Exclusive: US is 'rigorously preparing' for possible Russian nuclear attack on Ukraine in late 2022, official says

CNN
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At the end of 2022, the United States began “rigorous preparations” for the possibility of Russia attacking Ukraine with nuclear weapons. The attack would have been the first nuclear attack in war since the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki nearly 80 years ago. officials told CNN.

The Biden administration was particularly concerned about Russia's potential use of tactical or battlefield nuclear weapons, officials said.

I first reported that U.S. officials were worried about Russia using tactical nuclear weapons in 2022, in my new book, The Return of the Great Powers, to be published on March 12. I am revealing exclusive details about the unprecedented level of emergency planning undertaken as a senior official. Members of the Biden administration have become increasingly alarmed by the situation.

“That is what the conflict brought us, we believed so, and it is our right to strictly prepare and do everything possible to prevent such things from happening. I think so,” the first government official told me.

What led the Biden administration to such a surprising assessment was not a single metric, but a series of developments, analyzes and, importantly, highly sensitive new information.

A second administration official told me that the administration's concerns were “not just hypothetical, but also based on some information that we had.”

“We needed to plan to put ourselves in the best position possible in case this now-unthinkable event actually happened,” the same government official told me.

During this period, from the end of the summer until the fall of 2022, the National Security Council convened a series of meetings and said, “If there were very clear indications that we were going to do something, that we were going to commit a nuclear attack. , or” developed an emergency plan. If they did, how would we respond and how would we try to preemptively stop them?'' the first government official told me.

“I don't think many of us in our line of work expected to spend so much time preparing scenarios that a few years ago were believed to be from a bygone era.” a senior government official told me.

The late summer of 2022 was a devastating time for Russian troops in Ukraine. Ukrainian troops were advancing into Russian-occupied Kherson in the south. The city was Russia's greatest spoil since the invasion. It was now in danger of being lost to a Ukrainian counterattack. Importantly, as Ukrainian forces advanced, entire Russian units were at risk of being surrounded. There was a view within the administration that such a catastrophic loss could be a “potential trigger” for the use of nuclear weapons.

“If a significant number of Russian troops were overrun, if their lives were crushed in that way, it was a kind of harbinger of a direct potential threat to Russian territory or the Russian state,” the first official said. Ta.

“At that time in Kherson there were increasing signs that the Russian military front might collapse. Tens of thousands of Russian troops were now potentially vulnerable.”

Russia was losing ground, not within Russia, but within the sovereign territory of Ukraine. But U.S. officials were concerned that Russian President Vladimir Putin might see things differently. He told the Russian people that Kherson was now part of Russia itself, and therefore devastating losses there could be perceived as a direct threat to him and the Russian state.

“Our assessment has been for some time that this is one of the scenarios where they would consider using nuclear weapons. [included] An existential threat to the Russian state, a direct threat to Russian territory,” the first official said.

In such an assessment, Russia could view a tactical nuclear strike as a deterrent against further losses of Russian-held territory in Ukraine or a potential attack on Russia itself.

At the same time, Russia's propaganda machine was disseminating new false flag reports about dirty bombs in Ukraine, which U.S. officials feared could be a cover for a Russian nuclear attack.

In October 2022, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu made a series of calls to defense officials from the United States, United Kingdom, France, and Turkey, stating that the Kremlin was “concerned about possible provocations by Kiev, including the use of dirty weapons.” “I'm here,” he said. bomb. ”

U.S. and other Western officials rejected Russia's warnings. Still, Russia's ambassador to the UN personally delivered a letter to the UN detailing similar alleged threats. Russian officials claimed that Ukraine would build and detonate a dirty bomb against Russian forces and blame Russia for the attack.

U.S. officials ignored Russia's warnings, but were concerned about the motives behind them. “Russia's public messages were pretty far-fetched about the possibility of Ukraine using dirty bombs, which we didn't see as fact-based,” the first official told me. Told. “What's even more worrying” to this official was that the Russians would say these things “as an excuse to do something crazy, or as a cover for something they themselves are going to do.” . So that was very alarming. ”

But there was another work that took those concerns to a new level. Western intelligence had received information that there were currently communications between Russian officials explicitly discussing a nuclear attack.

As the first administration official explained to me, there were “indications that we knew through other means that this was at least what the lower echelons of the Russian system were discussing.”

US access to Russia's internal communications has previously proven possible. In the run-up to the invasion of Ukraine, the United States intercepted Russian military commanders discussing preparations for the invasion, and the communications became part of a U.S. intelligence assessment that later confirmed the impending invasion was accurate. It turns out that there is something.

“It's not a strict, black-and-white assessment by any means,” the first government official told me. “But the risk level seemed to be elevated more than at any other point.”

The United States has never detected any information indicating that Russia was taking steps to mobilize its nuclear forces to carry out such an attack.

“We obviously valued tracking, and at least had some ability to track the movements of such nuclear forces,” the official told me. “And there has never been any indication that if they were to go down the path to using nuclear weapons, that would be the type of measures that we expected.”

However, U.S. officials were unsure whether Russia had deployed tactical nuclear weapons. Unlike strategic nuclear weapons that can destroy entire cities, tactical or battlefield nuclear weapons are small enough to be moved silently and can be launched from conventional systems already deployed on Ukrainian battlefields.

“If they were going to use tactical nuclear weapons, especially very low-yield tactical nuclear weapons, especially if they were only going to use one or a very small number, it's not 100 percent clear to us. We obviously knew that,” the official continued.

Several government officials participated in emergency relief efforts. Secretary of State Antony Blinken conveyed U.S. concerns “directly” to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, administration officials said. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley called his Russian counterpart, General Valery Gerasimov, the Russian military chief of staff. President Joe Biden has dispatched CIA Director Bill Burns to meet with Russian foreign intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin in Turkey to convey U.S. concerns about a possible nuclear attack and gauge Russia's intentions, according to a senior U.S. official. It is said that

The United States also developed contingency plans for a Russian nuclear attack and worked closely with allies to warn the Russian side of the consequences of such an attack.

“We had a number of quiet conversations with our core allies to consider our ideas,” the first administration official told me. “This is a hallmark of our entire approach. We can do this work better and stronger when we are fully aligned with our allies.”

india and china

Additionally, the United States sought to enlist the cooperation of non-aligned countries, particularly China and India, to deter such Russian attacks.

“One of the things we've done is not only send a direct message to them, but also urge, pressure and encourage other countries that might be more considerate to do the same. ,” a second government official told me.

U.S. officials say support and public statements from Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi helped avert the crisis.

“It is also a useful and persuasive element to demonstrate to the international community our concerns about this, especially the concerns of Russia and the major powers in the Global South, and to give them an idea of ​​what the costs of all this will be. We believe we were able to demonstrate that,” said the first senior executive. A government official said.

“I think the fact that we know that China, India and other countries have consulted may have had some influence on their thinking,” a second senior administration official told me. told. “I can't say this positively, but I think that's our assessment.”

Since the nuclear scare in late 2022, I have been asking US and European officials whether they have identified similar threats. The danger diminished as the war entered a period of relative stalemate in the East. But the United States and its allies remain cautious.

“Since that time, we've become less concerned about the immediate outlook, but it's never far from our minds,” a senior U.S. official told me. “We continue to refine our plans, but at least we are not beyond the realm of possibility of facing this heightened risk again in the coming months.”