Vladimir Putin confirms that tactical nuclear weapons are now in Belarus.

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin. BBC/Reuters.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has confirmed that tactical nuclear weapons have been delivered to Belarus. BBC. The weapons would only be used if Russia's territory or state was threatened, with the United States remarking that Russia is not planning any kind of strike. Tactical nuclear weapons are smaller weapons designed to be used on the battlefield with a minimum of fallout and collateral damage compared to strategic nuclear weapons. Belarus is a major Russian ally and has allowed the country to be used as a staging area for attacks on Ukraine. Putin remarked that the move was for "containment" and said that "extreme measures" could be used against those that would threaten Russian statehood. 

My Comment:

This is a fairly significant deployment and one that should hopefully deter a wider war in the region. There had been rumblings that Belarus should be invaded by certain NATO members but this would surly deter them. Well, hopefully, in a sane world any plans to attack Belarus while it was armed with nukes would be vetoed by the powers that be. Too bad we don't have a sane world anymore. 

I don't have any worry about these weapons being used by Putin. He has zero reason to use tactical nukes against NATO or against Ukraine for that matter. If the war turned against him to the point where Ukrainian tanks were threatening Moscow? Maybe then. But that's even more unlikely than Russian tanks threatening Paris. Putin has no reason to use nukes. 

What does worry me a bit about this is how secure these weapons are going to be. Belarus doesn't exactly strike me as a competent and secure country, it's possible these weapons could be lost, sold or stolen. My hope is that Putin will assign Russian troops to guard and operate these weapons and not leave it up the armed forces of Belarus or their commander, Aleksandr Lukashenko.

If a nuclear war does break out over Ukraine I think it would be more likely that NATO is the one that is responsible. They are getting more and more desperate as Ukraine's offensive has largely failed and the country is running out of equipment. It would be insane to deploy tactical nukes to Ukraine for use on Russian forces but I also thought it was insane to send German tanks and American F-16's to the war as well. Both of those things are now happening, so why not tactical nukes? It's not like our leadership cares that much about nuclear war, they think they will survive it and they don't give a damn if the people they are supposed to be responsible for get killed in a nuclear holocaust. 

Regardless, I do think this is another example of how the war in Ukraine has backfired in NATO. Before the war, keeping Belarus from having tactical nukes would have been a major priority for many obvious reasons. But now it has happened and isn't likely to be reversed anytime soon. It really didn't need to happen but it has and there is no going back.