According to the researcher, the effectiveness of threats with a nuclear weapon has weakened, and Russia is now trying to strengthen the effectiveness of threats.
Russia’s new doctrine has not increased the risk of using a nuclear weapon. This is what the researcher who visited in the morning on Wednesday estimated Kristi Raik.
Russia announced on Tuesday that it has changed its nuclear weapon doctrine, i.e. its instructions and rules regarding the use of nuclear weapons. The new doctrine would allow the use of nuclear weapons in more cases than before.
Russia has threatened with nuclear weapons before, but according to Raik, the effectiveness of the threat has weakened.
– By changing the doctrine, Russia is trying to strengthen it again.
Russia’s goal is to test whether a new threat could influence the policy of Western countries that support Ukraine, Raik, who works as the deputy director of the International Defense Research Center of Estonia (ICDS), estimates.
Director of the Alexander Institute of the University of Helsinki Markku Kangaspuro agrees with Raik.
Kangaspuro adds that Russia may also try to influence Ukraine’s security policy position in the future. Russia opposes Ukraine’s joining NATO and the transfer of Western armaments to Ukraine after the end of the war.
– Although that [ydinaseiden käytön] the risk is of course small, it’s a matter of course, knowing the consequences of a nuclear war, in any case even that small risk has to be taken seriously, says Kangaspuro.