Russia’s setbacks in its invasion of Ukraine may lead Russian President Vladimir Putin to use low-yield or tactical nuclear weapons, CIA Director William Burns said Thursday.
Given the potential desperation of President Putin and the Russian leadership, as well as the setbacks they have thus far faced militarily, none of us can take lightly the nuclear threat of the potential use of tactical nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons,” he warned. Burns in a speech in Atlanta.
The Kremlin said it put the nuclear deterrent forces on high alert shortly following the invasion began on February 24, but the United States has not seen “much practical evidence” of deployments of greater concern, Burns added when speaking to Georgia Tech University students.
Obviously, we are very concerned. And I know that President (Joe) Biden is deeply concerned regarding avoiding a third world war, regarding avoiding the threshold where a nuclear conflict becomes possible,” the CIA chief said.
Russia has many tactical nuclear weapons, less powerful than the bomb the United States dropped on Hiroshima in World War II.
Russian military doctrine lays out a principle called “escalation to de-escalation,” which would involve striking a first blow with a low-yield nuclear weapon to regain the initiative if things go wrong in a conventional conflict with the West.
But under this hypothesis, “NATO might intervene militarily on the ground in Ukraine in the course of this conflict, and this is not something that, as President Biden has made clear, is on the cards.”
Recalling that he once served as ambassador to Russia, Burns had harsh words for Putin, calling him an “apostle of revenge” who for many years “has been kept in a flammable combination of nonconformity, ambition and insecurity.”
Every day Putin proves that powers in decline can be just as disruptive as those on the rise,” he said.
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