Announcing snap tactical nuclear weapons exercises, Russia is increasing pressure on the West to reduce support for Ukraine. The exercises declared on Monday center on Russia’s southern military district, which has responsibility for operations in Ukraine. This is clearly an effort to intimidate the West over the war in Ukraine.
Two key points bear note.
First, this announcement fits within a broader portfolio of escalating Russian intimidation tactics. Recent weeks have seen numerous covert sabotage attacks and plots across Europe, including a successful arson attack in London. Western intelligence services are highly confident that further attacks of this kind are being planned. The Russian rationale for these attacks is clear. Russian President Vladimir Putin is infuriated by French President Emmanuel Macron’s warning that a major Russian military breakthrough of Ukrainian defensive lines would lead him to consider deploying French forces to Ukraine.
Putin is also attempting to intimidate the United Kingdom. Following the Russian arson attack in London back in March orchestrated by the Russian intelligence service, the U.K. allowed Ukraine to use British weapons, such as the Storm Shadow cruise missile system, against targets inside Russia. Responding to the U.K., the Kremlin summoned the British ambassador to Moscow on Monday. Foreign ministry officials informed him that if U.K. weapons are used in Russia, then Russia may target U.K. military sites “beyond” Ukraine. The U.K. response to this threat will be to reinforce its commitment to defending itself and to triggering NATO’s Article 5 mutual defense stipulation if necessary.
Nevertheless, Putin’s intent is clear. He wants to provoke fear among Western populations that their governments are taking excessive risks in Ukraine’s support. Putin knows that the more cautious bloc of European leaders, led by Germany’s Olaf Scholz and supported by others such as Spain’s Pedro Sanchez, tends to bend whenever Russia ups the intimidation ante. Putin wants to catalyze this dynamic and see these leaders put pressure on their counterparts in France, the U.K., and Poland to placate Russia. He wants political and military breathing room to launch a major summer offensive in Ukraine.
The second takeaway here involves China.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping is on an official state visit to France. And while Xi has shown resolute support for Russia’s war effort via massively increased trade and the provision to Russia of sanctioned goods, he has also made clear that China views any prospective use of nuclear weapons in Ukraine as a red-line concern.
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Scheduling these exercises just after Xi arrived in Paris, Putin is thus sending a message to European leaders that Xi’s influence over him has limits. The Chinese will be infuriated by Putin’s action, viewing it as disrespectful and undermining of Xi’s very carefully cultivated leadership narrative. Putin knows this. But he also knows that the Europeans and the United States also know it. In turn, his calculated repudiation of Xi is designed to reinforce the credibility of his nuclear brinkmanship against the West. Put simply, Putin is saying, “Don’t view these exercises as just for show.”
France, the U.K., the U.S., and other allies cannot afford to bow before Putin’s nuclear dagger. As in the Cold War, Russian nuclear brinkmanship can be deterred by two things: first, the presentation of a significantly greater nuclear threat against Russia than what Russia can present against the West and, second, the assurance by rhetoric and action that Russian brinkmanship will result only in greater Western resolution and excess risks to Putin’s standing. Oh, and the U.S. should also push China to explain how its pledge to seek only “win-win cooperation” with Europe is compatible with its close partner threatening to use nuclear weapons against Europe.
