Changes in Russia’s nuclear doctrine are intended to discourage Ukraine’s Western allies from supporting attacks on Russia, the Kremlin said on Thursday.
The threat, outlined in a revision of Moscow’s nuclear doctrine, was clearly aimed at discouraging the West from allowing Ukraine to strike Russia with longer-range weapons and appears to significantly lower the threshold for the possible use of Russia’s nuclear arsenal.
Speaking during Wednesday’s Security Council meeting that discussed changes in the nuclear doctrine, Putin didn’t specify whether the modified document envisages a nuclear response to such an attack, but he emphasized that Russia could use nuclear weapons in response to a conventional assault posing a critical threat to our sovereignty, a vague formulation that leaves broad room for interpretation.
