Soon after Putin invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Russia’s nuclear arsenal was put on high alert. There have been several thinly veiled threats about the use of nuclear weapons since.
The conflict has also resulted in regrettable nuclear proliferation. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a close Putin ally, has abandoned his country’s status as a non-nuclear weapon country to host Russian tactical nuclear weapons. Lukashenko said in June that Belarus had started taking delivery of the weapons, some of which he claimed were three times more powerful than the atomic bombs the US dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. It is the first time Moscow has deployed nuclear warheads outside Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union.
The Financial Times recently reported that according to “Western and Chinese officials”, China’s President Xi Jinping has personally warned Putin against using nuclear weapons in Ukraine. This suggests China remains concerned about the possibility of a nuclear escalation.
When US President Joe Biden was asked last month about the threat of a nuclear escalation in Ukraine, he claimed there was “no real prospect” of Putin resorting to nuclear weapons. But Medvedev’s comments cast some doubt on these reassurances. No one can be sure what a desperate Putin will do should he face a devastating Russian defeat in Ukraine.
Other nuclear-armed powers, especially Beijing and Washington, must do all they can to deter Putin from taking the nuclear option.
The Kremlin’s recklessness has delivered a terrifying setback to the cause of nuclear arms control and has pushed the world closer to nuclear disaster.
The “Doomsday Clock”, run by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, symbolises the heightened threat. Earlier this year the minute-hand on the clock was set at 90 seconds to midnight – the closest it has ever been to a nuclear catastrophe.
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A statement by the Bulletin said this was done “largely (though not exclusively) because of the mounting dangers of the war in Ukraine”.
Medvedev’s latest disgraceful remarks are a reminder that a nuclear escalation of the Ukraine conflict by intention, accident or miscalculation, is a real risk.
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