“In many cases, attempts to bully other countries by raising the specter of nuclear war plainly failed, like in Khrushchev’s threats over Berlin. “The track record for nuclear blackmail is not great,” said Fuhrmann in an email. They also include former President Richard Nixon, employing his madman theory of foreign policy, wanting the North Vietnamese to be told his aides believed, “We can’t restrain him when he’s angry – and he has his hand on the nuclear button.” These include Soviet leaders like Nikita Khrushchev telling the then-US ambassador in 1959, “The West seems to forget that a few Russian missiles could destroy all of Europe.” They documented 19 instances of nuclear threats and coercive language in the post-World War II era. I talked to Matthew Fuhrmann, who along with Todd Sechser, wrote the 2017 book, “Nuclear Weapons and Coercive Diplomacy.” President Joe Biden had a simple answer on Monday when asked by reporters if Americans should be concerned about the prospect of nuclear war. Now Russia has invaded Ukraine – and Belarus, which is allied with Moscow, plans to renounce its non-nuclear status and could theoretically allow Russia to bring nuclear weapons back into the country. Russia took control of arms from other former Soviet republics, including Ukraine and Belarus, in the 1990s.

Russia’s nuclear weapons are a part of its “deterrence” strategy. “Top officials in leading NATO countries have allowed themselves to make aggressive comments about our country, therefore I hereby order the Minister of Defense and the chief of the General Staff to place the Russian Army Deterrence Force on combat alert,” Putin said in a televised meeting with top Russian defense officials on Sunday. Even some Russian oligarchs are pressuring President Vladimir Putin to end the war.īut Putin’s rhetoric has also intensified to include direct reference to his nation’s vast nuclear stockpile, placing the country on its highest state of alert and forcing an appraisal of the equilibrium that keeps nuclear-armed countries from destroying themselves and the world.The Russian Central Bank more than doubled interest rates to 20%.The value of the ruble has cratered, losing about a quarter of its value.

More of Russia has been cut off from the world banking system.

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