On November 7, 2022, the Foreign Minister of Pakistan, Bilawal Bhutto unequivocally criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin’s repeated threats to use tactical nukes in the Ukraine war. He was addressing a news conference in Berlin along with his German counterpart, where he said that he was horrified by recent reports on discussions about the possible use of nuclear weapons. “This is absolutely not an option. And surely, we’ve agreed throughout history, and should continue to agree: the use of nuclear weapons is not an option, for anyone, anywhere in the world,” he said.
This was perhaps the first Pakistani comment on the international stage where the Russian President, reportedly faced with a bad military situation in the war with Ukraine, repeatedly or on several occasions, hurled both veiled and overt nuclear threats against the West. The war in Ukraine has not been going well for Russia, the aggressor and the initiator of hostilities. Both the Americans and Western European countries started materially aiding Ukraine in its war against the much stronger Russian federation. Unexpectedly, the Ukrainian nation has put up a tough resistance against the Russian aggressors, partly on account of their own strength of national character and partly because of the modern weaponry that the United States and Western Europeans were providing to them.
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, Russian President Putin has threatened to use nuclear weapons on several occasions. But the clarity of his message or threat was never clearer than it was in his State of the Union address that he delivered in Moscow in the third week of February 2024. Putin threatened to use nuclear weapons against NATO countries, “if they send troops to fight against Russia in Ukraine.”
Putin’s comments apparently referenced French President’ Emmanuel Macron’s assertion that NATO countries could decide to send troops to Ukraine — a suggestion that the United States, the UK, and Germany almost immediately ruled out. “They must understand that we also have weapons that can hit targets on their territory,” Putin said of any deployment of NATO troops to Ukraine. “All this really threatens a conflict with the use of nuclear weapons and the destruction of civilization. Don’t they get that?”
Global politics is coming out of the dream world so painstakingly constructed around the neoliberal portrayal of the post-Cold War international order, which presumably had shunned war and conflict to resolve disputes.
What if Russia actually uses nuclear weapons or tactical nuclear weapons against Ukrainian cities or the Ukrainian military? This possibility or apprehension about this possibility are giving policymakers around the world sleepless nights. Albeit, the American political and military leadership and intelligence community seem to be making a deliberate effort to downplay Putin’s threats. There are countless nuclear and disarmament experts and strategists who are of the opinion that Putin’s threats should not be discounted out of hand.
I will quote one renowned American nuclear expert, Scott Sagan, in order to give the readers a sample of how the majority of independent experts view the situation. Sagan, an American professor of nuclear studies, has not only written about American nuclear policy making, he is a great critic of fairy tales that the American officialdom narrates about the success of nuclear deterrence during the Cold War in preventing the two superpowers from coming to nuclear blows. Sagan has also written extensively on the deterrence relations between Pakistan and India. Here is what Mr. Sagan has to say about Russian threats, “The likelihood of Russia nuclear use is less than it was back in late February... However, unlikely things happen all the times... and it behooves us to think through what we should do if Russia decides to use nuclear weapons,” he said in June 2022.
Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto was vehement in his assertion on this situation. He made it clear that he despised the very idea of use of nuclear weapons. But there are two problems with Bilawal Bhutto’s assertions in Berlin. Firstly, Bilawal Bhutto was representing a country which has held the rare distinction of maintaining a nuclear doctrine which practically indicates an inclination to use nuclear weapons against a conventional attack. In other words, Pakistan would be the first to use nuclear weapons in case of conflict that could possibly threaten its survival—a position not very different from the Russian stance that President Putin has put on display through his public statements. The second problem is that Bilawal Bhutto’s statement at a press conference in Berlin failed to cause any ripple on the international stage. Compare Foreign Minister Bhutto’s assertions and their impact at world stage with how Indian Prime Minister Narendar Modi’s similarly but well-crafted assertions on the possibility of a nuclear attack on Ukraine were received by important players at the world stage.
According to Indian media, Modi made it clear to Russian President Putin, “Today’s era is not of war.” He also warned leaders of belligerent nations in the Ukraine conflict that an attack on nuclear installations would be catastrophic for world health. American CIA Director William Burns praised Modi for what he said on the issue and told American media in an interview that Modi’s assertions impacted Russian strategic thinking. Bilawal Bhutto’s assertions on the issue, on the other hand, even failed to cause any ripple in domestic debate, if there was any. The media didn’t give conspicuous coverage to what Bilawal said in Berlin. Apparently, no one in the media was able to comprehend the significance of Bilawal’s assertions—the Foreign Minister of a nuclear state, whose officialdom and experts never miss an opportunity to portray Pakistan desperately primed to use nuclear weapons (especially tactical nukes) in case it is attacked by an enemy which is conventionally much stronger than its own military.
Perhaps Bilawal, a young foreign minister, was seen as too lightweight to make a statement which was a departure from the usual jingoism that Pakistani officialdom and experts display when the chips are down. So obviously no one within the country or outside took it very seriously when Bilawal opined about the issue.
Western military and nuclear experts are predicting that Ukraine might become the second site in human history where nuclear weapons would be dropped, while rejecting the existing military situation in Ukraine as a plausible scenario for any decision maker to opt for a nuclear option.
Global politics is coming out of the dream world so painstakingly constructed around the neoliberal portrayal of the post-Cold War international order, which presumably had shunned war and conflict to resolve disputes. War is a reality in today’s international politics. Powerful countries and states are drifting towards a foreign policy paradigm that treats military power as a priority. Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet Union's last President said at the time of the Soviet Union’s dissolution, while receiving the Nobel Prize, “the risk of global nuclear war has practically disappeared.”
This statement seems to be from another world; as of now, military and political leaders, nuclear strategists, arms control and disarmament experts all are pondering over the global nuclear exchange in the wake of Putin’s repeated threat to use nuclear weapons on Ukrainian cities or against the Ukrainian military.
Two unrelated developments on the world stage in recent years indicate that military and nuclear power is again becoming relevant in real politik around the world. Not only that, but military power and nuclear weapons bearer status is being operationalized by those states which previously were projected as poster children for peace and liberal attitudes. First, Sweden and Finland have decided to shun their military neutrality, which was the pillar of their official foreign policy since the Second World War, as they have formally joined NATO. They have been military powers par excellence in their own right ever since after the Second World War, but have remained neutral militarily during the Cold War and even after that.
Strong military power and military neutrality seem paradoxical, but both Sweden and Finland explain this situation by pointing out their close geographical proximity to a military giant like the Russian Federation. Second, China has never flaunted its nuclear power historically, and now in the changing and militarily tense international environment, “there have been recent signals that Beijing has elevated the role of nuclear weapons and integrated strategic deterrence in its overall military strategy,” reads a report from the United States Institute of Peace (USIP). For example, China has been growing its nuclear arsenal at an accelerated rate since at least 2021. And in his delivery of the work report at the recent 20th National Party Congress, Xi Jinping also proclaimed the need for China to build a strong “strategic deterrence system.” Experts of international politics say instead of pointing to any legitimate change in its position on the use of nuclear weapons, however, these developments point more to Beijing’s changing perception of the international environment.
What if Russia actually decides to use nuclear weapons in the conflict with Ukraine? Maybe it will simply use tactical nukes? Maybe it will use nuclear weapons as a demonstration of their determination? In overly ambiguous and deeply complex language, Western military and nuclear experts are predicting that Ukraine might become the second site in human history where nuclear weapons would be dropped, while rejecting the existing military situation in Ukraine as a plausible scenario for any decision maker to opt for a nuclear option.
Countries like Pakistan and India cannot remain oblivious to the possibility of use of nuclear weapons in the Ukrainian conflict. This will simply abrogate the existing international nuclear norms on which some of our positions relating to our respective nuclear doctrines, threats and deterrence stability are based.
Western nuclear experts’ assertions are confusing to say the least. American President and military leaders are deliberately making efforts to downplay Putin’s threats. On February 28, 2022, “No,” President Biden said in response to a question about whether US citizens should be concerned about the start of a nuclear war. Similarly on March 31, 2022, US media quoted a senior US defense official as saying, “No indications at this time that they’re preparing to use [nuclear] weapons.” On June 1, 2022, former Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and international security, and former Deputy Secretary General of NATO, Rose Gottemoeller was quoted as saying, “I frankly think that the chances of nuclear use are greater than one percent, but they are not 10 percent. But the consequences of Putin using a single nuclear weapon, whether a demonstration strike or in any other way, we have to take it extremely seriously.” You will get more confused as you keep reading the plethora of statements on the nuclear issue and the Ukrainian conflict emanating from Washington and Western capitals.
Countries like Pakistan and India cannot remain oblivious to the possibility of use of nuclear weapons in the Ukrainian conflict. This will simply abrogate the existing international nuclear norms on which some of our positions relating to our respective nuclear doctrines, threats and deterrence stability are based. Suppose that Russia decides to use tactical nukes against Ukrainian military forces in the battlefield - how will that impact Pakistan-India nuclear deterrence stability? Long ago, India shunned it's “no first use” policy and added some qualification to the absolute terms in which it used to adhere to this policy. Pakistani officials - or semi officials - are now defining its full spectrum deterrence to include “vertically the spectrum encapsulates adequate range coverage from 0 meters to 2,750 kilometers [about 1,700 miles], as well as nuclear weapons destructive yields at three tiers—strategic, operational, and tactical.”
The Pakistani and Indian strategic communities must start pondering over the question as to what will be the fate of their deterrence relations if the nuclear taboo is ever broken in Ukraine.
Some nuclear experts describe the new situation in the following words, “Reducing the minimum range to 0 meters is unprecedented and, if implemented, points to a major shift in Islamabad’s nuclear policy thinking... Talk of zero-range weapons suggests that Pakistan is either going to develop artillery shells as the United States, Soviet Union, and United Kingdom did during the Cold War—raising questions of whether it is going to be an M28/M29 Davy Crockett-style recoilless rifle system, the smallest weapon in the US nuclear arsenal, developed during the 1950s as a front-line weapon with yields as low as a fraction of a kiloton—or it could be a hint that Pakistan could possibly lay nuclear land mines across the India-Pakistan border to deter an Indian advance.”
If international nuclear norms and taboo against the use of nuclear weapons are to be buried under nuclear debris in any Ukrainian city - God Forbid - what will become of Pakistan-India nuclear deterrence relations, which, despite all the jingoism that is put on display in New Delhi and Islamabad in the time of military crisis, are influenced by international nuclear norms and the painstakingly constructed taboo against the non-use of nuclear weapons as battlefield weapons in South Asia.
Indian nuclear experts themselves opine that Indian deterrence relations with Beijing are relatively stable, however, deterrence relations with Pakistan are completely a different story. Military crises are the norm in Pakistan-India relations. There is fairly extensive debate among nuclear experts as to what role international nuclear norms played in preventing a nuclear exchange between Pakistan and India during the past twenty years. Official statements in Pakistan and India during the crises clearly demonstrate that these norms are not some valueless realities in the context of the South Asia military and nuclear equation. The Pakistani and Indian strategic communities must start pondering over the question as to what will be the fate of their deterrence relations if the nuclear taboo is ever broken in Ukraine.