually irrelevant, because Putin isn't looking for off ramps and isn't looking to say face. He's looking to win because that's how Putin thinks. I think it is a problem that people are thinking that way. I think that there's an over intellectualization of this situation and a mirror imaging that is not applicable to Putin, who doesn't think in terms of off ramps. There is a question of how we get Putin to accept a defeat. That's a very important question and we do need to think about that.
How is this war managed to a non-nuclear end?
FK: In general terms, I think we need to present Putin with a situation in which he cannot stop the conventional defeat in which we incredibly deter him from using nuclear weapons and in which we persuade him that continuing to try to fight will put his own rule at risk. Not because we're going to do anything, but just because the price he's going to have to demand of the Russian people for a war that he's losing is going to be too high. I can see circumstances in which he decides that he needs to accept what he will regard as a temporary defeat in Ukraine in order to solidify his base so that he can come back after it again.
How is Putin deterred from using nukes?
FK: I think a lot of people, including David Petraeus and others, have articulated what the right approach here is, which is to make it very clear to Putin that if he uses nuclear weapons in Ukraine, the U.S. and its partners will enter the war on Ukraine's side and destroy the Russian military in Ukraine with conventional weapons. There's no need for us to use nuclear weapons and we shouldn't, but we do have the capability basically to end this war by destroying the Russian military in Ukraine. And I would be making it very clear to Putin that, that is the first thing that we would do. And then if he sought to escalate further, there are other conventional military things that we could do that would have the effect of just destroying the Russian military.
I would be prepared to go far down that path and I would not be interested in using nuclear weapons of our own until and unless Putin actually looked like he was going to use them against us, which I frankly think is extraordinarily unlikely because in this respect, he is not Hitler. I do not think that Putin is interested in bringing the world down in flames around him.
So…. Armageddon?
FK: To Biden's comment, I have a lot of issues with where he said it and what he said and what thought process that reflects. But in a certain fundamental way, I think it was actually helpful because the logical train that is implicit in that statement is, if Putin uses nuclear weapons and tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine, the U.S. will take military action. If Putin escalates in response to that action, the U.S. will escalate further. And if Putin continues to escalate, then the U.S. will nuke him. That's the only way that you get Armageddon, is that you have a full scale thermonuclear exchange.
Well, by Biden saying that there is weirdly an implicit threat. And, candidly, I think Putin heard that, and it has been interesting to listen to Putin's rhetoric and observe his actions as he has escalated and has talked about escalating in response to that statement. I think Putin heard the threat that is implicit in that. I don't know whether Biden meant to make it the threat, but it is logically there and I think Putin heard it. And so, in that sense, I actually think that it was probably net helpful with Putin, weirdly
What makes you think Putin recognizes the peril of his situation?
FK: It is interesting that Putin's announcement of the horrific war crimes that the Russian military committed yesterday and again today in retaliation for whoever it was who blew up the Kerch Strait Bridge, Putin's statement of that included an explicit statement that escalation would be proportional, which we haven't heard from him before. His commentary has been more cautious about this and this was an incident when he could very well have escalated to nuclear use. Now, I don't tie that directly to Biden's statement but I have to say that if we're looking for evidence on the ground and in Putin's actions that he has took Biden statement as some kind of a green light, we see the opposite actually.
So Putin’s now using Iranian drones to attack Ukrainian civilians…?
FK: Evil dictators help each other out. The good thing about this is those drones are not that great. And as we demonstrated in Syria, the Ukrainians are now demonstrating in Ukraine. You can shoot them down and the Ukrainians have shot down a high proportion of them. From the Russian perspective, it's an act of desperation. You know you're in trouble as Russia when you have to buy stuff from Iran. You know that you're really in trouble when you're talking about buying artillery shells or anything from North Korea. So the presence of these things in Ukraine is an indication of how much trouble the Russians are in and how terrible the defense industry is performing right now, but also, it is a demonstration that yes, this is an axis and it is an axis in the World War II sense of states that are working with each other and supporting each other in the common name of destroying the liberal world order that we care about, that we depend on, that matters so much to us, and that the Iranians are in on that.
Whole transcript here.
SHOWNOTES
Ukraine’s Resilience Transcends the Battlefield (TIME, October 7, 2022)
The New Russian Offensive Is Intended to Project Power It Cannot Sustain (TIME, June 6, 2022)
A decision tree for Biden if Putin goes Nuclear (Washington Post, September 21, 2022)
Biden’s nuclear warning not based on new intelligence but opens a window into real worries inside the White House(CNN Politics, October 7, 2022)
Can vague US threats deter Russia from using nukes? (Foreign Policy, October 7, 2022)
U.S. Warns Russia of ‘Catastrophic Consequences’ of Using Nuclear Weapons in Ukraine (The Wall Street Journal, September 25, 2022)
'Those comments were reckless': Pompeo slams Biden's 'Armageddon' remarks (Politico, October 9, 2022)
Putin labels Crimea bridge explosion terrorist attack by Ukraine (Axios, October 10, 2022)
Putin summons security council after Crimean bridge blast (Politico, October 9, 2022)
Russia names new commander amid setbacks in war against Ukraine (Axios, October 8, 2022)
US procures anti-radiation drugs worth $290 million after Russian President Vladimir Putin's nuclear threats (Economic Times, October 7, 2022)
Order of Radiation Sickness Drug Unrelated to Recent Events in Ukraine, U.S. Health Officials Say (US News, October 10, 2022)
Kremlin: Putin to meet U.N. nuclear watchdog chief in Russia on Tuesday (Reuters, October 10, 2022)
Bosnian Serb pro-Russian leader renews secession threat (Reuters, October 10, 2022)
Putin’s path: from pledges of stability to nuclear (AP News, October 7, 2022)
Keeping Putin From Going Nuclear: Can Xi and Modi Help? (Russia Matters, September 29, 2022)
Biden Riffs on Armageddon (WSJ, October 7, 2022)
Poland suggests hosting US nuclear weapons amid growing fears of Putin’s threats (The Guardian, October 5, 2022)
Petraeus: US would destroy Russia’s troops if Putin uses nuclear weapons in Ukraine (The Guardian, October 2, 2022)