Briefly: Is The US Trying To Provoke Russian Use Of Tactical Nukes?

Speculation regarding the purpose for the American attack on the Russian early warning radar at Voronezh continues. Austrian Colonel Markus Reisner has weighed in with a very concise article at an Austrian military site. Reisner warns that the attack could set the stage for a dangerous escalation:

Three questions about the attack on the Russian nuclear missile rain-war system: Colonel Reisner answers

First, Reisner establishes that the Voronezh radar site is an integral part of Russia’s early warning system. As such, it’s designed to pick up incoming ICBMs:

Russia currently has up to ten such early warning radar systems. They are spread throughout Russia, in locations in Murmansk, near St. Petersburg, Kaliningrad, Barnaul, Omsk, Irkutsk, Workuta, Krasnogorsk and in the mentioned Armavi. The latter facility, consisting of two radars, was built to compensate for similar Soviet systems installed originally in western Ukraine and in Crimea.

These Voronezh-DM radars are over-the-horizon (OTH) - Ultra High Frequency (UHF) radars, which are part of the Russian early warning radar system for the detection of ballistic missile. The radars have a horizontal range of 6,000 and vertical 8,000 kilometres. Their goal is to be able to identify flying American nuclear missiles, especially early, in order to be able to rapidly initiate their own measures, including a Russian nuclear counterattack in the utmost case.

Second, Ukraine would derive little to no benefit from damage to Russian early warning radar systems of this type. This is because the ATACMS missiles, the most advanced the US is currently using in Ukraine, fly beneath the early warning radars. Russia uses different radar systems to address missiles of the ATACMS type.

What then would be the reason for the US attack on Russia’s early warning radar system?

Reisner suggests that this US attack on an integral component in Russia’s early warning system against US nuclear attacks is intended to force Russia to stand down from its threats to use tactical nukes. The strike at Voronezh is a “boiling the frog” tactic. It clearly crosses a Russian red line, but if Russia fails to respond with nukes—as standard doctrine would indicate should happen—the red line, in effect, gets pushed back.

The Russian early warning detection system is part of the country's nuclear deterrence strategy. The attack on Armavir could meet the conditions that Russia has publicly set for enemy attacks in 2020, which could trigger a nuclear retaliatory strike.

This could embolden US vassals to send their own forces to Ukraine. France, for example, has now publicly stated that they will send training personnel to conduct training in Ukraine.

However, Reisner concludes with this intriguing sentence:

The attack on Armavir could meet the conditions that Russia has publicly set for enemy attacks in 2020, which could trigger a nuclear retaliatory strike. Added to this is the fact that possible cooperation between Russia and its close allies has been restricted in the area, to the advantage of close partners in the USA.

What’s Reisner suggesting? I read this in the light of other views that are now being suggested on the internet. Look at it like this.

Pushing the redline back a bit so that the French, and perhaps others, are emboldened to send more resources—including personnel—to Ukraine is not going to do Ukraine much good. Russia is prepared for a conventional war against NATO—that’s what has been going on for two years, and that’s what the appointment of an economic planner to head the Russian MoD is all about. Russia’s nuclear doctrine is unlikely to change in the event of a broader war.

What others are suggesting has to do with the reference to Russian cooperation with its close allies (especially China, but to a lesser degree India) being “restricted in the area.” What that means, at least as I read it, is that Chinese cooperation with Russia—which the US claims is the only thing that has prevented a Russian defeat—has in the past been conditioned on Russia not using nukes. The Chinese are very sensitive in this matter, and the Indians are as well. Has that position changed? We don’t know. If it has, the change would have been caused by provocative US behavior with regard to China.

So the speculation I’m seeing is that the US may actually be trying to provoke a nuclear response from Russia by attacking the early warning site. Presumably that would involve a tactical nuke directed against a presumed launch site for the ATACMS that targeted the radar. The reasoning would be: If we (the US) can get Russia to go nuclear first, then that could separate China from Russia—and then we win! Pure genius, right?

How do you feel about the Neocons gambling like this?