Putin’s nuclear threats proven hollow as Ukraine invades Russia, expert says
Ukraine's incursion into Russia exposes Putin's nuclear bluff, urging Western leaders to support Ukraine's offensive without fear of escalation, a retired UK army officer says.
In an op-ed for The Telegraph, Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, a former British Army officer and a chemical weapons expert, argues that Ukraine’s incursion into Russian territory has exposed Vladimir Putin’s nuclear threats as a bluff.
Despite Putin’s previous warnings of “unimaginably catastrophic consequences” for interference with Russia’s “Special Military Operation” – i.e. the ongoing invasion of Ukraine – there has been no nuclear retaliation from Moscow in response to Ukraine’s incursion into Kursk Oblast, de Bretton-Gordon notes.
“President Putin’s ‘red lines’ mean nothing, and it is time our leaders in this country and across the West realised this,” he says.
De Bretton-Gordon notes that the US has promised severe consequences if Russia were to use nuclear weapons, and that China would not condone such actions. Meanwhile, “Putin has done nothing since the Ukrainians made their move. That has to be at least in part because he doesn’t have any nuclear option which would magically solve his current problem: it would hardly help him to drop a nuke on Russian territory, after all.”
The author argues that this incursion has left Moscow struggling to respond effectively with non-nuclear means, without weakening its positions elsewhere in Ukraine.
The US, the UK, and France continue to restrict Ukraine from using the long-range missiles they supply against targets deep within Russia. De Bretton-Gordon urges the West to remove such restrictions:
“It must be made clear, even to the most timid leaders in Europe, that the nuclear option is not actually available to Putin. The West both can and should remove the shackles it has put on Ukraine and allow that bold nation to fight with its hands free, using its Western weaponry to its full range and capability,” Hamish de Bretton-Gordon wrote.
Related:
- Kursk operation seen as rehearsal for Crimea’s liberation, says Crimean Tatar leader
- Politico: Kursk incursion catches Putin off guard, shifts tactical narrative
- Ukraine boosts morale and negotiating power with Kursk incursion, says Lithuanian minister
- Ukraine has full right to attack Russia’s Kursk Oblast, Finnish President Stubb says
- Kursk offensive: “I’m living every soldier’s dream,” says Ukrainian fighter
- Ukrainian forces set up “buffer zone” in Kursk Oblast
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