Western leaders should not be intimidated by Kremlin threats of nuclear escalation, the head of the CIA said on Saturday, and be willing to consider allowing Anglo-French Storm Shadow missiles to be used inside Russia.

Bill Burns, on a visit to London alongside the head of MI6, said the US had brushed off a previous Russian nuclear scare in autumn 2022, demonstrating that threats from Moscow should not always be taken literally.

“Putin’s a bully. He’s going to continue to sabre rattle from time to time,” Burns said. “We cannot afford to be intimidated by that sabre rattling … we got to be mindful of it. The US has provided enormous support for Ukraine, and I’m sure the president will consider other ways in which we can support them.”

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Russian leaders has been yelling about their nukes since I was a kid.

I can honestly say that I don't care anymore. Like, either launch them or shut up about it. It's just tiring now.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

Same. The thing is we have nukes and they have nukes. One cannot let more or less useless nukes dominate the discussion. Similarly Russia cannot even beat Ukraine. What do they think will happen if they go up against NATO.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago (2 children)

nukes are basically zero sum except tactical nukes and dirty bombs

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago (1 children)

tactical nukes escalate all the way to strategic anyway and dirty bombs don't work

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

The modern tactical nuke is as strong as what the US dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. People have this idea that a tactical nuke is 'small', but what is really the case is they are full sized nukes, and strategic nukes are simply larger. From a MAD perspective, there is no reason why dropping a nuke the strength of what was dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki would somehow be notably different than a larger nuke.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

tacnukes were obsoleted by DPICM and later PGMs

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago

Tactical nukes aren't real. They start an escalation ladder that gets you to global thermonuclear war in a few hours. Using a "tactical nuke" is just laying naked your intent to have things go nuclear while giving your opponent a chance to respond.

During the Cuban Missile Crisis Kennedy wanted to nuke Cuba. The joint chiefs told him that if he wanted to do that he would also have to nuke Russia in a massive fully committed first strike.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

I wasn't?

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Since when are we listening to whatever the fucking CIA says as if they were the good guys/ on our side?

edit: That being said, never trust anything Putin's boasting about either