Ever since the last days of World War II, when clouds of mushrooms rose over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, humanity has been living in the shadow of nuclear war.
As a student in the 1980s, I vividly remember the paranoia of the following decades. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, I assumed that those days were over.
But now, with Vladimir PutinThe chilling statement that he is putting Russia’s nuclear forces on “special alert” against the West is once again in a world haunted by Armageddon’s nightmares.
Should we take Putin’s nuclear threat seriously? As shocking as the last few days have been, I find it hard to believe that he will invite a full-scale war. But no one who has read about the massacre in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, where more than 200,000 civilians are believed to have been killed, can feel remotely satisfied.
As a student in the 1980s, I vividly remember the paranoia of the following decades. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, I assumed that those days were over
It is appalling that today’s nuclear weapons are far more deadly than their predecessors. And if you read the recently declassified Cold War documents of the National Archives, you will find that even in the 1950s and 1960s, the death toll here in Britain after a nuclear exchange was expected to reach tens of millions.
Older readers will remember, of course, that we have been close to the edge before. During the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962, the secret installation of Soviet nuclear weapons on Fidel Castro’s island in the Caribbean provoked an outraged reaction from the United States and almost provoked World War III.
For 13 long, horrible days, the world trembled on the edge. For the first time in history, US President John F. Kennedy raised the nuclear alarm on Defcon 2 – the highest level since the actual war.
Some U.S. generals have called on him to order preemptive air strikes against Cuban bases. If he had followed their advice, the result would almost certainly have been a full-scale conflict.
The Soviet cargo ship Anosov was escorted by a Navy plane and the destroyer USS Barry while leaving Cuba in 1962.
But Kennedy kept his cool. Instead, he declared maritime quarantine around Cuba, and although Soviet ships sailed very close, Kremlin Nikita Khrushchev eventually blinked. The Soviet leadership agreed to withdraw its missiles from Cuba. In return, the Americans quietly pulled their own missiles out of Turkey, and the world sighed with relief.
Although the Cuban Missile Crisis remains the worst omission in history, there have been others. As tensions escalated during the Arab-Israeli war in October 1973, with reports of possible Soviet military intervention against Israel, Richard Nixon raised the alarm on Defcon 3, although this was not widespread.
An even more horrific moment occurred in November 1983, when the Kremlin completely misread NATO’s massive military game codenamed Able Archer.
Convinced that Ronald Reagan was on the verge of ordering a preemptive strike, the Soviet leadership warned its agents around the world that the war could only be over. At a Moscow clinic where Soviet leader Yuri Andropov was dying, a military aide was waiting by his bed, ready to send nuclear codes. The minutes passed, the tension almost unbearable.
Ever since the last days of World War II, when mushroom clouds rose over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (above), humanity has been living in the shadow of nuclear war.
Only when the fighting game Able Archer ended without an attack, the Russians realized that their fears were unfounded.
But Putin’s threat feels different. This is not a mistake; it is a deliberate, cold-blooded threat from a violent, angry, and increasingly paranoid man.
During his indiscriminate declaration of war on Ukraine last week, the Russian strongman warned that the West would “face consequences greater than any you have ever encountered in history” if it dared to intervene. Three days ago, he again warned of “military and political consequences” if Finland and Sweden join NATO.
And now, in his latest chilling address to the Russian people, he seems to be preparing the ground for a possible nuclear strike – something completely unimaginable just a few days ago.
I may be naive, but I cannot believe that the Russian president will voluntarily initiate a nuclear conflict in which tens of millions of his own people will surely be destroyed.
What frightens me, however, is the possibility that with growing discontent, growing economic pressure and the sinking of his army, this vicious, resentful man may embark on a desperate attempt to save his regime.
Older readers will remember, of course, that we have been close to the edge before. During the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962, the secret installation of Soviet nuclear weapons on the Caribbean island of Fidel Castro provoked an outraged reaction from the United States and almost provoked World War III.
Can he prepare Russian public opinion for the use of tactical nuclear weapons against Ukrainian military positions? Can he seriously consider a nuclear strike against the city of Kiev?
A week ago, I would have considered such proposals completely fantastic, something like a terrible nightmare. But after the horrors of the last few days, with an increasingly unstable and irrational dictator in the Kremlin, I no longer feel so confident.
But one thing is for sure. The Russian president would not have made such threats unless he believed we were weak and was convinced that we would collapse.
Last week he had to teach us the folly of atonement. And even in the face of its terrifying noise, we must keep our nerves and stand up for freedom.