War in Ukraine: Vladimir Putin plays the nuclear card again due to lack of progress on the front

The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has once again put it on the table the nuclear letter given the lack of progress on the Ukrainian front during the winter campaign and in an attempt to force the West to give up, in the long run, arming the enemy army.

Putin announced agreement to advance deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus just four days after asking the United States in a joint statement with Chinese leader Xi Jinping the withdrawal of their nuclear arsenals from abroad.

Precisely, Xi warned him in Moscow that this was a red line that no one should cross, given that in a nuclear war “there are no winners”.

All this happens when Russian forces have significantly reduced intensity of their attacks on Bakhmut, according to Western intelligence, even though Ukrainian defenders believe the battle for that Donbass stronghold is not over yet.

war of nerves

In an interview on Russian television, Putin accused the West of trying state visit of torpedo Xi, received as a savior in the Kremlin, where both leaders discussed China’s peace plan for Ukraine.

In this regard, Putin denied that Moscow and Beijing have a “military alliance” and are a threat to the world, and instead accused NATO of creating a “global axis” similar to the one Nazi Germany forged with Italy and Japan in the 1930s.

In addition to the fact that the International Criminal Court ordered Putin’s arrest on the eve of the visit, the European Union announced on the same Monday, the day of Xi’s arrival in Moscow, the shipment of one million bullets to Ukraine, a figure that the Russian leader himself considered “more than decent”.

To this must be added the announcement of the United Kingdom that it will supply Kiev depleted uranium ammunition, which the Kremlin chief described as weapons with a “nuclear component”.

Putin’s revenge was not long in coming. With the excuse of depleted uranium, on Saturday he assured that on April 3 the training of the Belarusian military in the use of tactical nuclear weapons will begin and on July 1 the silo that will house them will be built in a country bordering Ukraine and NATO.

“Putin deprived himself of the moral charter of defender of the nuclear non-proliferation regime, without receiving anything in return,” Maxim Starchak, an expert on nuclear policy, told the Meduza online newspaper.

A lamp post

Starchak believes that with this decision Putin wants to force the United States to do so accept as a “fait accompli” their territorial conquests in Ukraine, otherwise there will be no occasion to talk about agreements on strategic disarmament.

Instead, in his opinion, the tepid reaction of the USA and NATO proves to have failed, since the White House does not want to participate in that bargaining and you don’t want the “nuclear factor” be part of the settlement equation in Ukraine.

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) believes the announcement of the tenant of the Kremlin It’s irrelevant” in the context of a possible nuclear escalation, the possibility of which he continues to consider “extremely low”.

“Putin is trying to exploit Western fears of a possible nuclear escalation,” he said.

kyiv called on sunday convene a meeting of the United Nations Security Council, as Russia uses its arsenal “as a tool of threat and intimidation”.

Meanwhile, the European Union’s high foreign policy representative, Josep Borrell, assured EFE in Santo Domingo that Putin’s announcement “another escalation of the conflict”This comment is not contradicted by his recent claim that Xi’s visit to Russia reduced “the risk of nuclear war”.

arms race

It didn’t end there. Putin also warned NATO countries that they will not be able to keep up with the pace of weapons production from Russia, which this year will produce and modernize 1,600 tanks, compared to the 400-odd ones that Kyiv will receive from the allies.

The ISW believes some of these claims are false. Remember that the main Russian tank factory, UralVagonZabod, produces 20 tanks per month, when the Russian army loses 150 tanks a month on the battlefield.

Also, consider the American Abrams, German Leopards and British Challengers sThey are superior to the T-55, T-62 and even the Russian T-71.

Be that as it may, the Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelensky, has assured that there will be no counter-offensive until Kiev receives enough Western ammunition.

Russian and Ukrainian war reports on Sunday reported fighting along the entire front line, but especially in Bakhmut, where the Russians continue their failed assault operations.