Opinion | Bluff or not, Putin’s revival of the nuclear threat is a global security game changer

For years, nuclear weapons have served only as a deterrent to conflict, but Putin has upped the ante as he pursues his expansionist agenda

The risk now is that other nuclear powers may seek to replicate the Russian formula, while countries without such weapons will attempt to get hold of them

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Published: 3:30am, 4 Oct 2022Updated: 4:01am, 4 Oct 2022

Historians will record 2022 as the year Russian President Vladimir Putin reintroduced nuclear weapons into the centre of the East-West rivalry. After years of the ultimate weapon staying in the background, acting exclusively as a deterrent to a direct military clash between the major powers, Putin has put them back on the table. He is blatantly trying to capitalise on these weapons to secure an expansionist political agenda.

The reintroduction was made in two phases. The first commenced immediately after Russian troops invaded Ukraine on February 24. Back then, Putin broadly hinted that the advancing units were shielded by a nuclear umbrella which would be exercised if any country dared to intervene.

The second phase came just days ago when Putin formally annexed four Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine – Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia – labelling them the “four new regions of Russia”. He vowed to defend them “using all forces at our disposal”.

Putin was even less ambiguous a few days earlier when he announced a “partial” mobilisation to pursue his war plans. On that occasion, he said Russia was prepared to use all tools at its disposal to defend its “territorial integrity”. But, he went on to emphasise that “this is not a bluff. And those who try to blackmail us with nuclear weapons should know that the weathervane can turn and point towards them.”

The danger of Putin’s new nuclear gambit is of dual nature. First, nuclear-armed countries harbouring irredentist claims against their neighbours could seek to replicate the Russian formula.

For example, Beijing might think it could adopt a similar strategy vis-à-vis Taiwan, and a nuclear-armed but economically impoverished North Korea could seek to occupy South Korea, or at least its most productive areas, under the banner of what its leader Kim Jong-un in March called efforts to “guarantee the [country’s] security and contain and put under control all threats and blackmails by the imperialists”.

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