Strategy&Future

Scott Sagan w swoim uznawanym za epokowy artykule „Why do states build nuclear weapons. Three models in search of a bomb” przedstawia rolę, jaką odgrywa kształtowanie norm zachowania państw w odniesieniu do broni jądrowej – i jakiej zmianie uległo postrzeganie proliferacji przez wspólnotę międzynarodową. Sagan zastanawia się, jak to jest, że podczas gdy w latach 60. dążenie do posiadania broni jądrowej było postrzegane jako uzasadniony i prestiżowy cel państw (niezależnie nawet od znaczenia jej posiadania dla bezpieczeństwa), w następnych dekadach proliferacja stała się aktem nieodpowiedzialnym i nielegalnym...

The decision taken by the government of Tadeusz Mazowiecki in December 1990 to put the “Żarnowiec” Nuclear Power Plant then under construction into liquidation was preceded by a series of earlier political decisions, the careful examination of which shows that with the end of communism, the possibility of building the first nuclear-powered power plant did not close to Poland.

Poland is the only country of the former Eastern bloc where no nuclear power plant was built. Although power units had been under construction in Żarnowiec since 1983, the decision of the government of Tadeusz Mazowiecki stopped work on them in 1990 and real actions aimed at building nuclear power stations will start only now. However, it is worth considering how it happened that for so many years in the People’s Republic Poland (Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa, or PRL), no government managed to create Polish nuclear power plants.

Albert Świdziński and Patty-Jane Geller discuss the Biden Administration 2022 Nuclear Posture Review.

What if the Russians wanted to end the conflict by using threats or actually using nuclear weapons not by trying to scare Ukraine’s allies, but by forcing a readiness for peace talks directly in Kyiv? Sechser and Fuhrmann analysed a total of 200 cases of disputes between states (between 1918 and 2001) possessing nuclear weapons, in which one of them issued extortionate threats against the other.

Almost exactly sixty years ago, in October 1962, the Cuban crisis took place. Speaking on Thursday 6th October, at a meeting with donors supporting the Democratic party’s campaign for the Congressional by-elections, President Biden stated that “For the first time since the Cuban Missile Crisis, we have a direct threat to the use of nuclear weapons, if in fact things continue down the path they’d been going.” It is worth noting that Biden was referring not to situations where a nuclear weapon could be used in the course of an unintentional escalation (i.e., for example, during the Able Archer ’83 exercise), but as a result of structural factors.

The war in Ukraine unleashed by Russia represents the most serious challenge that has been faced by the United States since the end of the Cold War, a clear challenge to both the international order and the rules of the road established by Washington during the unipolar moment. In fact, the most important postulate that was part of the list of demands made by Russia against the collective West in December 2021 was the recognition of Russia’s right to have its own sphere of influence – and thus accepting its imperial status.

In addition to Putin’s two declared goals in Ukraine, “denazification” and “demilitarisation,” we should think about adding a third, which is to deprive the country of access to any source of traditional energy like coal, hydro, thermal, or nuclear power stations, most of which are stationed in Eastern and Central Ukraine. A special component of Moscow’s strategy appears to be to gain control over the nuclear plants, uranium deposits, and to destroy the infrastructure enabling Ukraine to restore nuclear weapons.

On Sunday 27th February (the day before the meeting of the Russian and Ukrainian negotiating teams), President Vladimir Putin announced that the nuclear forces of the Russian Federation would be under increased readiness. Let’s add that Putin did not specify whether it is a strategic or a non-strategic force.

On 5th December 1994, the three depository states of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) that entered into force on 5th March 1970 – Russia, UK, and the US – pledged to provide security assurances to Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine for their accession to the NPT and to respect their independence and sovereignty within their existing borders. Already from the very document, it is possible to draw three main components.

“I asked my opponents the question, ‘Who are our weapons aimed at?’ If we are to retarget our missiles, we must choose a target to aim the missiles at. Let’s suppose that we choose a target. What will the reaction be in a situation where no one aims their missiles at us while we choose an ‘enemy’ to target our missiles? What will be the international reaction and attitude toward Ukraine?” Leonid Kravchuk, 1993 TV-statement

Jacek Bartosiak talks to Hugh White on strategic implications of nuclear submarine acquisition for Australia as well as the operational aspects of that procurement.