Biden Riffs on Armageddon – WSJ

“Think about it. We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban missile crisis. We’ve got a guy I know fairly well; his name is Vladimir Putin. I spent a fair amount of time with him. He is not joking when he talks about the potential use of tactical and nuclear weapons, or biological or chemical weapons, because his military is, you might say, significantly underperforming,” Mr. Biden told the Democratic worthies.

“It’s part of Russian doctrine that they will not—they will not—if the motherland is threatened, they’ll use whatever force they need, including nuclear weapons,” he added. “I don’t think there’s any such thing as an ability to easily [use] a tactical nuclear weapon and not end up with Armageddon.”

Pass the canapes and make my next drink a double.

It’s tempting to pass this off as one of Mr. Biden’s random soliloquies that the White House quickly walks back. Recall the three times he’s said the U.S. will defend Taiwan militarily, which his staff explained away each time. And sure enough, on Friday the White House told reporters there was no new information about Mr. Putin’s intentions that had prompted Mr. Biden’s focus on the bomb.

Yet that’s hardly reassuring since Mr. Putin has threatened to use tactical nukes, and it isn’t clear the Russian believes in the credibility of the U.S. nuclear deterrent. U.S. vows of “consequences” didn’t stop him from making the catastrophic mistake of invading Ukraine.

Mr. Biden didn’t help on this score when he also said at the fundraiser that “we’re trying to figure out: What—what is Putin’s off-ramp? Where—where does he get off? Where does he find a way out? Where does he find himself in a position that he does not not only lose face, but lose significant power within Russia?”

If you’re Mr. Putin, you might interpret that to mean Mr. Biden is looking for his own off-ramp, and that maybe escalating with a nuclear explosion would cause Mr. Biden and Europe to give him a ramp that includes a large chunk of Ukraine.

Mr. Biden is right about how dangerous Mr. Putin is now that his military is losing ground in Ukraine. He has trapped himself in a place where he lacks the conventional military power to win, but he can’t afford to lose a war without risking his position at home. The war has revealed the low morale and discipline of Russian forces, and his mobilization of 300,000 more men may not stop Ukraine’s advances. He faces growing criticism in Russia for the war’s mismanagement. All of this suggests no small risk of nuclear escalation.

But such a step would also carry grave risks for Mr. Putin. The battlefield utility of tactical nukes is limited against dispersed forces, and his own troops would be vulnerable. He’d poison with radiation land he hopes to own. He could lose the support of the allies he has left, such as China and India. President

Xi Jinping

doesn’t want to see the first use of a nuclear weapon since Nagasaki prompt Japan to get a bomb.

Mr. Putin might hope to demoralize Ukraine enough by nuking a city, but the opposite effect is more likely. Ukraine’s fury would cause it to press on, no doubt with more support from the U.S. and NATO.

Which brings us back to Mr. Biden. If he really does fear a nuclear escalation, he owes more of an explanation to the American people than cocktail-party doomsday chatter. He needs to marshal support in Congress and around the world to do everything possible to deter Mr. Putin. A crucial part of deterrence in a democracy is preparing the public for the challenges it might confront. Instead his comments have needlessly frightened Americans and maybe undermined deterrence.