Do you think Putin will use nuclear weapons?

[colddayinhell]

I'm getting very nervous about the ramping up of the war and Putin's calling up of 300,000 reservists. It feels like this is a major escalation. I know that any use of nuclear weapons would mean instant retaliation but it no longer feels like a MAD scenario as it almost feels now like he wants a scorched earth and has nothing to lose and doesn't care that it would destroy everything.

And anyway we really need to be cranking back from seeing China as an enemy or that we could beat them because their tech is shit or some such argument. If we ever go to a serious fighting war with them then we will all be huge losers at best and all dead at worse.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-59600475

If the US and China get into a serious fighting war the UK should stay the hell out

This is my thinking.

A small tactical nuke . The more he struggles to win ,the more likely he is to use them I think

I don't think (hope?) that they will and Harold Wilson very wisely stayed out of the Vietnam War in the 60s - something Blair should have followed and Bush even gave him the option to.

Worryingly the Telegraph is leading with an article about how Putin could be replaced with something even worse.

www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/09/24/ultra-nationalists-waiting-vladimir-putin-fall/

Arkady Babchenko, a disillusioned Russian opposition journalist living in exile in Ukraine recently predicted a coup or revolution would only replace Putin with a "cannibal."
Babchenko himself is a divisive figure, considered by some to be as radical in his own way as Girkin. He is infamous for attacking the Russian liberal opposition and believes only Ukrainian or American tanks on Red Square will bring down the regime.

Reassuring they don’t hate us and it’s all propaganda.

It’s made me really sad seeing the young men leaving the last few days. I am glad they are and not fighting but why is he doing this! These are his own people he’s sending to a battlefield he created. They are similar age to me and remind me of my male friends.

I am a new mother recently to a son. It’s just - I have no words really. What on earth is he doing!!!

I think he will. Should have taken the fucker out at the start.

Taking Putin out might sound great but what’s waiting in the wings to take over isn’t necessarily any better, in some cases it could be far worse.

I keep hearing this nonsense. What could be worse than a comic book villain threatening nuclear war?

A 'comic book villain' who is more likely to actually use nuclear weapons threatening nuclear war?

For example Ramzan Kadyrov doesn't exactly seem like a fun alternative....... Its not nonsense, its fact.

Just don't watch the old BBC film Threads. 😯😂

Henchmen always parrot the line of a leader. Change the leader and you might hear a different líne.

I can't think of a worse situation right now as Putin has given every indication of preparation and sincerity about his plans. I suspect he has been testing sonar weapons in UK seas too for the last few years, given the occasional unexplained massive sea kills. Plus he has been continuously testing responses in various state's waters and air for about 5 years. At this point I'm genuinely scared for our future.

Performance of Russian kit in Ukraine has been dismal.

Their tanks have been sitting ducks for UK/Swedish anti tank weapons. Their air force has never achieved air superiority and the flagship of their black sea fleet has been sunk.

I suspect this is going to have a large effect on the world military equipment market, because after this dismal performance no one is going to want to buy or use Russian kit.

As for tactical nuclear weapons - I reckon it is likely he will use them at some point, because at the moment his options are fast running out.

For POTUS to issue such a stark grim warning when previously it was all taken as bluff then one can only wonder what they know and whether are we being prepped for NATO intervention and the fallout that would result from that.

Either that or a partial US disengagement wrapped up as an inevitable climbdown from 'armageddon'. The Republicans, for the most part, are ambivalent in their support for Ukraine if not hostile as daddy's boy Don Junior makes clear in a recent tweet and Ron de Santis the most likely Republican contender if Trump stays out has had very little to say about Ukraine with their fox cheerleader Tucker Carlson almost pro-Putin in his utterances.

The fact that OPEC won't come to our rescue by bringing on extra capacity is also telling.

Donald Trump Jr.
@DonaldJTrumpJr
How about we get every single Floridian back into their homes and back to normal before we send one more cent to the Ukraine?

PinkPlonk, if you had done even the smallest iota of research on Kadyrov or knew his history, you would realise that no, he would not have a ‘different line’ than Putin. Unless you mean he might be even more bloodthirsty than Putin.

Russia would be no better off with that monster Kadyrov in charge than they are with Putin, and quite possibly worse.

I think re. Biden’s comments in the news today, it’s probably important to think about the context they were given in - to a fundraiser for the Democratic party ahead of the midterm elections. Are we (as in nations abroad/the world at large) the audience? Not really, he’s speaking to the people who are going to help fund his campaign and vote for him, possibly for having a strong stance against Putin and other dictators. Unnerving as it is to hear the word ‘Armageddon’ from the US President, I’m not sure if changes much, and US security have consistently said there is no change to the ‘readiness’ of Russia’s nuclear missiles based on their surveillance.

I remember my mum telling me that they really thought they were going to be a nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis - she was pregnant with me at the time and she said everyone was very worried. If the Russians hadn't backed down then one wonders what the US would have done.

If Putin did use a small nuke then I would expect the US response to maybe sink the Black Sea Fleet or some symbolic Russian target but not with nukes. After that god only knows we will be in uncharted territory,

'US intelligence agencies believe that Putin has come to see defeat in Ukraine as an existential threat to his regime, which he associates with an existential threat to Russia, potentially justifying, according to his worldview, the use of nuclear weapons.'

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/oct/07/biden-warns-world-would-face-armageddon-if-putin-uses-a-tactical-nuclear-weapon-in-ukraine

As an expert in the area for the last twenty years and consulting with appropriate agencies my take has been last year I would have 100% said no, in March I would have said 99.9% no........but in October - yes, he might. Small tactical and only in Ukraine. But surveillance even over those is very very robust and we will know - or rather our intelligence will know. They monitor them in real life 24/7. I think that's why Biden acknowledged the West got the message. However, they also said they (the West) will retaliate with conventional. So this is not the same situation as during the cold war.

However, no Putin will not (and will not be allowed to) use anything remotely like a long range one. So despite crazy Russian pundits no one is going to hit London.

Oh and no....please lets not tout Kadyrov as an alternative. The man is literally a maniacal man child who likes to pretend to have seen 'real' war but actually just enjoying torturing people. He aint his dad.

Mmm, I don't think Kadyrov even has Putin's brains actually. The idea of him being capable of actual dictatorial leadership without being propped up seems rather far fetched. Not that there's any chance of an ethnic Chechen being allowed to become Russian president in any case so it's moot.

Thanks for that post..

Ties in with the more sensible considered ex-pro, now amateur (sort of 😉) analysis doing the rounds.

The trick to avoiding anxiety is to avoid 99% of what's on Twitter and a lot of what's in MSM.

Personally I didn't regard POTUS's speech and comments as changing anything and simply being a case of stating the very obvious.

If Putin thinks he's going down and has nothing more to lose then a tactical nuke at the government centre of Kyiv might be his revenge tactic hoping to kill Zelensky and his government and ruin symbolically the beating heart of Ukraine. It would be a scorched earth policy for which they are infamous.

They then retreat to the borders leaving a partially destroyed Ukraine to try and find investment to rebuild and prosper. Putin takes that public line we tried to denazify our Ukrainian friends but the imperialist west frustrated us and then Russia goes back to soviet levels of existence and isolation along with a vicious police state to control the masses and sell their mineral wealth to the many countries that didn't cause him problems during the war.

I understand all of your fears but, living during the 80s (teen) I refuse ever to feel such fear again.
They struck the fear into us in many ways,
Films and DocuDramas like Threads, The Day After, Testament and When the Wind Blows (probably others too)
Records like Two Tribes, Enola Gay, Dancing with Tears in my Eyes etc
Terrified a Generation.
It will be fine OP for reasons others have explained.
Live your Life love, is all I can say.

Something to keep in mind is Putin today is not Putin of twenty years ago. Whether or not he is dying, sick etc etc etc - am very tired of commenting on this. He is clearly off his game, paranoid, unable to grasp reality and mentally done. The regime however refuses to remove him and so you are stuck with a nutter at the top. One thing that Putin was is a shrewd operator - he was smart....not nice but smart. Thats no longer the case - he's mental........

Nonetheless.....to get long range nucs into action takes time, a lot of time and Americans will absolutely prevent that. Sadly, I would not low trust that he wouldnt nuc Ukraine. Areas they are currently fighting over have been written into the Russian constitution - according to Russia's nuclear strategy defensive nuclear response to an existential threat is allowed. And the biggest problem at the moment - is that Putin is off his game and so we have no idea what he'll do.

Predictable dictators are so much better to analyse than unpredictable ones.

I'm still not convinced that he's 'mental'. Paranoid yes, anti-western yes (but that's not new) and in an echo chamber where he doesn't seem to be getting any sort of dissenting views coming through.

People keep talking about the newly annexed areas of Crimea and an attack on those areas constitutes an attack on the motherland. There has been ongoing activity against Crimea, which has been long-annexed and indeed within the undisputed boarders Russia itself (Belgorod) and this hasn't lead to any sort of specific reprisal.