Russia will make changes to its doctrine on the use of nuclear weapons in response to what it regards as Western escalation in the war in Ukraine, state media quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov as saying on Sunday.
The existing nuclear doctrine, set out in a decree by President Vladimir Putin in 2020, says Russia may use nuclear weapons in the event of a nuclear attack by an enemy or a conventional attack that threatens the existence of the state.
Some hawks among Russia’s military analysts have urged Putin to lower the threshold for nuclear use in order to “sober up” Russia’s enemies in the West.
In Putin’s eyes:
Putin = Russia.
So, “threatens the existence of the state” means “I might personally lose power over this”.
It wasn’t that long ago troops marched towards Putin, and while he meant to teach the lesson “go against me and die” what he really taught everyone was “next time don’t negotiate and don’t believe anything I say”.
All it takes is letting some fall guy with a personal grudge against Putin get close to him with a gun.
Everyone gets to pretend that they didn’t want him dead, and the fall guy gets killed immediately after but got to settle his score first.
Without Putin the focus goes back on making money, and Russia stops invading people and threatening nuclear Armageddon.
The people around him are definitely considering if he’s worth more as a myth than a man at this point.