Could Detonate Nuclear Weapons: Media Analyzes How Putin Will Respond to Permission to Attack Russia

It can detonate nuclear weapons: the media analyzed how Putin will respond to permission to strike Russia Irina Martsiyash

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Vladimir Putin's options for response if the West allows Ukraine to use its long-range missiles to strike Russia could include strikes on British military assets near Russia.

Or, as a last resort, conducting a nuclear test to show intent, three analysts said.

Putin's Options for Response

Ulrich Kuehn, a weapons expert at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy in Hamburg, said he could not rule out Putin sending some kind of nuclear signal. For example, testing nuclear weapons to intimidate the West.

“That would be a dramatic escalation of the conflict,” he said in an interview.

The publication notes that Russia has not tested nuclear weapons since 1990, a year before the collapse of the Soviet Union. A nuclear explosion would mark the beginning of a more dangerous era, Kuehn said, warning that Putin could feel seen as weak in his own right in response to NATO's increased support for Ukraine.

“A nuclear test would be new. I wouldn't rule it out, and it would be consistent with Russia violating a number of international security agreements that it has signed over the decades in the last few years,” he said.

Gerhard Mangott, a security expert at the University of Innsbruck in Austria, said in an interview that he also thought it possible, though unlikely, that Russia's response could include some form of nuclear signal.

“The Russians could conduct a nuclear test. They have made all the necessary preparations. They could detonate a tactical nuclear weapon somewhere in the east of the country to “to demonstrate what (they) mean when they say that we will eventually resort to nuclear weapons,” he noted.

Russia's response could be to step up attacks on Ukraine's civilian infrastructure, said another expert, Ulrich Kuehn of the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy in Hamburg.

According to Gerhard Mangott, if the missile restrictions are lifted, “Kiev will bear the brunt of Moscow's military response.”

He noted that the danger for the West is that it does not know where Putin's red lines actually were.

“Allowing Ukraine to use Western weapons with the help of Western satellite images (and) Western military advisers is something that greatly encroaches on the vital important interests of Russia. Therefore, I think that those who say: “Well, nothing will happen, let’s just do it” are mistaken, the expert added.