Putin has just made the world a far more dangerous place

Let’s not play down what has happened this week. The leader of the world’s largest nuclear power publicly threatened to use nuclear weapons. In an address in Moscow on Wednesday, Vladimir Putin declared that Russia would use “all weapon systems available to us” to defend the country. He emphasized, “This is not a bluff.”

It might be. Putin’s threat is at odds with traditional Soviet military doctrine, which once ruled out “first use.” Under his leadership, the Russian military now contemplates scenarios in which it could use nuclear weapons. But Putin knows that the West has powerful nuclear weapons of its own; and he knows that the doctrine of “mutually assured destruction” has prevented any power from deploying them since 1945. Moreover, these kinds of threats must rattle China, India and all those countries that have been trying to steer a course between Russia and the West.

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