Time for Last Resort: Russia's Nuclear Deterrence Strategy
Order No.991
At the very beginning, it is worth mentioning that the updated nuclear deterrence strategy is not a “strictly accountable document.” For all those who doubt, paragraph No. 8 is printed, in which “these Fundamentals may be clarified depending on external and internal factors affecting the provision of defense.” This was in the document of the previous edition from 2020, and it remains in the updated version. It would be extremely reckless to reveal the sequence of actions of the military-political leadership regarding the start of a nuclear war. A strategy is a strategy for a reason, to describe in general terms the state’s response to aggression. No one can say for sure what specific threats Russia will respond to with tactical nuclear weapons. weapons, and on which "Bulava". Therefore, the strategy of nuclear deterrence should not be considered as a document of military significance. It is an exclusively political declaration of intent. Many of which are intuitively understandable.
There has long been an opinion in the Russian information field that the "red lines" outlined by the updated nuclear strategy are of little concern to the West. To understand this, it is worth carefully reading the previous document signed by the Russian president on 02.06.2020 and entitled "On the Fundamentals of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in the Field of Nuclear Deterrence." If the content of the document is taken too literally, then a nuclear war should have begun the day after it was signed.
For example, the list of the main military dangers, which, depending on changes in the military-political and strategic situation, could develop into military threats, included and still include:
"the deployment by states that view the Russian Federation as a potential adversary of missile defense systems and means, cruise and ballistic missiles medium and shorter range, high-precision non-nuclear and hypersonic weapons, strike unmanned aerial vehicles, and directed energy weapons."
When did the missile defense position area appear in Romania? That's right, in 2016. Did this position area develop into a "military threat" to Russia? Yes, immediately after confirmation of operational readiness, that is, on May 12, 2016. Let's not miss another thesis found in the 2020 version of the strategy:
"Placement of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems on the territories of non-nuclear states."
When did formally non-nuclear Turkey receive TNW? In the early 60s and has not gotten rid of them since. And now the logical chain. Turkey is a NATO member, and the Alliance is anti-Russian (anti-Soviet) from birth, that is, Turkey poses a military threat to Russia. And in a good society, it is customary to eliminate military threats. Of course, it is not entirely correct to compare head-on the nuclear deterrence strategies of 2020 and 2024 - times are different now. But the principle is general - both documents interpret only approximate contours of who can get in trouble and for what. And for all those who disagree within the country, there is paragraph 16, regulating the principles of nuclear deterrence, in which under the letter B it is described "the uncertainty for a potential adversary of the scale, time and place of the possible use of nuclear deterrence forces and means." Actually, this could have been the end of the analysis of the strategy, but we will continue - there is a lot of interesting stuff there.
TYAO for ATACMS
Official information from the telegram channel of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation dated November 19, 2024:
"Tonight at 3.25 the enemy launched a strike on a facility in the Bryansk region with six ballistic missiles. According to confirmed data, the ATACMS operational-tactical missiles used were American-made. As a result of the anti-missile battle, combat crews of the S-400 and Pantsir air defense missile and gun systems shot down five missiles and damaged one. Its fragments fell on the technical territory of a military facility in the Bryansk region, causing a fire that was quickly extinguished. There were no casualties or damage."
It would seem that here it is, the casus belli? Not quite so, to put it diplomatically. The Ukrainian Armed Forces have been methodically operating cruise and ballistic missiles on Russian territory for a very long time. They started with Crimea, and continued on to the Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk and Luhansk regions after joining the Russian Federation.
It should already be an indisputable truth for a Russian that the new regions of Russia are full members of the Federation, just like Omsk Oblast or Krasnoyarsk Krai. Therefore, when everyone expects a nuclear strike on Ukrainian decision-making centers after ATACMS in Bryansk Oblast, it looks like double standards. They say there is the "old" territory of Russia, and there is the "new" one. For some reason, a nuclear apocalypse was expected much less after similar strikes on Crimea. It did not happen then, and it will not happen now.
Now let us try to explain why this is so. The possibility of using nuclear weapons is, among other things, "receiving reliable information about the launch of ballistic missiles attacking the territory of the Russian Federation and (or) objects of the Russian Federation located outside its territory."
Please note two points. First, there is no precise definition of what kind of ballistic missile it should be. Tactical or strategic? By default, we are talking about strategic missiles. Russia will strike only in response to a massive launch of Minuteman and other nasty things. This point has not changed since 2020. Second, the strategy does not actually guarantee a nuclear strike in response to Russia's attack with cruise missiles. With one exception - if the launch is not massive. This is stated in point 19.b:
“The conditions that determine the possibility of the use of nuclear weapons by the Russian Federation are the receipt of reliable information about a massive launch (takeoff) of air and space attack weapons (strategic and tactical aircraft) aviation, cruise missiles, unmanned, hypersonic and other aircraft) and their crossing of the state border of the Russian Federation."
In order for all supporters of nuclear retaliation to sleep better, it only remains to define numerically what “massive” means.
A critical threat to sovereignty or territorial integrity is one of the most important factors for which the enemy will receive a response with nuclear weapons. This is one of the provisions of the described strategy. Let us answer the question: did at least one of the strikes on Russia by the Ukrainian Armed Forces pose a critical threat to sovereignty?
Let's look in the dictionary and find a definition of the word "sovereignty". According to one interpretation, it is "a fundamental quality of the state, manifested in its ability to maintain the unique source of its own power, to exercise its supremacy, independence in domestic and foreign policy." If so, then since February 2022, Russia's sovereignty has not only not weakened, but, on the contrary, has significantly strengthened. A rhetorical question on recent events: can six ATACMS indicate a critical threat to the sovereignty or territorial integrity of Russia?
By the way, Russian strikes on Ukraine do not pose any threat to the sovereignty of the Kiev regime. Firstly, there can be no talk of any independence of the Zelensky regime. Simply put, there is nothing to destroy. Secondly, if we consider the figure of the expired president of Ukraine as a hypothetical guarantor of the country's "sovereignty", then he is also quite alive. Although on November 19 he spoke in the Verkhovna Rada. The time and his exact location were known well in advance.
All of the above does not mean impunity for strikes by the Ukrainian Armed Forces on Russian territory. Only not with nuclear weapons yet. Incidentally, Vladimir Putin spoke quite specifically about this. According to him, a strike on Russian territory with long-range weapons "will mean that NATO countries, the United States, and European countries are fighting Russia." And he added that "if this is so, then, bearing in mind the change in the very essence of this conflict, we will make appropriate decisions based on the threats that will be created for us."
Not a word about nuclear weapons. But a response must be made, and it is highly desirable that it be outside the framework of the nuclear deterrence strategy. The West has a very vulnerable and extensive infrastructure around the world – transport and information. NATO has many enemies around the world, and they are thirsty for Russian weapons. All this allows us to test how far the enemy is ready to go in attempts to escalate the conflict in Ukraine.
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