Joe Biden was twice asked in a news conference Thursday whether NATO would respond with military action if Russia used chemical weapons in Ukraine, a concern repeatedly voiced by the US, Britain and others in recent weeks.
Could Russia use chemical weapons in Ukraine?
Russia is one of 193 countries that have signed an international treaty banning the manufacture, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons – and Moscow denies possessing or using any such weapons.
However, Russian agents used a deadly nerve agent, novichok, in Salisbury in 2018, killing a woman. It was used again by agents in August 2020 to poison opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Investigative journalists believe Russia is running a covert chemical weapons program, while its ally Syria is accused of repeated use of a series of chemical weapons during the long-running civil war there.
Western leaders are concerned that Russia’s failure to secure a quick victory in Ukraine means it may consider escalating the weapons it uses to avoid a bloody urban warfare that favors the defenders.
Helicopters dropping chlorine gas on residential areas of Aleppo in November and December 2016 brought an end to rebel resistance in the Syrian city after four years of fighting. “These weapons are pathologically effective and can break the will of the civilian population to resist,” said chemical weapons expert Hamish de Bretton-Gordon.
How did Biden respond to questions about the possibility of Russia using chemical weapons?
“We would respond,” Biden said in his initial response. “We would react if he used it. The type of response would depend on the type of use.”
The second answer was less clear. “It would elicit a response in kind. Whether – you ask if NATO would cross – we would make that decision at that point.”
It was clear from the context that “aid in kind” should mean it should be a considered response to what allegedly took place. Military action was by no means certain – although Biden was careful not to rule it out either.
What could a NATO response look like?
Biden’s response clearly depended on what an attack would look like. De Bretton-Gordon argues that there are two possible types of Russian attacks: a chlorine or ammonia attack that the Kremlin could disguise as an industrial accident, and the use of chemical weapons specifically designed to kill, like sarin, which was in 2017 used in Syria, or novichok.
“First, I’m not sure there would be kinetics [military] NATO Response – Allies would rather provide Ukraine with more and better weapons and additional intelligence if they can. But if Russia deployed agents intended only for use in warfare, NATO would likely have to respond militarily, as it did in Syria,” said de Bretton-Gordon, also a former commander of NATO’s chemical weapons force.
The US participated in two series of attacks in Syria. Rocket attacks took place in April 2017 after the sarin gas attack. Air and missile attacks followed a year later, in April 2018, with the help of France and Britain after chlorine gas was used in Damascus. Each time, locations designated as Syrian chemical weapons sites were attacked.
But it would be very unlikely that an attack by NATO forces or a subset of Western countries would directly attack chemical sites in Russia for fear of starting an all-out war, which NATO members have agreed to avoid. The fact that Russia is able to retaliate against the West could make a military response impossible.
Are there non-military alternatives?
Possibly, although no one knows what Russia’s red lines are. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made a direct appeal for more weapons, warplanes, tanks, rocket artillery and air defense systems at the NATO summit on Thursday. Western nations could increase military aid.
A second option would be to further tighten economic sanctions on the grounds that chemical weapons are illegal. Options would be sanctions on other Russian banks and a total ban on oil and gas imports by the EU and the UK, although that would be a tough economic decision for some countries.
Western leaders say they want to keep “a bit of ambiguity” in any response, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Thursday. But the reality is that serious discussions will only take place after a chemical attack.