You're not seeing the forest from the trees lol. If Russia nuked Ukraine, lets say they nuked Kiev, and idk Dnipro, the war would be over. The power apparatus would be gone and Ukraine lines in 2-3 months eventually become under-supplied and eventually non-existent.

A tactical nuke is a low-yield, small blast radius weapon for battlefield use. Strategic weapons are the kind that level cities, and Russia has never threatened strategic nuke use, they've threatened tactical nukes. Putin's masters in China have assuredly informed him that such a thing would not be tolerated.

This post was edited by Santara on Sep 22 2023 04:22pm

I really shouldn't have brought up the nuke thing again, I can't blame anyone but myself, I apologize to everyone. Brain hurts now.

This post was edited by DizzyBusiness on Sep 22 2023 04:24pm

If they are willing to use nukes, I probably wouldn't place my hope that they will ring fence themselves in only a specific type that's small and insignificant. At that point, it's an existential war and everything is on the table.

But again it's silly speculation of a highly unlikely scenario. It's also pretty silly to think China somehow has some ultimate sway how Russia behaves in an existential scenario.

That is not an entirely true narrative. I can say without a doubt at least for the next 5 to 10 years , the Chinese are more fearful of the Russians and Putin than the Russians are to the Chinese.

Coping over a nuke attack when facing the reality of the 2nd army in the Wurld failure is a thing...

I would not be surprised if Ukraine has a team already working on dirty bomb/missiles/drones retaliation solution, making Moscow metropolitan area unhabitable. (25+ millions people)
Don't forget Ukraine already modified its neptune missiles and is also developping long range drones.

Imho deterrence is certainly not excluded from Ukrainian military "program". Maybe even before the main feb 2022 agression. When you have such barbaric and reckless regine just nearby...

First google result:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-63373637

Case closed, it's a suicide for the Kremlin.

it should not be hard for all sides to agree with Santara here.



xD

This post was edited by ferdia on Sep 22 2023 04:45pm

Tac nukes are not the top of the escalation scale. Aren't you one of the "muh escalations" crowd? Tac nukes do not mean Russia has decided it's in an existential crisis.



Well, you're in better position to assess the Chinese public than I am. I just don't see such fears as justified. China is so much more massive militarily and economically. Throw in the fact that they represent one of the few unrestricted outlets for Russian trade goods, and all of a sudden, Chinese displeasure can matter greatly.

Santara is not wrong on the Japan scenario though. But I think what we are missing is the Nukes that were dropped on the Japanese were 10 times less destructive that the ones that North Korea have at the moment.
Furthermore, the Atomic Bomb was just produced at the end of WW2 and effects and after effects of the nuclear fallout hasn't been studied and documented since it was the first time it is being used.

That being said if Nukes were used on Japan which it did, the fallout and contamination only affect Japan, the magnitude is not great enough at that moment to cause too much harm towards neighboring countries.

Now....if a Nuke is being used , and I am sure if the Russians really want to screw around, they will not use it in the Capital since it is closer to Belarus and Russia. Furthermore , once you destroy the command center , there will be no back channels available for further discussion of deescalation.

They will use it in places like Lviv or places closer to Poland where there is less population as an escalation to deescalate.

Well, I am not from China so there are a lot that I do not know. But staying in Hong Kong and traveling in and out of China for 13 years I do know their mood.

Put it this way, the first person that Xi Jinping paid a visit to when he was inaugurated was Putin. Russia is huge, any nuclear fall out on the Eastern side of their territory really doesn't matter much to them, but it matters to China, Mongolia, and if it go Far East, it will affect North and South Korea.