Putin is intensifying nuclear threats as the West wavers over Ukraine’s use of long-range weapons

Russian President Vladimir Putin at a security council meeting in Moscow in September 2024.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is stepping up his nuclear threats against the West, as the US and its allies waver over allowing Ukraine to use long-range weapons they’ve supplied on targets in Russia.

Putin, in a National Security Council meeting Wednesday, said that Russia was considering updating its nuclear doctrine to state that an attack on Russia by a country allied with a nuclear power would be considered a joint attack.

The remarks were a thinly veiled reference to Ukraine, which is seeking permission to use long-range missiles supplied by the likes of the US, France, and the UK to strike targets deep inside Russia.

“We see the modern military and political situation is dynamically changing and we must take this into consideration,” he said.

Putin said this included the “emergence of new sources of military threats and risks for Russia and our allies.”

Two weeks ago, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and US President Joe Biden discussed lifting restrictions on Ukraine’s use of long-range weapons at a White House meeting.

But despite US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken indicating after the meeting that the restrictions would be lifted, reports say discussions are still ongoing and no final decision has been made.

Ukraine has long argued that it needs to use the weapons to hit military sites and airfields in Russia crucial to its invasion force in Ukraine, but the US has hesitated, fearing it could cross Russia’s “red lines” and provoke a nuclear attack.

Analysts at the Institute for the Study of War, a US think tank, said that Putin’s latest remarks are likely hollow threats designed to intimidate the West.

The Russian president, they said, is seeking to “breathe new life into the Kremlin’s tired nuclear saber-rattling information operation and generate a new wave of panic among Western policymakers during a particularly critical moment in Western policy discussions about Ukraine’s ability to use Western-provided weapons.”

Putin has in the past suggested a series of red lines in response to Western support for Ukraine, including designating seized territory as part of Russia, which would be defended by nuclear weapons.

Some analysts have urged caution, with George Beebe, a former CIA Russia analysis chief, and Suzanne Loftus, a research fellow at the Quincy Institute’s Eurasia program, warning in an article for Responsible Statecraft last year that the West might not know it’s crossed Russia’s red lines until it was “too late.”

According to reports, Putin considered using tactical nuclear weapons against Ukraine after it pushed back Russian forces early in the full-scale invasion in 2022, but was deterred by China’s President Xi Jinping.