Die USA bereiteten sich auf eine „nichtnukleare“ Reaktion vor, falls Russland Atomwaffen gegen die Ukraine einsetzen sollte – NYT

31 comments

1. And then we can act skittishly as if the nonnuclear response is escalatory as well, right?

2. It’s about time putin falls out of a window

3. This is about as effective as thoughts and prayers. This bullshit about “trying not to escalate” is what started WWII. Bullies only understand one language and they interpret any kind of appeasement as encouragement to go further. Putin needs to know that any use of nuclear weapons will lead to immediate retaliation in kind. That’s the only thing that will stop him from crossing that line.

4. And that’s why trump was itching to use a nuclear tactical weapon. This way his boss putin would be free to use them as well. He would say, if the USA can use them why can’t Russia? And the World would be a much worse place for all of us.

5. US is preparing for no response at all when Trump becomes president.

6. Cold and calculated, as expected.

7. Is Ukraine close enough to Russia that nukes used would spread their radiation to Russia?

8. Time to warm up the Jewish space lasers

9. My guess would be a devastating cyber attack that would cripple Russia almost entirely.

10. How would the world react to satellites picking up the launch? Would they wait to see if it’s targeting Ukraine or assume nato / USA is under attack and fire everything?

11. Turns out it’s anti matter bomb jk

    But the truth is almost funnier ” oh you used you’re guess what we still don’t need ours to beat to you “

12. Seem fair the Us respond in kind

13. One correction: the dirty bomb accusation was not a pretext, it was preparation for the case if the nuke gets intercepted.
    An intercepted nuke is the same as a dirty bomb, and they even claimed Ukraine plans to blow it north of Kyiv on Ukrainian territory.

14. More sanctions….this time we mean it!

15. 100x MOABs.

16. Petraeus said as much in 2022 after Medvedev kicked off his serial nuke-threats in earnest

    An “overwhelming conventional response resulting in the destruction of all ground forces of the Russian Federation on occupied territory and the elimination of the Black Sea Fleet”, was the gist of it, from memory

17. Translation: “we do not need to use our nuclear weapons to destroy you, Putin.”

18. Time to adjust the dooms day clock. We’ve become so numb to this shit. Times are so different

19. >There would have to be “some kind of dramatic reaction”, including the possibility of a conventional attack on the units that had launched the nuclear weapons.
    >
    >Otherwise, Biden’s administration worried, the US would risk emboldening not only Russian President Vladimir Putin, but also every other authoritarian leader with a nuclear arsenal, large or small, the NYT reported.

    I really, really hope everyone around the world realises the importance of this, and will back this approach. A world where fascist dictators can simply say, “oh, I have nuclear weapons, I guess I can invade whoever I want, annex whatever I want, *drop a nuke wherever I want*, no-one is going to stop me, there won’t be any real consequences, I can do anything” — that is *not a world you would want to live in*.

    This is already a very moderate response that the U.S. government was considering. They wanted to emphasize that they’d only use conventional weapons. That’s about as moderate as you can get, while still making it clear that use of nuclear weapons in aggressive wars by conquering dictators will not be tolerated.

20. Hasn’t this been our position since the first year of the war?

21. Makes sense.

    Using nuclear weapons will only be an absolute last option, when all other options have been used.

    If Russia uses a nuclear weapon on Ukraine, NATO will put ground forces in Ukraine and they and wipe out all Russian forces in Ukraine through conventional means (boots on the ground and through total air superiority).

    If Russia launches an attack on NATO country (either conventional or just by launchig. 1 nuke) they will invade Russia and will try to topple the current administration (basically WW3).

    If Russia launches multiple nuclear weapons at several NATO countries, then MAD will probably be initiated.

    People need to understand that NATO will only use nuclear weapons as an absolute last defence when all other options are off the table. Basically only if they face an existential crisis (1 nuke on a city is not existential, however 10 nukes on 10 cities is).

    if Russia launches 1 nuke, they will retaliate and will always try and deescalate (funnily enough) to prevent 1M casualties from turning into 250M casualties overnight.

22. To quote Lindsey Graham; “If you say there won’t be a nuclear response to the use of a tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine, a tactical nuclear weapon will be used in Ukraine.”

    Probably the smartest thing he’s said in years but it is true. Both Senator Graham (Republican) and Blumenthal (Democrat) wanted a resolution passed to state that a (tactical) nuclear weapon used in Ukraine means war with NATO.

    The one thing we as the west are determined to do is the Chamberlain appeasement instead of what we used to do during the Cold War which was being clear about the cost of action.

    This strategy will only lengthen the war, increase monetary costs on both our people and the Ukrainian people and the rebuild as well as eventually waste humongous amounts of additional human life as after years of appeasement Putin will attack NATO regardless and we’ll have to get thousands of our men killed to defend it.

    Clearly the lesson learnt from WWII was the appeasement of Hitler only got millions of people killed let’s do it again!

23. The only reason that’s a news-worthy comment is because we are ALWAYS prepared for a nuclear response. They’re just putting people at ease.

24. I’m sure we would have launched massive shock and awe against all available targets inside of Ukraine.

25. I guess they have to come up with a new plan since the old plan was “We’ll sink the entire Black Sea fleet”… Ukraine already took care of most of that themselves, so it wouldn’t be much of a response at this point.

26. Russia uses Ukraine as its testing ground for cyber warfare and the new flow of war in a digital age. All those videos of drones dropping bombs and the suicide drones are practice for them. No way they nuke the practice field for what’s coming.

27. US prepared for nonnuclear response = bye, bye every single satellite Russia has in space, and maybe a few of China’s too but that was an accident. 2nd step, Putin himself and his cabinet would be targeted. 3rd step all Russian military assets would destroyed in Ukraine and anywhere they reside outside Russia and anywhere they go outside of Russia for quite some time. 4th step sanctioned to the stone age, Russia will become the NK of the world, poor, desperate and dying.

28. I’m l the only one that recalls President Biden saying that the USA would sink Russia’s entire navy if they used a nuke?

29. Non-nuclear response in all but name. The destruction would be targeted and overwhelming. The only scenario where an attack on a nuclear power after using nuclear weapons makes sense is if you’re executing a decapitation strike. They could target the Russian leadership or the weapons, so it should be a foregone conclusion they’d target the weapons. Mobile launchers, silos, sub, and storage facilities. A massive, widespread black eye that prevents the use of nuclear weapons in the future without complete annihilation. In theory.

    In reality, they’d swamp Ukraine with Allied airframes and kill the Russia leadership and any significant war materiel they found en route.

30. Regardless of if it’s conventional or not, there has to be a response. If it goes unanswered it’ll tacitly encourage them to do so again.

31. I don’t think Putin was ever seriously thinking of using nukes. It was a calculated and calibrated escalation threat to see what would happen. He discovered it was a red line, and that was that.

    The problem is more that Ukraine is a distraction while Putin is subverting Rest of World. He has made epic inroads into Africa in less than a year. He has captive politicians across Europe, and far-right parties salivating for power.

    And the big one – he has Trump and the Republicans waiting in the wings in the US.

    He doesn’t *need* nukes. He just needs to keep pushing, subverting, and dividing, and weapons become irrelevant.