What measures could the West take if there was a nuclear strike and what would it mean for Putin?

Published

3 years ago

October 13, 2022

admin

Speculation over whether or not Vladimir Putin will use nuclear weapons has been rife and the consequences could be disastrous for the West and the Russian president

With Russia’s invasion stalling and the Ukrainian attack on the Kerch Bridge have both contributed to increased concern Putin could escalate from conventional weapons to a tactical nuclear strike.

The US President Joe Biden said last week that the world was the closest it had been to “Armageddon” at any point since the Cuban Missile Crisis, after more sabre rattling from the Kremlin.

NATO says that such a move would probably lead to a “physical response” from Ukraine, her allies and even NATO itself.

It said any use of nuclear weapons would have “unprecedented consequences” and that Moscow was using its nuclear threats mainly to deter NATO and other countries from intervening directly in Ukraine.

What measures could the West take if Putin goes nuclear?

Former Ukrainian defence minister, Andriy Zagorodnyuk, has said that NATO has several options should Putin make a “terrible” decision.

Writing in Foreign Affairs he said: “It might not even need a land operation, the Western coalition could credibly tell the Kremlin that it would hit Russian capabilities with direct missile strikes and airstrikes, destroying its military facilities and disabling its Black Sea fleet.

“It could threaten to cut all its communications with electronic warfare and arrange a cyber-blackout against the entire Russian military.”

He added that “breaking the nuclear taboo” could also provoke repercussions from China and India, which would be another blow to the Kremlin.

Is the West doing anything to deter a nuclear attack?

Professor Michael Clarke, former director-general of the Royal United Services Institute, said the Kremlin had already been warned about the consequences of escalation.

He said: “When the tactical nuclear weapon threats were raised a few weeks ago, the US and three or four NATO members personally contacted their counterparts in Russia and in the Russian general staff to say ‘don’t even think about it’.

“They won’t tell us what they said and nor should they because there has got to be some uncertainty about this in order to maintain a deterrent but what they seem to have said is first of all ‘we will not be passive’.

“Second, we won’t go nuclear, but we will go conventional, and we have the conventional power to hit all of your nuclear infrastructure and facilities. If we even think that you’re going nuclear, if we see the preparations start – we might attack you’.

“That seems to have been the message.”

Should the West be doing more now?

Alexander Gabuev, a senior fellow of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, has said Russia’s latest missile attacks in Ukraine were “a sad reminder that the most horrific pages of this ugly war are still ahead of us”.

The “Kremlin’s response is becoming ever more erratic disproportionate and destructive,” he said.

Discussing Russia’s reaction to the blast on Kerch Bridge – a key route from Russia to Crimea – Mr Gabuev said this showed Russia “still has a vast toolkit for escalation”.

He said: “Given the high stakes and emotions, the window for diplomacy is likely to open at the most dramatic moment: for example, when Putin starts to unpack his nuclear toolkit, which will be visible to NATO and involve a lot of signalling by Moscow.

“Only then might the Ukrainian and western publics be convinced there is an urgent need to negotiate.”

He added that negotiations would have to involve President Biden “since the Kremlin considers him the only real head of the opposing coalition” and the sooner they started, the better.

What do the Ukrainian people think?

A nuclear attack wouldn’t change anything about the Ukrainian people’s resolve to fight, a Ukrainian MP has claimed.

The Ukrainian MP Yelyzaveta Yasko told Kay Burley: “Putin doesn’t have any logic any more. It’s not possible to justify Putin any more.

“We understand that he’s in his final battle of his life where he wants to prove to all the world that he can do whatever he wants, including taking land, killing thousands of people, destroying infrastructure, and we understand that nuclear threat and a strike is very possible, but it’s not going to change a lot on the scene of Ukraine.

“Of course, it’s a disaster. It’s catastrophic for me. It’s a big tragedy to see thousands of people being killed, wounded, destroyed lives.

“But it’s not going to change the rule of Ukrainian people to restore justice and to restore our territorial sovereignty.”

Zelenskyy vows to make battlefield ‘more painful’ for Russian forces after another day of deadly rocket strikes on Ukraine

Opinions divided in Moscow after Kremlin’s escalation in Ukraine

Why the West should stop sounding so worried about a nuclear attack

Ian Bond, from the Centre for European Reform, says the West needs to stop being – and sounding – afraid of a nuclear attack.

He told the Doomsday Watch podcast: “Nothing is as provocative to Putin as weakness, so the more the West says ‘We are afraid that Russia might use nuclear weapons’, the more likely that Putin is to continue making the threat of using nuclear weapons – and perhaps even use one or two to demonstrate he really means it.”

Bond says the message to Russia, which could be delivered privately, should be: “Please understand that if you go nuclear, we will regard the gloves as being off.”

While accepting that no one could “absolutely rule out” Russia using nuclear weapons, he added: “We should stop frightening ourselves with the Bogeyman that if the Ukrainians drive the Russians out, the Russians are going to go nuclear, I just don’t buy that.”

World

Mile after mile of grey rubble – the view from a plane dropping aid to Gaza

Published

10 hours ago

July 29, 2025

admin

Mile after mile of grey rubble - the view from a plane dropping aid to Gaza

We are on our way to Gaza with the Jordanian military.

The aircraft is hot and noisy and as we get closer, the atmosphere gets more tense. Aircrew gesture with their hands to tell us how many minutes there are to go. Fifteen. Six. One.

The Jordanian military C-130 flies out over the sea before banking and heading inland for Gaza. The parachutes, attached to the top of each of the eight pallets, are prepared for the drop.

As land approaches, I look down. The ground is modern and built up – we’re still over southern Israel.

Then a few short minutes later, it’s clear we’ve crossed Gaza’s border.

The ground turns grey, the shapes of buildings disappear, there are no cars, no people.

You can see the outline of communities and villages that are now flattened. Mile after mile of grey rubble.

This mission by the Royal Jordanian Air Force is one of the first aid drop flights since Israel announced they could resume. It is carrying eight tonnes of food and baby formula.

Foreign nations know this is a deeply flawed way of delivering aid – road convoys are far more effective and can carry far more – but the Jordanian flight crew say the need in Gaza is so urgent, it’s simply an attempt to do something.

When the aircraft ramp opens, the aid is pushed out and it’s gone in seconds.

The parachutes seem peaceful as they open and their fall slows. But dropping food from the sky is a dangerous and undignified way to feed people.

On the ground it’s chaos.

Our colleagues in Gaza say the fighting for food has become lethal – gangs are now punching and stabbing people to reach it first. Most critically, it’s not getting to the weakest. To those who really need it.

One man becomes emotional as he describes racing to find food and leaving with nothing.

“I came only for my son,” he says. “I wouldn’t come here if it was just for me. When you have a child, they need bread.”

He’s an engineer in normal times and seems in disbelief that his life has come to this. “The aid comes from the sky and we have to run after it. I’ve never had to do this in my life.”

It is hoped Israel’s humanitarian pauses in fighting will rapidly increase food distribution by road but it’s very unclear how that is going.

Hospitals in Gaza have reported another 14 deaths from starvation in the last 24 hours, the Gaza health ministry said on Monday.

Airstrikes killed another at least 78 Palestinians across Gaza on Monday, local health officials said.

We cannot verify these numbers because Israel has not allowed international journalists access to Gaza.

And Monday’s flight came with strict media conditions.

We were told the Israeli side had warned that any shots of Gaza filmed from the air could result in these aid flights being cancelled.

But Israel’s tight grip has not stopped the images from Gaza getting out, horrifying people around the world.

The question now is what more the international community will do about it.

World

Israeli human rights organisations accuse country of genocide

Published

13 hours ago

July 28, 2025

admin

Israeli human rights organisations accuse country of genocide

Two Israeli human rights organisations have said the country is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

In reports published on Monday, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) said Israel was carrying out “coordinated, deliberate action to destroy Palestinian society in the Gaza Strip”.

The two groups are the first major voices within Israeli society to make such accusations against the state during nearly 22 months of war against Hamas.

Israel has vehemently denied claims of genocide. David Mencer, a spokesperson for the government, called the allegation by the rights groups “baseless”.

He said: “There is no intent, (which is) key for the charge of genocide… it simply doesn’t make sense for a country to send in 1.9 million tonnes of aid, most of that being food, if there is an intent of genocide.”

B’Tselem director Yuli Novak called for urgent action, saying: “What we see is a clear, intentional attack on civilians in order to destroy a group.”

The organisation’s report “is one we never imagined we would have to write,” Ms Novak said. “The people of Gaza have been displaced, bombed, and starved, left completely stripped of their humanity and rights.”

PHR said Israel’s military campaign shows evidence of a “deliberate and systemic dismantling of Gaza’s health and life-sustaining systems”.

Both organisations said Israel’s Western allies were enabling the genocidal campaign, and shared responsibility for suffering in Gaza.

“It couldn’t happen without the support of the Western world,” Ms Novak said. “Any leader that is not doing whatever they can to stop it is part of this horror.”

Hamas said the reports by the two groups were a “clear and unambiguous testimony from within Israeli society itself regarding the grave crimes perpetrated by the occupation regime against our people”.

Dire humanitarian conditions

Since Israel launched its offensive in Gaza following the deadly Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, nearly 60,000 people – mostly civilians – have been killed, according to Gaza health officials.

Much of the infrastructure has been destroyed, and nearly the whole population of more than two million has been displaced.

An increasing number of people in Gaza are also dying from starvation and malnutrition, according to Gaza health authorities.

On Monday, the Gaza health ministry reported that at least 14 people had died from starvation and malnutrition in the past 24 hours, raising the total number of hunger-related deaths during the war to 147.

Among the victims were 88 children, with most of the deaths occurring in recent weeks.

UN agencies say the territory is running out of food for its people and accuse Israel of not allowing enough aid deliveries to the enclave. Israel denies those claims.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday said “there is no starvation in Gaza” and vowed to fight on against Hamas.

US President Donald Trump said on Monday that many in Gaza are facing starvation and implied that Israel could take further steps to improve humanitarian access.

Israel has repeatedly said its actions in Gaza are in self-defence, placing full responsibility for civilian casualties on Hamas. It cites the militant group’s refusal to release hostages, surrender, or stop operating within civilian areas – allegations that Hamas denies.

World

Why are airdrops on Gaza so dangerous?

Published

22 hours ago

July 28, 2025

admin

The United Nations has condemned airdrops on Gaza, warning they risk killing the starving Palestinians they are intended to help.

Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, and Israel parachuted aid packages into the territory for the first time in months at the weekend amid claims a third of the population has not eaten for days.

But Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general for the UN Relief and Work Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), has said they “will not reverse the deepening starvation” and often do more harm than good.

‘Make or break’ as starvation looms; Middle East latest

“They are expensive, inefficient & can even kill starving civilians,” he wrote in a statement on X.

What is an airdrop – and why are they dangerous?

There are several ways humanitarian agencies and international allies can deliver aid to regions in need – by land, by sea, or by air.

While parachuting in supply packages from planes may look impressive, airdrops are “fraught with problems”, Sky correspondent in Jordan Sally Lockwood says, and often used as a “desperate last resort”.

“Foreign nations know airdrops are a deeply flawed way of delivering aid,” she says.

“Palestinian sources tell us the aid that’s been dropped so far is not reaching the most vulnerable. They are an attempt to get something to a few – often viewed as a desperate last resort. Gaza is at that point.”

Military analyst Sean Bell says that delivering aid by air is ideally done when planes can land on a runway – but Gaza’s only landing strip in Rafah was shut down in 2021.

The alternative is “very dangerous”, he warns. “Aircraft flying relatively low and slow over a warzone isn’t very clever. When these parcels hit the ground, there’s a significant danger of them hitting people.”

Crucially, they can only deliver a fraction of what lorries can.

“The really big issue is aircraft can only deliver one truckload of aid. Gaza needs 500 truckloads a day, so it’s 0.2% of the daily need,” Bell adds.

They also risk falling into the wrong hands and ending up on the black market.

“Some of it has been looted by gangs and is on the black market already,” Lockwood says.

Why are they happening now?

Israel cut off all supplies to Gaza at the beginning of March, reopening some aid centres in May, but with restrictions they said were designed to stop goods being stolen by Hamas militants.

Israeli authorities control the only three border crossings to the strip: Kerem Shalom in the south, Crossing 147 in the centre, and Erez to the north.

Since the current conflict with Hamas began in October 2023, humanitarian agencies and world leaders have repeatedly accused Israel of not allowing enough deliveries through.

Mr Lazzarini says the UN has “the equivalent of 6,000 trucks” in neighbouring Jordan and Egypt “waiting for the green light to get into Gaza”.

Israel says it has commissioned a “one-week scale-up of aid”, having conducted its own airdrops on Saturday.

In a statement over the weekend, the Israeli Defence Forces said it will work with the UN and other aid organisations to ensure aid is delivered but no more details were given.

Meanwhile on Sunday, it began daily 10-hour pauses in fighting in three areas of Gaza to address the deteriorating humanitarian situation.

According to the Hamas-run health ministry, 133 Palestinians had died of malnutrition by then, including 87 children.

Doctors Without Borders warned on Friday that 25% of young children and pregnant women in Gaza are malnourished.

Israel says there is no famine in Gaza.

What are in the airdrops and who is behind them?

Air packages are largely being delivered by C-130 planes. Jordan is reported to be using 10 and the UAE eight.

They can carry eight pallets of goods each, weighing around eight tonnes in total, according to Lockwood, who is on the runway at Jordan’s King Abdullah II airbase.

There are no medical supplies in the packages, she says, only dried food, rice, flour, and baby formula.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has said the UK will help with airdrops – but no British aircraft have been seen in Jordan so far.

He will discuss the matter with US President Donald Trump during talks in Scotland on Monday.

The RAF delivered 110 tonnes of aid across 10 drops last year as part of a Jordanian-led international coalition – but it is not clear what level of support will be offered this time.