
The treaty limits each side to 1,550 deployed strategic weapons, down from tens of thousands at the height of the Cold War. It has put an end, at least for now, to the discussions between Russia and the United States about what they do in four years, when the one remaining nuclear treaty between the two countries, called New START, expires. It came only a few days after he warned the United States and other NATO powers to stay out of the conflict, adding that “the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history.” Putin’s judgment, the decision to put the forces on alert in the midst of extraordinary tensions over the invasion of Ukraine was highly unusual. The ground-based nuclear forces - the intercontinental ballistic missiles kept in silos by both nations - are always in a state of readiness, a keystone to the strategy of “mutually assured destruction” that helped avoid nuclear exchanges at even the most tense moments of the Cold War. A deviation from usual practice would almost certainly be noticeable. The Times has also launched a Telegram channel to make its journalism more accessible around the world.Ī vast nuclear-detection apparatus run by the United States and its allies monitors Russia’s nuclear forces at all times, and experts said they would not be surprised to see Russian bombers taken out of their hangars and loaded with nuclear weapons, or submarines stuffed with nuclear weapons leave port and head out to sea.īoth Russia and the United States conduct drills that replicate various levels of nuclear alert status, so the choreography of such moves is well understood by both sides.

Putin has reminded the world, and Washington, that he has a massive arsenal and might be tempted to use it. It was the second time in a week that Mr. Biden, in Delaware for the weekend, respond to Mr. Similar concerns drove the decision not to have Mr. Putin wants to create that impression, to add to Washington’s unease. Clapper Jr., said in public today what some officials have been saying in private since the Russian leader began accusing Ukraine of genocide and claiming it was developing nuclear weapons of its own. The former director of national intelligence, James R. And his outburst highlighted anew the question, coursing through the American intelligence community, about the state of mind of the Russian leader, a man previously described as pragmatic, calculating and cunning.
