Non - Nuclear Targets

[SeaQueen]

That's not necessarily the case. One of the interesting things about nuclear weapons is how many security features they usually have built in to avoid unintended nuclear detonations. You would not, for example, want to have a nuclear weapon go off in the event of a fire in their storage facility, or if the the bunker they were stored in got struck by something. It may be possible to make them go off, every nuclear explosion is driven by a conventional explosion after all, but it's exceptionally improbable if not impossible for the nuclear reaction to occur unintentionally.

There have been multiple live nuclear weapons unintentionally dropped on land and sea. So far none of detonated, so they seem to have a great deal of resistance to shock and impact as well. For nuclear weapons to work, certain very specific things have to happen, and if they don't, at most you just get a big conventional explosion.

Destroying nuclear facilities in the RF means nuclear explosions in the RF.

And of course they will retaliate with whatever they still have, all of it.

This is not the way to go.

The strikes have to be on conventional forces, and the results decisive comparing losses in each side.

[DeepTyphoon]

Here is an update. And a bit of bluster:
Petraeus went as far as to say that the United States “would respond by leading a NATO, a collective effort, that would take out every Russian conventional force that we can see and identify on the battlefield in Ukraine and also in Crimea and every ship in the Black Sea” in a statement that has since been criticized for being too inflammatory.

If NATO starts attacking Russian forces directly, it will quickly lead to a nuclear exchange between Russia and the United States.

[DeepTyphoon]

"A conventional retaliation against nuclear use won't be mere "punishment" or some sort of warning against further escalation, it will be the opening of a new conflict/expansion of the existing one.'

So NATO would allow Russia to use tac nukes (missiles or shells) with impunity? I don't think so. You mentioned high value targets (non-nuke) like HQs. That is the intent of the thread. In the end Ukraine's land is too valuable to poison it with fallout. But it's Putin's recent rhetoric in the context of Russia's horrible military performance and pressure on his 20 year rule that makes one think - just maybe he is irrational after all.

This would make an interesting CMO scenario.

How far can you go until Armageddon?

Have a lot of random triggers based upon a players decisions and actions that controls an A.I. players responses.

But bringing it back to reality. Russia would not sit back and let NATO attack its military forces. NATO attacks on Russian forces would escalate to a nuclear exchange fast.

[Nikel]

That's not necessarily the case. One of the interesting things about nuclear weapons is how many security features they usually have built in to avoid unintended nuclear detonations. You would not, for example, want to have a nuclear weapon go off in the event of a fire in their storage facility, or if the the bunker they were stored in got struck by something. It may be possible to make them go off, every nuclear explosion is driven by a conventional explosion after all, but it's exceptionally improbable if not impossible for the nuclear reaction to occur unintentionally.

There have been multiple live nuclear weapons unintentionally dropped on land and sea. So far none of detonated, so they seem to have a great deal of resistance to shock and impact as well. For nuclear weapons to work, certain very specific things have to happen, and if they don't, at most you just get a big conventional explosion.

I hope you are right

Found this wikipedia article listing the known military nuclear accidents.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_m ... _accidents

Surely one or two could be the argument for a scenario.

[ultradave]

One of the things I learned when being trained on certain nuclear weapons was how to blow them into tiny little pieces with conventional explosives so that if we were overrun, the weapons wouldn't fall into enemy hands. And since these were uranium warheads, it's not even much of a contamination worry. Hardly any. There was no danger in this at all of a nuclear explosion. None.

Dave

[SeaQueen]

One of the things I learned when being trained on certain nuclear weapons was how to blow them into tiny little pieces with conventional explosives so that if we were overrun, the weapons wouldn't fall into enemy hands. And since these were uranium warheads, it's not even much of a contamination worry. Hardly any. There was no danger in this at all of a nuclear explosion. None.

I always think it's interesting how people are shocked when you tell them that uranium isn't that radioactive. It has a very very long half-life and decays slowly producing very little radiation. The problems are all the uranium decay products which can build up. Those are frequently INTENSELY radioactive and decay quickly.

[kevinkins]

That's right and why workers wear simple detectors - radiation dosimeters - to monitor build up over time. A good organization would not let their people accumulate a dose that is known to be harmful. Of course, in the case of Chernobyl and Fukushima, some sole had to risk their life to stop each disaster and blew away safe exposure limits. The biggest fear when working with even small amounts of radioactivity is ingesting it accidentally. Workers are constantly checked and they shower all the time. To bring even trace amounts of radioactive compounds home where the family can be exposed is a great concern. It's the persistence of small amounts that worries people on a day to day basis.

[kkdogs20]

I totally agree with SeaQueen.

If NATO attacks Russia they have to prevent them from moving to the military level, it is not enough to wrest Ukraine from them, they must be left without an answer, and that can only happen by attacking the nuclear balance. One thing SeaQueen does not comment on is the attack on Russian SSBNs which I believe are the main Russian nuclear attack vector.

Dmitry Rogozin, deputy prime minister, in 2013 stated that:

Pentagon simulations indicated that an attack with the bulk of U.S. cruise missiles (about 3,000-4,000 and only with conventional warheads) could destroy 80-90% of Russia's nuclear potential.

Russia would be without a Second Strike force, essential for strategic stability

SSBNs and strategic missile forces aren't just second-strike capabilities. They are also first strike ones and that is why they would not be targets of any attacks by NATO. The destruction of assets like these would be all too likely to be interpreted as the lead up to a nuclear attack on Russia or a pre emptive step before an actual invasion and would put tremendous pressure on the Russians to respond militarily before they lose their capability. It would be a catastrophic mistake.

[SeaQueen]

SSBNs and strategic missile forces aren't just second-strike capabilities. They are also first strike ones and that is why they would not be targets of any attacks by NATO. The destruction of assets like these would be all too likely to be interpreted as the lead up to a nuclear attack on Russia or a pre emptive step before an actual invasion and would put tremendous pressure on the Russians to respond militarily before they lose their capability. It would be a catastrophic mistake.

Let's go over the order of events:

1. Russia employs tactical nuclear weapons on Ukraine.
2. NATO responds with leaders conveying the unified and forceful strategic message of, "Do not do that again," to the Russian government and conventional strikes on Russian tactical nuclear facilities, destroying a large fraction of their tactical nuclear weapons stockpile.
3. Russia responds with city busters from their remaining strategic nuclear stockpile and SSBNs.
4. NATO responds in kind.
5. The world ends.

This makes sense to you? It seems a little extreme to me.

What about the alternative of:

1. Russia employs tactical nuclear weapons on Ukraine.
2. NATO responds with leaders conveying the unified and forceful strategic message of, "Do not do that again," to the Russian government and conventional strikes on Russian tactical nuclear facilities, destroying a large fraction of their tactical nuclear weapons stockpile.
3. Russia refrains from attempting a second nuclear strike on Ukraine and fearing strategic nuclear retaliation from NATO, refrains from launching its own remaining arsenal at targets within the NATO alliance.
4. Russia continues to prosecute the war conventionally, is forced to withdraw to the 2014 borders and sues for peace.

or how about?

1. Russia employs tactical nuclear weapons on Ukraine.
2. NATO responds with leaders conveying the unified and forceful strategic message of, "Do not do that again," to the Russian government and conventional strikes on Russian tactical nuclear facilities, destroying a large fraction of their tactical nuclear weapons stockpile.
3.Russia refrains from attempting a second nuclear strike on Ukraine and fearing strategic nuclear retaliation from NATO, refrains from launching its own remaining arsenal at targets within the NATO alliance.
4. Russia continues to prosecute the war conventionally after a second mobilization? Succeeds in eventually stabilizing their lines, and refrains from another offense, attempting instead to rebuild their ground forces, which sustained heavy casualties while attempting to retain the remaining seized territory.
5. The conflict is frozen along new lines beyond the 2014 borders.

or what about this one?

1. Russia employs tactical nuclear weapons on Ukraine.
2. NATO responds with leaders conveying the unified and forceful strategic message of, "Do not do that again," to the Russian government and conventional strikes on Russian tactical nuclear facilities, destroying a large fraction of their tactical nuclear weapons stockpile.
3. Russia refrains from attempting a second nuclear strike on Ukraine and fearing strategic nuclear retaliation from NATO, refrains from launching its own remaining arsenal at targets within the NATO alliance.
4. The Russian Ground Forces are eventually routed and destroyed by the Ukrainian army with Western support?
5. The Russian government is forced to cede all territory, including Crimea, back to Ukraine. The pre-2014 borders are restored.
6. The disgraced Russian military forces spend the next decades recovering, while the Ukrainians militarize their border with Russia, creating some of the stiffest ground defenses since the creation of the DMZ following the Korean War.

or how about this?

1. Russia employs tactical nuclear weapons on Ukraine.
2. NATO responds with leaders conveying the unified and forceful strategic message of, "Do not do that again," to the Russian government and conventional strikes on Russian tactical nuclear facilities, destroying a large fraction of their tactical nuclear weapons stockpile.
3. Russia refrains from attempting a second nuclear strike on Ukraine and fearing strategic nuclear retaliation from NATO, refrains from launching its own remaining arsenal at targets within the NATO alliance.
4. Russia attempts punitive, conventional counter-force strikes against Poland, Romania, Norway, Finland and The Baltics. Similar to their air attacks in Ukraine, the results are lackluster, and while they cause substantial collateral damage, NATO leaders resist calls to retaliate in kind, believing deterrence to have been restored?

or conversely...

1. Russia employs tactical nuclear weapons on Ukraine.
2. NATO responds with leaders conveying the unified and forceful strategic message of, "Do not do that again," to the Russian government and conventional strikes on Russian tactical nuclear facilities, destroying a large fraction of their tactical nuclear weapons stockpile.
3. Russia refrains from attempting a second nuclear strike on Ukraine and fearing strategic nuclear retaliation from NATO, refrains from launching its own remaining arsenal at targets within the NATO alliance.
4. Russia attempts punitive, conventional counter-value strikes against Poland, Romania, Norway, Finland and The Baltics. Putin in condemned by European nation states as a war criminal, adding evidence to the ongoing war crimes investigations at The Hague against him. Europeans refrain from further retaliation believing deterrence to have been restored?

I can think of alternate time lines all day long. Not all of them end in a world-ending exchange of multi-megaton city busters. Lots of speculation.

[kevinkins]

Yes, there are a lot of timelines and scenarios less than thermonuclear war. But there is one constant with the use of tactical nukes below that threshold. That's the poisoning of Ukraine's and perhaps Europe's landscape and places to live and work. I would think that would provide justification to go after those who made the decision with everything short of using nukes. Even one tac nuke is too many. Allowing Russia to lob these things on a weekly basis can not be tolerated. Even one on a city or water source would be game changing. So in a CMO sense, what targets would bring Russia to it's knees without lighting the world on fire.

[SeaQueen]

So in a CMO sense, what targets would bring Russia to it's knees without lighting the world on fire.

Vladimir Putin.

Maybe.

[kkdogs20]

I have no idea why I haven't seen this until now! Your scenarios are very unconvincing for various reasons.

How likely do you think that Russia, a country that has a historic distrust of the West, is likely to trust that a massive coordinated attack by NATO to destroy or render unusable thousands of it's tactical nuclear weapons is not the prelude to a wider conventional attack by NATO or even a nuclear attack? Your entire thesis hinges on Russia watching its nuclear deterrence capacity dwindling and trusting that NATO won't exploit this. Bear in mind that the Kremlin relies heavily on it's nuclear weapons (specifically the tactical ones) to make up for conventional deficiencies. Would you trust if Russia just destroyed the vast majority of US nuclear tactical weapons capability (as limited as it may be at the moment) with the promise that they are just doing it to send a message? Seems astonishingly naive to me. The idea that NATO an alliance founded on the concept of collective defense would just look the other way if Russia attacks Poland, Romania, Norway, Finland, and The Baltics and their counter-value sites but intervened to protect Ukrainian cities also makes no sense.