Ukraine

8279 readers

521 users here now

News and discussion related to Ukraine

*Sympathy for enemy combatants is prohibited.

*No content depicting extreme violence or gore.

*Posts containing combat footage should include [Combat] in title

*Combat videos containing any footage of a visible human must be flagged NSFW

Donate to support Ukraine's Defense

Donate to support Humanitarian Aid

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

Russian President Putin signs a new doctrine that lowers the threshold for using nuclear weapons (apnews.com)

submitted 3 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

28 comments fedilink hide all child comments

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/28311786

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday signed a revised nuclear doctrine declaring that a conventional attack on Russia by any nation that is supported by a nuclear power will be considered a joint attack on his country.

The signing of the doctrine, which says that any massive aerial attack on Russia could trigger a nuclear response, reflects Putin’s readiness to threaten use of the country’s nuclear arsenal to force the West to back down as Moscow presses a slow-moving offensive in Ukraine.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

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

Oh I see what you're saying, I thought the term was more literal than you're suggesting.

I suppose the US president could launch a retaliatory strike based on a first strike that is still in the air, which is launch on warning, but the policy is to wait for a first strike and then have the president issue an order.

My understaning of launch on warning is any policy with no discretion, based on standing orders, not that it was necessarily strictly computer automated. The US policy is "hair trigger alert" which means that the strike systems are constantly in ready state, awaiting a valid order.

All I mean to say is that this is unlike the Russian system, which upon detecting an incoming missile issues valid, pre-approved orders to launch, with perhaps a human needed only to turn the key, but with no built in discretion once the pre-approved order is authenticated. The US does not have pre-approved launch orders.