Will Putin Abandon the Special Military Operation and Declare War?
Nuclear expert Steven Starr on what might come next in Ukraine...
Professor Steven Starr is the former director of the Clinical Laboratory Science Program at the University of Missouri. His expertise is recognized via his publications that appear in both the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and the Federation of American Scientists.
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Consider what has transpired since the war in Ukraine began in February 2022:
Russia has suffered (1) the first invasion of Russia since World War 2 in the Kursk region, (2) constant drone attacks on Russian oil pipelines, oil refineries, and natural gas facilities, (3) constant artillery and missile attacks on Russian civilians not associated with the Ukraine War (including evacuation 121,000 civilians during the invasion of Kursk), (4) constant sabotage of Russian infrastructure including railways, bridges, and trains carrying civilians, (5) the interception and attempted hijacking of Russian oil in tankers traversing the Baltic Sea by Estonia and Germany, and (6) more than 100,000 Russian soldiers killed and hundreds of thousands wounded in the fighting; all casualties inflicted with US and NATO-supplied weapons and munitions, (7) drone attacks on its strategic nuclear assets at 3 of its 10 nuclear Early Warning Radar facilities on May 22 and 26, 2024, and (8) on June 1, 2025, a series of major drone attacks against 5 air bases where many Russian strategic bombers were damaged and destroyed.
The drone attack about one year ago on the 3 Russian strategic nuclear Early Warning Radar facilities was a deciding factor in the revision of the official "Fundamentals of State Policy of the Russian Federation on Nuclear Deterrence", published in December 2024 on the website of Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The revisions included these statements:
II. The Essence of Nuclear Deterrence
10. Aggression by any state from a military coalition (bloc, alliance) against the Russian Federation and (or) its allies is considered as the aggression by this coalition (bloc, alliance) as a whole.
11. Aggression against the Russian Federation and (or) its allies by any non-nuclear state with the participation or support of a nuclear state is considered as their joint attack.
13. Nuclear deterrence is ensured by the presence in the structure of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation of combat-ready forces and means capable of inflicting assured unacceptable damage on a potential adversary under any circumstances through the employment of nuclear weapons, as well as by the readiness and resolve of the Russian Federation to employ such weapons.
15. The main military risks that, depending on changes in the military-political and strategic situation, can evolve into military threats to the Russian Federation (threats of aggression) and that are intended to be neutralized by the implementation of nuclear deterrence are as follows:
b) possession and deployment by a potential adversary of missile defence systems and assets, intermediate- and shorter-range cruise and ballistic missiles, high-precision non-nuclear and hypersonic weapons, unmanned combat vehicles of various basing modes, directed energy weapons that can be used against the Russian Federation;
f) establishment of new or expansion of existing military coalitions (blocs, alliances), leading to the advancement of their military infrastructure to the borders of the Russian Federation;
g) actions by a potential adversary aimed at isolating a part of the territory of the Russian Federation, including blocking access to vital transport communications;
i) planning and conduct of large-scale military exercises by a potential adversary near the borders of the Russian Federation;
19. The conditions that enable the possibility of nuclear weapons employment by the Russian Federation are as follows:
c) actions by an adversary affecting elements of critically important state or military infrastructure of the Russian Federation, the disablement of which would disrupt response actions by nuclear forces;
Consider how many of the previously listed attacks on Russia apply to this list.
While the US has tried to maintain the fiction that the Ukraine War is a war between Russia and Ukraine, the US Secretary of State has publicly admitted that Ukraine is being used as a US proxy to attack Russia. The war would have ended in 2022, but the US and the UK intervened to kill the peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine; the draft agreement had already been signed by both parties before Zelensky was told to tear it up because the US would give him complete backing if he allowed the war to continue.
The New York Times reported in March 2025 that US Generals located in Wiesbaden had been working with the CIA to plan, direct, and coordinate attacks on Russian forces, including targets within Russia. Zelensky has stated that the latest drone attack on Russian strategic nuclear bombers and air bases required a year and half of planning. This attack certainly required the assistance and participation of the US military and probably other members of NATO. Real-time intelligence and surveillance was required for the targeting of Putin's helicopter, which could only have been supplied by US satellite and/or aerial reconnaissance. The assassination attempt on Putin, which used a swarm of Ukrainian drones to attack his helicopter while in mid-flight, was also coordinated to occur at the height of a massive Ukrainian drone attack.
The UK, France, and Germany are now actively and publicly preparing for war with Russia.
The Russian leadership and population are clearly enraged by all these threats and attacks, which have become so numerous and destructive that they cannot be hidden.
The cumulative effect of all these events will force Putin to take decisive military action. I think Putin will abandon the Special Military Operation (SMO) and declare war on Ukraine. Trump had better "walk away" from Ukraine, as he has been threatening, otherwise there is a significant chance that the US will wind up with a direct military conflict with Russia in Ukraine.
Dr Starr's piece triggered a few thoughts. Might as well share them, for what they're worth.
He may prove to be right but if so, any such escalation would I fear be a grave error on Russia's part.
As things stand, for most of the world Russia still occupies the moral high ground. While no one (very much including Russia) likes the SMO, given the intransigence of its adversaries the need to carry on is generally acknowledged outside the west and Russia's patience and restraint are appreciated.
The net result, in my view, is that the small cracks in western unity are slowly widening. While most of the elites are still committed, the economic and social consequences of the anti-Russia crusade are uniformly negative. Domestic politics, particularly in Europe, are becoming ever more fractious. In short, time is on Russia's side.
A dramatic escalation would derail all that. And for what? If one thing has become clear in the last three years, it's just how much military force is required to subdue a determined opponent who has substantial external assistance.
Short of nuclear armageddon, in which everyone loses, how likely is it that any stepped up attack, or sequence of attacks, would break the will of Russia's opponents? More likely, I suspect, would be a further hardening of their attitudes and, perhaps, an increase in their number.
While I'm still not sure launching the SMO was the best strategy, having done so the cool, calm, methodical and careful manner in which it's been conducted has made the best of Russia's exquisitely difficult situation. With the military endgame in Ukraine in sight, changing the plan in an essentially emotional response to these latest provocations would not only be hugely risky, but quite likely counter-productive.
Putin has always kept the end game in mind. Namely, what sort of world will we be left with after the SMO is complete? The path to a livable, at least marginally cooperative one is narrow and demonstrations of destructive capability are unlikely to help.
Well surely the SMO ended summer 2022 with the appointment of Surovikin and the start of attrition warfare. I have not heard of Russians being arrested for calling the SMO a war since then.
Some context. Russia has 100k+ military dead, true. But Ukraine has 1.2million military dead. Ukraine is about to collapse at any moment - hence the wild terrorism and sabotage being promoted as Ukrainian success. That Western media still write up this nonsense as a real threat to Russia shows that western media understands how close to collapse Ukraine (and Nato) is.
Meanwhile weapon wise US and Nato look pathetic with their wunderwaffen being quite ineffective while Russia's hypersonics have proved vastly superior to anything the west has (and Yemen undelined the point too).
Russia has switched its economy to supplying BRICS with raw materials and demonstrated the ineffectiveness of sanctions not just on Russia but on anyone else too.
US has pretty much pulled out of Nato and what remains is collapsing (all the talk is of much higher military spending by 2030 so we know there is nothing at present).
Russia has known it was fighting Nato since 2014 or earlier. It chose not to back LPR/DPR rebels in 2014/15 because at that time direct conflict with Nato soldiers in Nato uniforms would have been unpleasant at best and perhaps worse. instead it accepted the obviously false Minsk agreements which (though Putin claims not to hav been deceived) they certainly knew would not be kept by Nato controlled Ukraine.
It is of course the Karate Kid or one of many hollywood movies, Nato bullies Russia in 1990, in 2000s, in 2010s and continues in 2020s. (Just look at the maps of Nato year by year). Perfectly sensible policy in 1990s when Russia was very weak. Less wise in 2000s when Nato had taken the peace dividend. Russia went to the gym, Nato sat and drank beer. By 2010s Nato was weak but still the bully boy - Nato learnt its lesson in 2022.
In 2017 Trump told a few truths - MAGA (still the only acknowledgement by any western leader that US or West was on the way down. And the 2% of GDP on defence for European Nato countries or US will not defend you - was a direct warning of the planned war with Russia.
So the good news is that Nato is already defeated, Russia prepared for a 2020s war with Nato, Nato claims to be preparing for a 2030s war. It is not happening now.