The United States has privately communicated with Russia over the past several months that there will be consequences if Moscow uses nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war, according to US officials.
It was not immediately clear how or when the alerts were sent. The State Department has stepped in, according to an official. The Biden administration has also relied heavily on intelligence channels to communicate sensitive messages to Moscow throughout its construction and prosecution of Russia over the war in Ukraine, including recent negotiations over arresting Russia. keep Americans wrong.
The warnings, first reported by The Washington Post, come as Russian President Vladimir Putin again threatens to switch to nuclear weapons amid a series of embarrassing defeats in the war. Ukrainian school. In a speech on Wednesday, he warned that, “In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to the defense of Russia and our people, we will certainly I’ll definitely use all the weapon systems available to me. This isn’t a bluff.”
US officials emphasize that this is not the first time that President Putin has threatened to switch to nuclear weapons since the start of the invasion of Ukraine in February, although some analysts have suggested the relationship This threat is more specific and escalatory than the past rhetoric of the Russian President.
The United States has previously sought to dissuade Russia from using nuclear weapons in public warnings and has made the issue the subject of speeches at the United Nations General Assembly this week in New York. York. Foreign Secretary Antony Blinken on Thursday said Russia’s “reckless nuclear threats must stop immediately.”
US President Joe Biden, appearing on CBS’s “60 Minutes” last week, said his message to Putin if he considers using nuclear weapons is: “Don’t. Don’t. Don’t.”
The US response will be “consequential” but will depend “on the extent of what they do,” Biden said, without providing further details.
Currently, top CIA officials have publicly stated that they see no indication that Russia is preparing to use nuclear weapons. However, some military analysts are concerned that Russia may seek to use tactical or battlefield nuclear weapons to counter its poor performance in Ukraine – a tactic sometimes called is “escalating to bring down”. Intelligence officials believe Putin will likely switch to that option only if he feels Russia or his regime is in danger of extinction, and it is unclear whether he feels defeated in the war in Ukraine match the description or not.
