Learning to Love the Bomb

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s repeated threats to use nuclear weapons should come as no surprise to anyone paying attention to Russian nuclear modernization over the past two decades. The reality of Russia is that it is a great power solely because it is a nuclear power. Russia has the largest, most advanced, and most diverse nuclear arsenal of any nation, with a particular and superior advantage in non-strategic nuclear weapons.

Wars in Serbia (1999), Afghanistan (2001–2021), and Iraq (2003–2011) left leaders in Beijing, Moscow, Pyongyang, and Tehran confident the United States would not hesitate to remove an unfriendly regime…unless it was a nuclear-armed regime. Thus, America’s adversaries came to understand what the United States has long known; nuclear weapons deter your enemies and guarantee survival.

Thus, to counter encroachment into Russia’s “Near Abroad,” Vladimir Putin began developing and fielding an advanced and diverse arsenal of non-strategic nuclear weapons, immune of any treaty restriction, that employ low- and ultra-low-yield warheads on delivery systems. These non-strategic nuclear weapons include short-, medium-, and intermediate-range ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and other delivery systems that Putin sees as giving him the ability to use one or a small number of nuclear weapons in Europe without crossing an all but undeclared American redline for nuclear retaliation.

While the United States fields approximately two-hundred fighter-delivered B-61 nuclear gravity bombs in Europe, the operational readiness rates of the aircraft and political decision-making required to deliver these weapons is too slow to prove effective. Thus, these few bombs may no longer satisfy today’s threat environment if they are to be viewed as e more than political weapons that ostensibly make NATO a nuclear alliance. This leaves the United States with either the option to respond conventionally or escalate to strategic nuclear weapons should Russia decide to employ a small non-strategic nuclear weapon.

In support of NATO, the United States could also threaten to launch one or more of its small numbers of low-yield submarine-launched nuclear weapons, but the handful of W76-2 low-yield warheads were never meant to be a permanent solution to Russia’s 2,000–6,000 non-strategic nuclear weapons. In the mind of Vladimir Putin, this creates an opportunity for a fiat accompli where he uses one or a small number of short- to medium-range low-yield nuclear weapons in or near Ukraine, for example, with the expectation that the United States and NATO will back down and disengage their support to Ukraine rather than escalate.

For the past three decades, American conventional military superiority led multiple presidential administrations to believe nuclear weapons were no longer necessary to defend American interests. After all, by the start of the new millennium, Soviet communism was vanquished, China was in the midst of a “peaceful rise,” and democracy was triumphant. With few exceptions, the Beltway intelligentsia was wrong about Russia and China.

The world has changed since President Barack Obama’s speech in Prague on April 5, 2009. Standing before a crowd of thousands in Hradcany Square, President Obama declared, “So today, I state clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.” Today, Russia’s nuclear weapon modernization and expansion program is nearly complete; with new novel weapons to threaten the west. China is fielding new nuclear warheads and delivery vehicles with greater range and accuracy; adding over 300 new ICBM silos in its deserts. Thanks to the evolving security threat environment, even the United Kingdom is increasing its overall nuclear weapon stockpile by 40%. It seems only the United States desires to do the opposite.

If not for public revelations in 2021 that China is dramatically expanding its nuclear arsenal and President Putin’s repeated nuclear threats over Ukraine, the United States may very well have added a “no first use” or “sole purpose” policy to the latest Nuclear Posture Review, which, to date, has no unclassified version for the American people to review. Despite both China and Russia growing their nuclear arsenals and, in the case of Russia, threatening to use them, America is still looking for ways to reduce the size and role of its nuclear weapons via a renewed  “sole purpose” policy—despite the recent success of nuclear deterrence in Europe.

Instead, it is time to set aside long-held utopian ambitions of a world free of nuclear weapons. Should the United States find itself unprepared for a limited nuclear war in Asia or Europe, the president will not be judged by his aspirations but by his actions. Eschewing nuclear weapons and the peace nuclear deterrence provides is folly and dangerous to world peace and stability. In short, it is time to learn to love the bomb.

Dr. Adam Lowther is Vice President for Research at the National Institute for Deterrence Studies and the host of ANWA DC’s Nuclecast. Col. Curtis McGiffin (U.S. Air Force, Ret.) is Vice President for Education at the National Institute for Deterrence Studies and visiting professor at Missouri State University’s Department of Defense and Strategic Studies. Together, they have more than five decades of experience in uniform and DoD civil service. 

The views expressed in this article are the author's own.