Russian nuclear strategy and conventional inferiority

Bruusgaard, Kristin Ven

doi:10.1080/01402390.2020.1818070

Cited by 22 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Our first aim in the experiment was to examine the baseline difference in support for nuclear and conventional strikes and explore the elasticity of Russian views on nuclear use with respect to the expected collateral damage and the shifts in conflict intensity. To this end, we 1 Some scholars argue that the Western understanding of "escalate-to-deescalate" strikes does not fully correspond to the actual Russian nuclear strategy (Ven Bruusgaard 2021;Oliker and Baklitskiy 2018;Tertrais 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

From Moscow With a Mushroom Cloud? Russian Public Attitudes to the Use of Nuclear Weapons in a Conflict With NATO

Smetana

Onderčo

2022

Journal of Conflict Resolution

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This article presents findings of an original survey experiment on public attitudes toward nuclear use conducted on a representative sample of Russian citizens. We randomly assigned our participants to experimental treatments with vignettes describing a military conflict between Russia and NATO in the Baltics, where Moscow considered a limited nuclear “escalate-to-deescalate” strike to avert defeat. Our findings show that Russians are significantly more averse to nuclear strikes than to the corresponding use of conventional missiles. The participants disapproved similarly of a demonstrative nuclear explosion in an unpopulated area and of nuclear strikes in a more escalated scenario. We also found associations between the moral values of individuals and strike support corresponding to earlier studies in the United States. Finally, our participants reported similar concerns about both nuclear and conventional strikes, with the worry about civilian casualties and the suffering of victims at the top of the list across experimental treatments.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

From Moscow With a Mushroom Cloud? Russian Public Attitudes to the Use of Nuclear Weapons in a Conflict With NATO

Smetana

Onderčo

2022

Journal of Conflict Resolution

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“…Hence, Russian political-military thinking focuses on balancing its conventional capabilities with a robust nuclear arsenal. Such a combination would provide Russia with more flexible response options to escalation management (Bruusgaard 2020;Renz 2019). The purpose of increasing nonnuclear deterrence options is to reduce the dependence on nuclear possibilities for dealing with conventional contingencies (Bruusgaard 2016).…”

Section: Rumsfeld Launched the Transformationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Accordingly, nuclear weapons would no longer be Russia's only means of confrontation in a scenario where it faces a conventionally superior opponent. In light of this, in the 2000s, Russian political-military elites began to focus on how nuclear and conventional capabilities could be combined to more effectively stop threats in medium-high intensity conventional war scenarios (Bruusgaard 2020). In the meantime, Russia has been building up its conventional strength capability while also modernizing its nuclear forces to balance its armed forces (Giles 2017).…”

Section: Rumsfeld Launched the Transformationmentioning

confidence: 99%

From Offsetting to Emulation: A Neoclassical Realist Analysis of Russia’s Internal Balancing Strategies

Dall'Agnol¹

2022

Urvio

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In 2008, Russia began to implement its largest military reform since the creation of the Red Army in 1918. Previous attempts at reforms in 1992, 1997, and 2003 did not result in fundamental transformations to the country’s military. Why was the 2008 military reform successful while others were not? This article uses the comparative-historical method to identify the causal mechanisms between Russia’s level of external threat, state capacity, and internal balancing strategies adopted since 1991. It advances Neoclassical Realism’s systemic and unit-level variables by building on the long-established contributions from Strategic Studies and Historical Sociology instead of relying on other International Relations theories. It concludes that the success of Russia’s military reforms in the post-Cold War period depended on the simultaneous existence of three conditions: the possibility of disrupting strategic stability, its ability to extract and mobilize societal resources, and the presence of some event of proven ineffectiveness. Under scenarios in which only one or two of these conditions were present, Russia carried out only partial military reforms. The article sheds light on three often-neglected drivers of Russia’s military reform by Western analysts: its enduring emphasis on interstate competition, strategic stability, and mid-to-high intensity conventional warfare.

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“…2 Flere argumenterer for at å true med å bruke atomvåpen på denne måten egner seg eksempelvis som en strategi for å kompensere for konvensjonell underlegenhet (se bl.a. Bruusgaard, 2020;Larsen & Kartchner, 2014, s. xix). Påfølgende er risikoen at atomkrigen ikke kan begrenses, men vil eskalere til fullskala atomkrig.…”

Section: Krisestabilitet Mellom Atomstaterunclassified

I atomvåpnenes skygge: Amerikansk atomstrategi og Norge

Andersen

2022

Internasjonal Politikk

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SammendragDenne artikkelen undersøker hvordan nylig inntrufne endringer i amerikansk atomvåpenstrategi kan påvirke krisestabiliteten mellom USA og Russland og hvilke implikasjoner det kan ha for Norge. Enkelt oppsummert fremstår moderniseringsprogrammene til atomvåpnene, introduksjonen av nye våpen og den deklaratoriske politikken egnet til å undergrave krisestabiliteten fordi det gir USA økte counterforce-kapasiteter. Dette har implikasjoner for norsk alliansepolitikk: Endringene i amerikansk atomvåpenstrategi kan senke terskelen for etablering av bastionforsvaret og øke russisk usikkerhet om norsk tilrettelegging for amerikansk politikk. Med utgangspunkt i tradisjonell teori om krisestabilitet, fremstår flere av de identifiserte endringene i USAs atomvåpenstrategi som destabiliserende. Den tyder på at amerikanske myndigheter ikke aksepterer ideen om den «kjernefysiske revolusjonen». Til tross for dette, skal bekymringen for atomkrig ikke overdrives. Militaere analyser må omsettes til politikk. Selv om sannsynligheten for et vellykket førsteslag øker, er det vanskelig å forestille seg politikere som vil risikere atomkrig. Det betyr at avskrekking er mer robust enn hva rene militaeranalyser tilsier.

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Russian nuclear strategy and conventional inferiority

Cited by 22 publications

References 42 publications

From Moscow With a Mushroom Cloud? Russian Public Attitudes to the Use of Nuclear Weapons in a Conflict With NATO

From Moscow With a Mushroom Cloud? Russian Public Attitudes to the Use of Nuclear Weapons in a Conflict With NATO

From Offsetting to Emulation: A Neoclassical Realist Analysis of Russia’s Internal Balancing Strategies

I atomvåpnenes skygge: Amerikansk atomstrategi og Norge

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