Considering Ukraine's Gutsy Counter-Invasion in the Context of Nuclear Escalation

Yes, all your thinking about climate policy and sustainable development goals goes out the window if humanity can't avoid a nuclear war.

I know, here I go again - someone perceived mainly as an environmental journalist worrying about nuclear war. But please remember that my reporting jourey on climate and charting a sustainable human path started with coverage of nuclear war risks in 1985 before I zoomed in on CO2-driven global heating.

And then consider the reality that all of our cogitation and debate about climate policy and sustainable development goals goes out the window if humanity can't avoid a nuclear war.

With that in mind, please read the disconcerting and vital new story filed by Daniel Michaels, Brussels bureau chief for The Wall Street Journal titled “Nuclear Weapons Always Stopped Invasions. Then Ukrainian Troops Poured Into Russia.”

He takes a hard look at what had become the sleepy world of nuclear war escalation theory in the context of Ukraine’s sustained incursion into Russia’s Kursk region.

This is a subject I explored in Sustain What webcasts in 2022 with an array of experts (see links below). But Michaels has gone deeper and of course the game board has changed profoundly now that Ukrainian forces are occupying hundreds of square miles of Russian territory.

First, here’s the latest on the Ukraine-Russia war from the mapping project of the Institute for the Study of War. Of course Russia is still dominant and devastating, and that reality may be limiting pressure on Putin to raise the stakes based on Ukraine’s brash, but tiny, countermove (the blue area):

Here’s a short excerpt from Michaels’ article, but please read the full piece (this is my gift link for you):

Ukraine’s incursion into Kursk isn’t just a brash bid to upend Russia’s invasion. It also marks the first time that a declared nuclear power has faced invasion and occupation by another country. 

For decades, nuclear-escalation theory has presumed that countries with atomic weapons were largely immune from attack because an aggressor risked triggering armageddon. Relatively small states including Israel, Iran, North Korea and Libya have pursued nuclear arms in part to deter attacks by larger, better-armed adversaries….

Now Western leaders, military thinkers and nuclear theorists are puzzling over what current events mean for prospects of Russian escalation—and for future war gaming. Theoretical risk faces a real-world test, forcing a re-examination of the role nuclear weapons can play in deterrence.

Keep in mind that, from Vladimir Putin’s perspective, that isn’t just a Ukrainian move; the incursion is enabled by the commitments of arms and money from NATO and the United States. We should be helping Ukraine defend itself (I’m saying this not just because my paternal grandfather was from that region and fled Russian pogroms at the turn of the last century). But there are limits that have to be weighed.

This comment in the Journal article says heaps:

“It is like we’re walking in the dark toward a cliff,” said Christopher Chivvis, who has assessed nuclear-risk issues at Rand and as a U.S. intelligence officer. “It is out there somewhere. We just don’t know where it is.”

Insert 10:10 a.m. - In a helpful comment below, the physicist and historian Spencer Weart points to the deep analysis of the Putin-Ukraine-West war dance by

Phillips P. OBrien

here on Substack. I’ve just subscribed and encourage you to read his posts, as well, although all are paywall-restricted, unfortunately for those of us overloaded with costs. - end insert

My friend from Columbia University, the economist Jeff Sachs, has been warning about the building threat of nuclear war in the context of Ukraine and Putin for quite awhile, including on Tucker Carlson’s show a few days ago and also on Paul Buitink’s podcast here:

Please listen.

Here are my previous posts on the underlying issues.

I hope we can laugh about this a decade from now.

But hope isn’t a strategy.