Since the Soviet era, Moscow has traditionally used nuclear weapons and nuclear energy as its foreign policy tool. At the same time, the methods of nuclear preferences or nuclear blackmail are widely used to attract potential partners or to make pressure on opponents.
Immediately after the beginning of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the USA/NATO, mass production of nuclear weapons was started in the USSR. A peak stockpile of about 45,000 nuclear warheads was reached by the Soviet Union in 1986, and it was the largest nuclear arsenal in the world. At the same time, the number of strategic and tactical exercises of the USSR nuclear forces, which were openly hostile toward Western countries, were increased significantly.
As early as 1953, Moscow transferred nuclear weapons production technologies to the People’s Republic of China as its US/NATO ally and opponent. China’s nuclear industry was also created with the help of the Soviet Union. Such actions of the USSR contradicted the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) and led to its spread in the world.
The collapse of the USSR in 1991 enabled the process of nuclear disarmament, as a result of which the Russian Federation was left with only 6,300 nuclear warheads. At the time of normalization of Russian-Western relations, the number of nuclear exercises was also reduced. Nevertheless, Russia’s nuclear potential remained the largest in the world (for comparison: the US has 5,400 warheads).
This process has become the reason for the increase of nuclear safety in the world. However, as a result of Putin’s coming to power in 2000 and his anti-Western policy, this process was actually stopped. In particular, in 2002, in response to Washington’s exit from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, Russia withdrew from the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (SNO-2).
Russia has also resumed systematic nuclear exercises, as it did during the Cold War. Despite the lack of funds in the Russian budget, the process of modernization of strategic and tactical nuclear weapons of the Russian Armed Forces, which received priority funding, became more active.
However, before the attack on Ukraine in 2014, Russia tried to avoid escalation in relations with the US and NATO, as it tried to maintain unlimited access to Western markets, loans and technologies. This Moscow’s position changed significantly only after the USA and the EU’s sanctions regime imposed against Russia for its aggression in Ukraine.
The leadership of the Russian Federation began to threaten the West to use nuclear weapons against it. It was accompanied by practical steps to demonstrate this possibility.
After the start of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine in 2022, Moscow’s provocative actions became obvious. In particular, in 2023–2024, Russia deployed tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of Belarus. The Kremlin threatens to revise the nuclear doctrine of the Russian Federation. At the beginning of 2024, exercises of the RF strategic nuclear forces were held. In addition, Russia has conducted tactical nuclear weapons exercises, including on the eve of high-level NATO Summits. In this way, Moscow is trying to intimidate the West and deter it from active assistance to Ukraine in resisting Russian aggression.
In its efforts to intimidate the West, Russia cynically uses the United Nations international organization to promote its own initiatives, and the nuclear energy subject to blackmail the international community, including the countries of the Global South. Unfortunately, today Moscow uses the issue of nuclear energy as a new tool of geopolitical expansion, instead of oil and gas issue, previously used by Russia as the “energy weapons”.
