jens stoltenberg
Campaigners Decry 'Dangerous Escalation' as NATO Chief Floats Nuclear Deployment
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons said both NATO and Russia must "reverse course" and end their nuclear brinkmanship.
Nuclear disarmament campaigners on Monday implored NATO and Russia to step back from the brink after the head of the Western military alliance said its members are considering deploying additional atomic weapons to counter Moscow and Beijing.
"This is the dangerous escalation inherent to the deterrence doctrine," the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) wrote on social media, referring to the notion that the threat of catastrophic nuclear retaliation prevents nations from using atomic weaponry.
The U.S., which spent more on its atomic weapons arsenal than every other nuclear-armed nation combined last year, currently has nukes deployed in five NATO countries—Italy, Germany, Turkey, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Russia, meanwhile, recently deployed nuclear weapons to Belarus, which said earlier this month that it would join Moscow's nuclear exercises.
ICAN said Monday that "it's time for both to reverse course."
"NATO countries hosting U.S. nuclear weapons should admit to their citizens they have weapons of mass destruction on their soil with no public say," ICAN added. "But neither Belarus nor NATO allies should flaunt being prepared to indiscriminately kill millions of people."
"The risk of nuclear weapons use, and public attention to this danger, is at an all-time high."
The group's warning came after NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg toldThe Telegraph on Sunday that members of the military alliance are in the process of deliberating over "how many nuclear warheads should be operational and which should be stored."
"NATO's aim is, of course, a world without nuclear weapons, but as long as nuclear weapons exist, we will remain a nuclear alliance, because a world where Russia, China, and North Korea have nuclear weapons, and NATO does not, is a more dangerous world," Stoltenberg continued.
The NATO chief's remarks drew a swift response from Moscow. Dmitry Peskov, a spokesperson for the Kremlin, condemned Stoltenberg's comments as "nothing else but an escalation" and claimed that whenever Russian President Vladimir Putin "comments on the issue of nuclear arms, he does so taking someone's questions or questions from reporters, including foreign ones."
A report published Monday by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) found that "nearly all" of the world's 2,100 deployed nuclear warheads that were "kept in a state of high operational alert" as of January 2024 belonged to the U.S. or Russia.
Separately, ICAN released an analysis Monday showing that the U.S., Russia, and China were the world's largest spenders on nuclear weapons last year. The U.S. and Russia control about 90% of the world's arsenal of atomic weapons. According to experts, a nuclear conflict between the two countries would likely kill tens of millions of people within hours and set off a devastating global famine.
"The risk of nuclear weapons use, and public attention to this danger, is at an all-time high," ICAN's new report warns. "Explicit and implicit threats to use nuclear weapons, including in the context of ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, combined with the Oppenheimer blockbuster, Fallout TV show (and possible video game reboot), and bestselling book 'Nuclear War: A Scenario,' mean the world is talking about the bomb."
Putin Warns of 'Serious Consequences' If Ukraine Uses Western Arms in Russia
The Russian president condemned the West's "constant escalation" as NATO members including France, Germany, and Canada back Kyiv's use of long-range missiles to attack targets inside his country.
As the head of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and leaders of NATO member nations joined the United States in advocating Ukrainian use of Western-supplied weapons to strike inside Russia, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Tuesday that any such attacks could have grave repercussions.
"This constant escalation can lead to serious consequences," Putin told reporters during a visit to Uzbekistan. "If these serious consequences occur in Europe, how will the United States behave, bearing in mind our parity in the field of strategic weapons? It's hard to say—do they want a global conflict?"
Putin's remarks came after French President Emmanuel Macronsaid Ukraine should be allowed to "neutralize" bases inside Russia from which Russian forces are launching missiles at Ukrainian targets.
"We should not allow them to touch other targets in Russia, and obviously civilian capacities," Macron said during a visit to Germany.
🇩🇪 🇺🇦 German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said Germany would not prohibit Ukrainian attacks on Russian military targets, saying Ukraine "is allowed to defend itself."
He made the comments in a joint show of policy support with French President Emmanuel Macron in Meseburg. pic.twitter.com/jqJctfeD3T
— euronews (@euronews) May 29, 2024
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz—who has so far declined to approve the transfer of his country's Taurus long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine—said he agreed with Macron, so long as Kyiv adheres to any restrictions imposed by suppliers.
"Ukraine has every possibility under international law for what it is doing. That has to be said explicitly," Scholz said during a joint press conference with Macron. "I find it strange when some people argue that it should not be allowed to defend itself and take measures that are suitable for this."
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday that he also supports letting Ukrainian forces use Western-supplied arms to attack Russia, which launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
"The time has come to consider whether it will be right to lift some of the restrictions which have been imposed because we see now that especially in the Kharkiv region, the front line and the borderline is more or less the same," he asserted.
The United Kingdom, Canada, Poland, the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, the Czech Republic, and other NATO members also say Ukraine should be permitted to attack targets inside Russia.
In the United States, NATO's most powerful member, there is disagreement within the Biden administration over the policy. While Secretary of State Antony Blinken is reportedly pushing for a change in the administration's stance against the use of U.S.-supplied weapons to attack Russian soil, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters Tuesday that "there's no change to our policy at this point."
"We don't encourage or enable the use of U.S.-supplied weapons to strike inside Russia," Kirby said.
Blinken, speaking in Moldova on Wednesday ahead of NATO talks in Prague, Czech Republic, responded to a question about whether the U.S. would support Ukrainian use of Western-supplied arms to attack Russia by saying that "we're always listening, we're always learning, and we're always making determinations about what's necessary to make sure that Ukraine can effectively continue to defend itself."
"At every step along the way we've adapted and adjusted as necessary," he added. "And so that's exactly what we'll do going forward."
Police in Chișinău, Moldova's capital, violently arrested anti-war demonstrators protesting Blinken's visit. Protesters reportedly doused American flags in beetroot juice simulating blood and chanted messages including "Blinken, go home; we don't want war!" and "We don't need NATO."