Ukraine - do we face a nuclear conflict?

 

So Putin has announced the annexation of the Eastern Ukrainian territories his troops have been occupying since 2014. This is in addition to the Crimea, annexed in a similar way earlier that year.  It should come as no surprise. 

Russia did the "decent thing" (that is a joke, of course), and held a referendum in each case, and reported residents voted "overwhelmingly" in support of "joining" the Russian Federation.  Given that credible reports and testimony has emerged showing that, throughout the voting process, people were being "encouraged" by heavily armed militia (for which read Russian troops) to vote in favour, the result was never in doubt.  The votes were of course roundly condemned by the Ukrainian Presidents and Governments; branded as illegal attacks, a land grab, and in breach of its Conventions by the UN and Western leaders including messrs Cameron, Obama, Johnson, Biden, Mrs. Merkel and other EU Heads of State.  Note there were dissenting voices: dishonourable mentions go to Salvini and Berlussconi in Italy, who consider Putin a personal friend, Orban in Hungary, who is as mad as a hatter himself, and of course the insurrectionist Trump (about whom the less said the better).

I wrote about much of this in the wake of the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 in July 2014 in Ukrainian airspace by Russian ground-to-air missiles fired by Russian troops who immediately scarpered back across the border.  The piece was called "What should we do about Putin?", and you'll find it at the following link.  I urge you to read it.

http://travellin-bob.blogspot.com/2014/07/what-should-we-do-about-putin.html

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The answer, of course, is we, the West, did nothing at all, except buy increasingly more of his country's abundant and cheap oil and gas reserves, thus giving him another potent weapon to use against us - which he is of course doing as I write.  We allowed him to strut around at G7 and G20 conferences, Davos get-togethers, buy Olympics and World Cups and Formula 1 Grands Prix and welcomed him on state visits.

None of which changed his basic character: i.e. a delusional bully and a killer and a Mafia leader.  We gave him free rein to do exactly what he wanted to do.  And he did it.

Assassinate, or attempt to do so, opponents no longer living in Russia?  Check, multiple times in the UK alone.  Likewise to critics in Moscow and elsewhere in Russia?  Of course: just ask Alexei Navalny.  Provide arms and support for brutal regimes elsewhere to use against their own citizens?  Absolutely - in Iran and Syria for a start. 

This has all left us facing the very real prospect of Armageddon. Putin has made it abundantly clear that his  "Special Operation" in Ukraine has, because of its open and strong support for the invaded country, become a conflict against NATO - a.k.a. The West, led by the USA.  He has also made it increasingly clear that he will use "whatever means necessary" to defend Russia and its territory - and stated simply that he is "not bluffing".  Given the the fabled Red Army has proved itself to be an incompetent rabble that is now being augmented by a draft of 300,000 conscripts, all ill-trained and many of them recruited from the ranks of the country's high security prison system and thus mostly murderers, rapists and violent criminals (all promised a full pardon for their service, assuming they survive), this has raised the chilling possibility of using nuclear weapons.

There is talk of this being done in "a limited way" - but let's be clear here: such weapons cannot be used like that.  They are way too powerful, way too final, to be just dropped here or there to get rid of a pesky enemy infantry group or something.  They are designed and built for a sole purpose: to destroy and render useless swathes of enemy territory, including major cities, and in so doing kill tens of thousands of innocent civilians (the invaders have been doing this for months anyway, so going nuclear will only speed up the process and add to the lengthening list of war crimes).  Russia has loads of the bloody things ready to go: they have been on high alert since March.  So do NATO member like the US, France and Britain....tit for tat strikes seem to me increasingly likely.

As usual, there are statements from both sides saying that a diplomatic answer is the only acceptable solution, but given that only one side is willing to sit at the table, and that country is not led by a gangster represented by a seasoned diplomat whose ability to lie and prevaricate and ignore the simple truth is a match for his own, this remains a distant hope.

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Before February this year, we all knew this was the position in terms of weaponry, but mostly believed they would never be used.  The argument was always no President would be stupid enough to risk the total destruction of his own country by retaliatory strikes: the MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) Doctrine.

Then the insane Putin sent his troops into Ukraine and everything changed.  A raft of sanctions, the strongest ever applied, have been invoked on Russia and its leaders (including Putin and his family) and the Russian currency and economy trashed.  It has made no difference: he and his people - who are not getting a true picture of what is happening across their border and are fed a diet of propaganda (lies if, like me, you prefer that term) - are content to suffer that if it mean the clear victory he is convinced will be won.  Any opposition is met with strength, masses of demonstrators arrested and beaten (and potentially liquidated).  If the monster is prepared to do all that to his own citizens, and tacitly agree to the brutality that is being revealed daily in Ukraine - mass graves, murder, torture, rape, the wanton destruction of civilian areas - then I can't see him flinching at the nuclear option.

Will NATO respond in kind?  Will Joe Biden, Liz Truss and all the others back up their fine rhetoric with more concerted action, or will they back away?  To do that will surely release Putin to do exactly as he wants, wherever and whenever he wants - and he is mad enough to do just that.  But if they do respond militarily, like-for-like, then we are perhaps looking at the End of All Things.  With this latest annexation, any military action by Ukraine, backed with NATO weapons, in those areas will of course be considered and loudly proclaimed by Putin as an attack on Russia - and a ready made excuse for him to go nuclear.

What a position to be in!  It seems to me a no win situation. But it's one of our own making.  Our lack of action against Putin, indeed quite the opposite: our sucking up to the bastard for the last 20-odd years, has come down to this.  It shouldn't have happened.  The EU and NATO leaderships have had ample warning from newly admitted member states like Poland and the Baltic States, who after 50 years under Communist and Russian rule know what Russian governance is really like, but we dismissed it all as an exaggeration, that Russia has changed, that Putin is ok......  

Make no mistake: if the nuclear option is used, it will be at Putin's instigation..  But it will be the result of the West's criminal inaction over many years.