Those suggesting major changes to NATO nuclear deterrence might first want to consider Russian nuclear strategy.
Former Costa Rican President Oscar Arias and Jonathan Granoff of the anti-nuclear weapons Global Security Institute fail this test. Seeking a negotiated end to the war in Ukraine, Arias and Granoff call for NATO’s preparation to withdraw “all U.S. nuclear warheads from Europe and Turkey, preliminary to negotiations [over the war in Ukraine]. Withdrawal would be carried out once peace terms are agreed between Ukraine and Russia.” Chiming in on Monday, Harvard scholar Steven Pinker suggests that this is a “bold idea” because nuclear weapons are “militarily useless, ineffective deterrents … [and] recklessly dangerous.”
This is surprisingly confident language from someone who evidently knows little about nuclear strategy. After all, the deterrent value of these otherwise terrible weapons isn’t hypothetical. It was repeatedly proven by the avoidance of major conventional conflict during the Cold War’s moments of highest crisis. Regardless, this peace-for-nukes proposal evinces a great ignorance of Russian nuclear strategy.
At the most basic level, NATO’s withdrawal of nuclear weapons from Europe would utterly vindicate President Vladimir Putin’s brinkmanship. Far from being penalized for waging the largest war in Europe since 1945, Putin would find a reward for his aggression. He would thus have reason to do more of the exact opposite of what NATO exists to deter: leveraging military force to extract political concessions and diminished democratic security. Indeed, this blackmail agenda is a key concern for Putin in regard to this very same issue of nuclear deterrence.
The removal of ground-stored nuclear weapons would also assist Russian planning over the prospective battlefield use of nuclear weapons. This matters greatly in that Russian nuclear doctrine explicitly identifies the limited use of nuclear weapons as a means of regaining the initiative during a conventional war. It underlines why the U.S. military has invested in capabilities that hold Russia at risk on the battlefield, as well as at the strategic level. The utility of ground-stored nuclear weapons is that they can be deployed where and when they are needed at any one moment. The weapons simply need to be loaded onto aircraft and dropped on the targets where those targets appear. This provides a clear advantage over land-based or submarine-based nuclear missiles, which must be pre-targeted to a specific area and fired from far greater distances.
Top line: The unilateral removal of these weapons from Europe would give Putin a major political and military victory. Russia would have new military space for the pursuit of its limited-use nuclear strategy, confident in NATO’s declined ability to counter that strategy. It would be the height of folly, sacrificing proven deterrence at the deluded altar of Putin’s better nature.
This is not to say that negotiation with Russia is impossible or even undesirable. Again, the Cold War proved that the opposite is true. But negotiations with Putin’s Russia require a key ingredient that this proposal lacks: The provision of credible strength alongside the offer of compromise. If Russia wants ground-based U.S. nuclear weapons removed from Europe, it must verifiably do the same.
