Kiev could be turned into a smoking hole with Nukes.
But that would trigger WWIII.
Would it?
Let’s say Putin declares that he’s going to hit Ukraine’s capital with one, and only one, smoking-hole nuke. Let’s say he then, uh, does that.
Does WWIII get triggered?
No.
Not unless he also launches one at London.
And if NATO starts launching conventional airstrikes on Russian soil? Will that trigger WW3? Or only if NATO launches a nuke at Moscow?
I doubt it. But NATO would likely respond militarily to Russia with overwhelming conventional strikes. I don’t think this would trigger WWIII because Russia is so obviously weak that China and everyone else would probably sit it out. Who would want to risk it all for Russia?
Conventional strikes on Russians in Ukraine, or on Russians in Russia?
Obviously it’s all speculation. If I were C-in-C, and based on what we know, if Russia detonated a nuke in Ukraine, I’d order massive conventional strikes on all Russian forces in Ukraine (including Crimea and other disputed parts), and the sinking of all Russian warships in the Black Sea.
Black Sea, I’d say go ahead and sink a couple of subs nearest our shores as a preemptive strike since they dared to play the nuke card. Pin their airforce down as well. Both of which are non-nuclear responses to a nuclear provocation.
Seeing as the air defense batteries are on Russian soil, it’ll have to be the latter. NATO won’t do anything before it has air supremacy.
That would take about ten minutes, though.
Modnote: Massive hijack of the Breaking news thread moved here.
I think it would have to be considered WWIII or close enough for government work (the only problem is that the Chinese would not be involved, but WWII started without the Americans so…)
Now WWIII is not the same as a massive nuclear exchange, in theory at last, it could remain more or less conventional… for a while…
This. It would depend on the Russian response. Here’s my guess. It would start with the simultaneous liberation of Ukraine and invasion of Russia proper (and likely Belarus as well) by western forces. The initial troops are likely to be Polish, Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian followed closely by Americans and British. Japan would likely get involved as well, with invasions of the Kuril Islands, Sakhalin, and the mainland at Vladivostok, with support from South Korean and US air and naval forces. By the time the French, German, Australian, Canadian, etc. forces get ready and make it to front lines it would all be over already.
Option 1. Russia surrenders, probably involving a coup of some sort. A disarmed and occupied Russia would be the result, hopefully in the style of the West German and Japanese occupations after WW2.
Option 2. Nuclear Armageddon.
It’s likely things would be over within a month one way or the other.
ETA. The only role China would have in such a war would be to push Russia to accept Option 1. That and to prevent Taiwan from getting in on the action on the eastern front.
Occupation of Russia is not and will never be an option. Occupation requires boots on the ground, and Russia has a LOT more ground then its enemies have boots.
But most of that ground is empty. We’d only need to occupy the major cites and industrial centers. This isn’t like WWII, where Stalin could move the factories East of the Urals, and they were far outside the German’s abilities to bomb them. We can hit anything in Russia with missiles, even if we don’t have boots on the ground in that particular spot. Without the ability to resupply troops, things will go very badly for Russia.
ISTM occupying Russia would take a force as large or larger than the combined Allied forces at the end of WWII (i.e. the equivalent of occupying Germany + Japan); current US and NATO forces aren’t even close to that large. That seems very unlikely to me, even if Putin was toppled and Ukraine completely defeated Russian invaders.
Taking Russia means holding Moscow and St Petersburg. The autocrats have spent a long time ensuring nothing get done without the central control. It’s not going to be easy to change that now.
But it’ll never come to that. External pressure encouraging internally initiated regime change is how the West will stop Russian expansionism.
-sigh-
Next set of nuclear saber rattling (stop helping Ukraine or else!) or increasing intent as it looks like Russia can lose? Still no clear answer, but figured I’d update the thread with the latest.
“The defeat of a nuclear power in a conventional war may trigger a nuclear war,” former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of Putin’s powerful security council, said in a post on Telegram.
Honestly, nothing new precisely, other than that faint acknowledgement that Russia could actually lose, and apparently that’s sufficient grounds of loss of national identity to justify the use of WMD. Based on the timing, I’m still leaning towards the above, stop helping the Ukraine or else, but each time they do it, I have the horrible worry they’re just preparing their excuses ahead of time. Thank the FSM that it’s Friday, and I can have a few drinks.
I wonder if they might be genuinely worried that if Russia loses in Ukraine, in the sense of having to retreat from Ukrainian territory, Ukraine and/or NATO forces will come across the border into Russia itself intent on taking over?
That looks like a pretty crazy idea to me. But I’m not sure whether it looks like a crazy idea to a lot of people in Russia; and it’s kind of what “if the West tried to destroy Russia” looks like. I have some hope that the nuclear saber-rattling is intended to deter that. Though they may also be still hoping that it’ll work to let them take Ukraine; or at least to let them keep bombing the whole country into desert.
I’m not sure I’d take anything this guy says seriously. He seems to be on the whack-a-doodle side of things. Maybe his job is to proposed outrageous things so that Putin seems more reasonable. Or he’s just sending out trial balloons to see how people react.