US Strategic Command, the branch of the US military responsible for America’s nuclear arsenal, tweeted the following on Tuesday:

“The spectrum of conflict today is neither linear nor predictable. We must account for the possibility of conflict leading to conditions which could very rapidly drive an adversary to consider nuclear use as their least bad option.”

The statement, which STRATCOM called a “preview” of the Posture Statement it submits to US Congress every year, was a bit intense for Twitter and sparked a lot of alarmed responses. This alarm was due not to any inaccuracy in STRATCOM’s frank statement, but due to the bizarre fact that our world’s increasing risk of nuclear war barely features in mainstream discourse.

#USSTRATCOM Posture Statement Preview: The spectrum of conflict today is neither linear nor predictable. We must account for the possibility of conflict leading to conditions which could very rapidly drive an adversary to consider nuclear use as their least bad option. pic.twitter.com/4Oe7xkl05L

— US Strategic Command (@US_Stratcom) April 20, 2021

STRATCOM has been preparing not just to use its nuclear arsenal for deterrence but also to “win” a nuclear war should one arise from the (entirely US-created) “conditions” which are “neither linear nor predictable”. And it’s looking increasingly likely that one will as the prevailing orthodoxy among western imperialists that US unipolar hegemony must be preserved at all cost rushes headlong toward America’s plunge into post-primacy.

The US has been ramping up aggressions with Russia in a way that has terrified experts, and it looks likely to continue doing so. These aggressions are further complicated on increasingly tense fronts like Ukraine, which is threatening to obtain nuclear weapons if it isn’t granted membership to NATO, either of which would increase the risk of conflict. Aggressions against nuclear-armed China are escalating on what seems like a daily basis at this point, with potential flashpoints in the China Seas, Taiwan, Xinjiang, Hong Kong, India, and any number of other possible fronts.

STRATCOM commander Charles Richard told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday that China’s nuclear capabilities are advancing so rapidly that they’re not even bothering with intelligence vetted more than a month ago in their briefings because it’s probably already out of date, urging an upgrade in America’s nuclear infrastructure. Richard reportedly testified that a portion of China’s nuclear arsenal has been recently primed for ready use.

The fact that those in charge of US nuclear weapons now see both Russia and China as a major nuclear threat, and the fact that US cold warriors are escalating against both of them, is horrifying. The fact that they’re again playing with “low-yield” nukes designed to actually be used on the battlefield makes it even more so. This is to say nothing of tensions between nuclear-armed Pakistan and nuclear-armed India, between nuclear-armed Israel and its neighbors, and between nuclear-armed North Korea and the western empire.

While China keeps the majority of its forces in a peacetime status, increasing evidence suggests China has moved a portion of its nuclear force to a Launch on Warning (LOW) posture and are adopting a limited “high alert duty” strategy. @US_Stratcom testimony at SASC right now.

— Barbara Starr (@barbarastarrcnn) April 20, 2021

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has the 2021 Doomsday Clock at 100 seconds to midnight, citing the rising threat of nuclear war:

“Accelerating nuclear programs in multiple countries moved the world into less stable and manageable territory last year. Development of hypersonic glide vehicles, ballistic missile defenses, and weapons-delivery systems that can flexibly use conventional or nuclear warheads may raise the probability of miscalculation in times of tension. Events like the deadly assault earlier this month on the US Capitol renewed legitimate concerns about national leaders who have sole control of the use of nuclear weapons. Nuclear nations, however, have ignored or undermined practical and available diplomatic and security tools for managing nuclear risks. By our estimation, the potential for the world to stumble into nuclear war — an ever-present danger over the last 75 years — increased in 2020. An extremely dangerous global failure to address existential threats — what we called ‘the new abnormal’ in 2019 — tightened its grip in the nuclear realm in the past year, increasing the likelihood of catastrophe.”

In a recent interview Phoenix Media Co-op’s Slava Zilber, Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft nuclear policy specialist Joe Cirincione described a ramp-up in weapons technology among all nuclear-armed nations in the world, the future of which he described as “bleak”:

“We right now have a global nuclear arms race. Each of the nine nuclear-armed nations are building new weapons. Some are replacing weapons that are getting old. Others are expanding their arsenals. But all of these new weapons represent new capabilities for these countries. So you’re seeing a qualitative and a quantitative arms race that is completely unchecked.

“If you look at the data that’s collected by the Federation of American Scientists, for example, you see that — since the 1980s at the height of the Cold War — we have slashed the global nuclear arsenals. We went from a world in 1986 where there were almost 70,000 nuclear weapons in the world down to where we are now where there’s just about 13,500 nuclear weapons. Tremendous progress. 85% reduction in the stockpile…

“But it’s flattened out. There really haven’t been significant reductions for years. The 2010 New START agreement was the last successful arms control agreement. That was 11 years ago. There’s been no reduction agreement since then. There’ve been no talks about new reductions agreements. Now I think the future of arms control is bleak. It’s bleak. And I see no interest really in a new round of arms control either from the United States or from Russia. So I’m pessimistic about our prospects.”

As I all too frequently find myself having to remind people, the primary risk here is not that anyone will choose to have a nuclear war, it’s that a nuke will be deployed amid heightening tensions as a result of miscommunication, miscalculation, misfire, or malfunction, as nearly happened many times during the last cold war, thereby setting off everyone’s nukes as per Mutually Assured Destruction.

The more tense things get, the likelier such an event becomes. This new cold war is happening along two fronts, with a bunch of proxy conflicts complicating things even further. There are so very many small moving parts, and it’s impossible to remain in control of all of them.

People like to think every nuclear-armed country has one “The Button” with which they can consciously choose to start a nuclear war after careful deliberation, but it doesn’t work that way. There are thousands of people in the world controlling different parts of different nuclear arsenals who could independently initiate a nuclear war. Thousands of “The Buttons”. It only takes one. The arrogance of believing anyone can control such a conflict safely, for years, is astounding.

A 2014 report published in the journal Earth’s Future found that it would only take the detonation of 100 nuclear warheads to throw 5 teragrams of black soot into the earth’s stratosphere for decades, blocking out the sun and making the photosynthesis of plants impossible. This could easily starve every terrestrial organism to death that didn’t die of radiation or climate chaos first. China has hundreds of nuclear weapons; Russia and the United States have thousands.

This should be the main thing everyone talks about. There is literally no more urgent matter on earth than the looming possibility that everyone might die in a nuclear war.

But people don’t see it.

On a recent Tucker Carlson Tonight appearance, former congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard did a solid job describing the horrors of nuclear war and the very real possibility that it could be inflicted upon us due to America’s insane brinkmanship with Russia. She spoke earnestly about how “such a war would come at a cost beyond anything we can really imagine,” painting an entirely accurate picture of “hundreds of millions of people dying and suffering, seeing their flesh being burned from their bones.”

Gabbard is correct, and was right to give such a confrontational account of what we are looking at right now. But if you read the replies to Gabbard’s tweet in which she shared a clip from the interview, you’ll see a deluge of commenters accusing her of “hyperbole”, saying she’s being soft on Putin, and admonishing her for appearing on Tucker Carlson. It’s like they can’t even hear what she’s saying, how real it is, how significant it is.

People’s failure to wrap their minds around this issue is a testament to the power of normalcy bias, a cognitive glitch which causes us to assume that because something bad hasn’t happened in the past, it won’t happen in the future. We survived the last cold war ; the only reason people are around to bleat “hyperbole” is because we got lucky. There’s no reason to believe we’ll get lucky in this new cold war environment; only normalcy bias says we will. Believing we’ll survive this cold war just because we survived the last one is as sane as believing Russian roulette is safe because the guy passing you the gun didn’t die.

It’s also a testament to the power of plain old psychological compartmentalization. People can’t handle the idea of everything ending, of everyone they know and love dying, of watching their loved ones die in flames or from radiation poisoning right in front of them, all because someone made a mistake at the wrong time after a bunch of imperialists decided that US planetary domination was worth rolling the dice on the life of every terrestrial organism for.

But mostly it’s a testament to the ubiquitous malpractice of the western media. It’s inconvenient to the agendas of the imperial war machine to have people protesting these insane cold war games of nuclear brinkmanship, so their media stenographers barely touch on this issue. If mainstream journalism actually existed, this flirtation with nuclear war would be front and center in everyone’s awareness and people would be flooding the streets in protest against their lives being toyed with as casino chips in an insane all-or-nothing gamble.

This is so much bigger than any of the petty little things we spend our mental energy on from day to day. It’s bigger than whatever your number one pet issue is. It’s bigger than your disdain for Moscow or Beijing. It’s bigger than my disdain for the US empire. It’s bigger than our political opinions. It’s bigger than whatever argument we might be having on the internet. It’s bigger than whether or not we’ve got a problem with Tulsi Gabbard appearing on Tucker Carlson.

Because once the nukes start flying, none of that will matter. None of it. All that will matter is the fact that this is all ending. If you open the door and see a mushroom cloud growing on the horizon, all of your mental priorities will rearrange themselves real quick.

We should not be in this situation. There is no good reason governments should be playing these games with these weapons. There is no good reason we can’t just get along with each other and collaborate toward a healthy world together. Only the psychopathic agendas of power-hungry imperialists perpetuate this insane balancing act, and it benefits none of us ordinary people in any way.

The rising threat of nuclear war is the most urgent matter in the world, and it’s absolute madness that we’re not talking about it all the time.

Let’s do what we can to change that.

caityjohnstone.medium.com

But there was another and less amusing ball-drop on New Year’s Day, involving a tweet from US Strategic Forces Command or Stratcom, which declares it “deters strategic attack and employs forces, as directed, to guarantee the security of our nation and our allies” In the gobbledegook language of the military it, amongst other things “deters catastrophic actions from adversaries and poses an immediate threat to any actor who questions US resolve by demonstrating our capabilities.”

According to Stars and Stripes, the Stratcom tweet read “Times Square tradition rings in the New Year by dropping the big ball… if ever needed, we are ready to drop something much, much bigger.” As greetings go, you couldn’t get much more crass, confrontational and puerile than that.

The Washington Post noted that an embedded video “showed footage of a B-2 stealth bomber. As the words STEALTH, READY and LETHAL flashed across the screen, the aircraft released bombs. They fall to the ground and crash with a fiery explosion.” Just another video game, really.

The tweet was withdrawn with the apology that it “was in poor taste & does not reflect our values” but it is obvious that the original message is the one that Stratcom, the US Air Force and Washington as a whole want to send : their “values” include being “ready to drop something much, much bigger” on targets all round the world, and they’ve been blitzing with depressing frequency for many years. A month before the big ball bomb tweet Reuters reported that “At least 30 Afghan civilians were killed in US air strikes in the Afghan province of Helmand, officials and residents of the area said on Wednesday [November 28], the latest casualties from a surge in air operations aimed at driving the Taliban into talks.”

Of course the Taliban will never be driven into talks by bombing. In 2018 they were blitzed at the highest rate in all the seventeen years that the US and its allies have been rocketing and bombing and generally blasting all over the country. It’s impossible for us to realise what death and destruction has been caused by the 5,213 bombs that slammed explosively onto Afghanistan in the period January to September last year, but one outcome is made fairly clear by a Forbes' report that “the UN announced that the number of civilian casualties in the first nine months of 2018 is higher than in any year since it started documenting them in 2009.” And it is apparent that Washington’s war aim has not been assisted in any way by its bombing surge.

One of the most over-used clichés is “history repeats itself” — but it’s difficult to refrain from using it, when one compares the US defeat in Vietnam to the present situation in Afghanistan.

As recounted by The Diplomat two years ago, “A new survey on the use of aerial bombing during the Vietnam War has seemingly confirmed what many suspected: the systematic bombing of South Vietnam detracted from, rather than furthered, US war aims… and in fact contributed to the instability of the South Vietnamese government.”

The parallels with 2019 Afghanistan are sadly unmistakable.

Exactly a year ago Donald Trump tweeted “Taliban targeted innocent Afghans, brave police in Kabul today. Our thoughts and prayers go to the victims, and first responders. We will not allow the Taliban to win!” Reuters reported him saying that “We don’t want to talk to the Taliban. We’re going to finish what we have to finish, what nobody else has been able to finish, we’re going to be able to do it.”

So 2018 became the Year of the Bombing, and the Taliban, those latter-day Viet Cong, undoubtedly suffered many casualties. Nobody knows how many were killed, and there is no means of estimating the effect that increased numbers of dead Taliban might have on the conduct of the war. What is of more significance, however, is the number of civilians killed, and the effects their deaths have had on Afghan citizens.

All the US-NATO countries involved in Afghanistan, and of course the Afghan government itself, are enormously pleased that the Afghan Air Force is now capable of conducting aerial attacks. Every media release concerned with such operations is redolent with pride that such progress in prowess is being made. The New York Times noted that “the Afghan government increasingly relies on airpower in its fight against a resurgent Taliban” and there is no doubt that many airstrikes are now being carried out by Afghan-piloted aircraft. They are, of course, US aircraft, and thereby lies a little problem.

One important thing to be taken into account is the fact that from the ground the people being blitzed have no idea of the nationality of the person who presses the button that releases the bombs and rockets that are intended to kill enemies of the despatcher but only too often kill civilians who have nothing to do with the conflict.

The problem is exemplified by the BBC’s report about one shambles in 2018, when “The helicopters arrived shortly after midday and sent a rocket hurtling into an area at the back of the crowd where children were sitting. As people began to flee, witnesses said, heavy machine gun fire followed them. It was the latest deadly example of how a ferocious new air campaign against the Taliban has caused a spike in civilian casualties from US and Afghan air operations. This Afghan Air Force attack on 2 April in north-eastern Kunduz province killed at least 36 people and injured 71, the UN says. Although witnesses said Taliban fighters and senior figures were in the crowd, 30 of those killed were children.”

The United Nations estimates that in the first six months of 2018 airstrikes killed 149 civilians and injured 204, a 52 percent increase from the same period last year and “ It is of particular concern that women and children made up more than half of all aerial-attack civilian casualties.”

Of course it is horrifying that all these ordinary people were slaughtered in the most awful manner. And what is not known is the fate of those who were wounded, physically and mentally, in these terrifying attacks. There is no health care in Afghan villages, and children who are maimed stay maimed.

And the Taliban gain influence.

In two of the latest airstrike debacles on December 31 “the Taliban attacked a military convoy… American helicopter gunships arrived and fired rockets at the trucks. A house was also hit during the bombardment. Two civilian men and three women were killed, and 12 others were wounded, including nine women” and “five civilians were killed by an American airstrike during a joint military operation by Afghan and American special forces in Zurmat District.”

If you are a young man who is a member or friend of a family that has been shattered by bombs and rockets in a terrifying attack from the air, are you going to support the government that ordered such slaughter? It doesn’t matter to you that it was a “mistake”. What matters is that you lost people close to you. And it is very likely that you will join the Taliban, whom you consider to be the only people fighting against those who killed members of your family, clan or tribe. These airstrikes are the militants’ best recruiting advertisements.

Washington’s bombing is backfiring.

Some senators want legislation to alter the nuclear authority of the US president. Questions were raised about Trump’s authority to wage war, use nuclear weapons and enter into or end international agreements after he made threats to strike North Korea. The president’s taunting tweets aimed at Pyongyang have sparked concerns primarily among congressional Democrats that he may be inciting a war. "We are concerned that the President of the United States is so unstable, is so volatile, has a decision-making process that is so quixotic that he might order a nuclear weapons strike that is wildly out of step with US national security interests," said US Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Connecticut.

It’s timing that is important. The next day after the hearings took place (Nov.14), a group of six House Democrats led by Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tennessee, introduced five articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump. The articles include obstruction of justice, violations of both the foreign and domestic emoluments clauses, undermining the federal judiciary and undermining the freedom of the press.

Right now, the move is unlikely to succeed as Republicans control both the House and the Senate but some Republicans, such as Senators Bob Corker and Jeff Flake, have begun to openly attack the president.

In August, Donald Trump had to sign into law the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, widely perceived as an encroachment on his foreign policy prerogatives. The law requires congressional approval before the president can ease or lift sanctions on Russia, Iran and North Korea.

The media has launched an assault on the president. Almost every day something happens to make President Trump come under criticism. Just a few innocent remarks about Russia are enough to make him a target of unprecedented attacks. For instance, putting into doubt the unconfirmed reports about alleged Russia’s interference into US elections triggered accusations of high treason on the part of mainstream media. “It is a striking declaration, a betrayal of American trust and interests that is almost treasonous in its own right”, writes Charles M. Blow in his New York Times article. “The truth here is that we are seeing in real time how the president’s personal paranoia impedes our national policy and our national interests. The uncomfortable fact here is that Trump is pursuing his own interest, not American interests. And, on the question of Russia attacking our elections, Trump and Putin’s interest align against the facts and against America” the author states.

The Washington Post is not lagging behind, calling the president “a dangerous fool”, manipulated by Russia. “President Trump’s authoritarianism, narcissism and racism threaten our democracy, but his gullibility threatens our national security,” writes Jennifer Rubin in the article called Russia’s Mark: a Dangerous Fool for a President. Evidently, the war on Trump reaches new heights. No coherent administration’s policy on Russia is possible under the conditions.

The recent wave of sex scandals has hit the US hard. There is a long list of well-known people involved. The campaign did not spare even former presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Nobody has immunity. Evidently, many of stories going around are fake ones but they tarnish the reputation of those whose names hit media headlines. The atmosphere is right to accuse President Trump of harassment.

Actually, the offensive has already been launched. The article titled “The Weinstein Moment and the Trump Presidency” by David Remnick published on Nov. 20 by The New Yorker is the first salvo in the smear campaign that has just been commenced. According to Mr. Remnick, “Trump has indulged in more scandalous behavior than is easy to recount. For some reason, his record of misogyny, in both language and acts, his running compendium of self-satisfied creepiness, the accumulated complaints against him of sexual harassment and assault (all denied, of course), have attracted only modest attention, one defamation lawsuit, and no congressional interest.” There is no doubt other media outlets will soon chime in.

Any pretext to get rid of Trump will do. Naïve? His biography excludes it. Incompetent? Does not know much about the world he lives in? Wait a minute, he had travelled across half or the planet before his election. Perhaps, only Nixon and George H. W. Bush knew more about international affairs before presidency. Trump has seasoned advisers: Henry Kissinger and Rex Tillerson. Russia’s influence? Does Trump want to do something running contrary to national interests? No US president has ever denied the fact that cooperation with Russia in certain areas is a matter of crucial importance. And, finally, there is nothing wrong with Trump’s desire to make his country a nation state again.

Does the president have a chance to survive trying to fend off the creeping coup d’état? Yes, he has. Trump has a trump card – economy. For an average American, the internal situation is a priority. Hovering around 2% growth during Obama tenure, the economic growth hit 3% under Trump. The stock market is up more that 30 percent since his election. Trump takes credit for over 2 million jobs. Earnings have also grown. Markets are up; unemployment is down from 4.6 to 4.2 percent. Trump claims the highest business enthusiasm in years. Like it or not, one has to give the devil his due – the economic outlook under Trump is positive and that’s an undeniable fact.

The president’s support has largely remained durable with a core group of his backers. The continued decline in support for both political parties works to Trump's advantage. The appearance of a major third-party candidate on the 2020 ballot to divide the anti-Trump vote will increase the incumbent president’s chances. Under the circumstances, some voters may be reluctant to admit that they are pro-Trump.

With economy on the rise and the US not dragged into a costly military conflict, President Trump has a good chance at winning a second term in the 2020 presidential election, sending hostile political operatives and the critical news media into a meltdown.

The United States had warned Russia about Global Thunder in advance as required by the New START. Last week, Russia held a strategic nuclear forces’ exercise too. President Vladimir Putin personally took part in the event as the Supreme Commander in Chief. The tests included an ICBM, three submarine-launched ballistic missiles and “an unknown number” of air-launched cruise missiles.

Global Thunder typically occurs about this time every year. It is taking place in the period of immense tensions between the United States and North Korea as President Donald Trump is to visit US Asia Pacific allies, including South Korea and Japan, in early November.

The US military is also planning a military exercise involving three of the Navy’s aircraft carrier strike groups scheduled to take place near North Korea, while Mr. Trump is traveling through the Asia-Pacific region. He’ll be in South Korea on November 7-8. Pyongyang will undoubtedly interpret it as another provocative act. Visiting South Korea on October 28, US Defense Secretary James Mattis emphasized that the United States would never accept a nuclear North. In August, President Trump warned the North not to make any more threats against the United States, and said that if it did, it would be met with "fire and fury like the world has never seen." Despite the president’s warning the threats were made.

Global Thunder has certain background. Moscow has recently expressed its concern over the involvement of non-nuclear NATO states in joint missions during nuclear exercises in violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

According to Alexander Grushko, Russia’s Ambassador to NATO, “We expressed our concern about the NATO continuing practice of involving non-nuclear states of the alliance in joint nuclear missions in violation of articles I and II of the NPT. This is also important in terms of compliance with the provisions of the Russia-NATO Founding Act, which remains one of the few pillars of material stability and security in Europe.”

Unlike Global Thunder, some exercises with nuclear scenarios are conducted by the US and its NATO allies without prior warnings. The example is Steadfast Noon held in October with Czech and Polish participation. The nuclear exercise had not been officially announced and the alliance was very tight-lipped about it because of the political sensitivity of this mission. The secrecy struck the eye. Only a few weeks before the training event, NATO complained that Russia was not being transparent about its Zapad exercise held in September. The forces practiced NATO’s nuclear strike mission with dual-capable aircraft (DCA) and the B61 tactical nuclear bombs the US deploys in Europe. It was the first time the Czech Republic took part sending its JAS-39 Gripen fighters. The Polish F-16s are nuclear-capable aircraft.

President Trump wants to ensure the US nuclear arsenal is at the “top of the pack.” He believes the United States has fallen behind in its weapons capacity. An ambitious and expensive program, estimated to take 30 years and cost upwards of $1 trillion dollars to upgrade and replace all three legs of its nuclear triad, is under consideration. Beyond constant upgrades of the existing nuclear systems, new weapons are designed to replace the current ones. The Navy is designing a new class of 12 SSBNs. The Air Force is examining a new mobile ICBM along with extending the service life of the Minuteman III currently in inventory. The service has begun development of a new, stealthy long-range bomber and a new nuclear-capable tactical fighter-bomber. A new long-range nuclear cruise missile is being developed to replace the current one. The production of B61-12, a new guided “standoff” nuclear bomb able to glide toward a target over a distance, is also underway.

A draft of the new Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) is being debated in Washington. According to the Guardian, “Among the new elements under consideration are a low yield warhead for a ballistic missile intended primarily to deter Russia’s use of a small nuclear weapon in a war over the Baltic states; a sea-launched cruise missile; a change in language governing conditions in which the US would use nuclear weapons; and investments aimed at reducing the time it would take the US to prepare a nuclear test”.

The plans include bringing back the nuclear Tomahawk sea-launched cruise missiles, which were dropped from the arsenal in 2013. It may mark a decisive end to the era of post-cold war disarmament. “You can … be assured that our administration is committed to strengthen and modernize America’s nuclear deterrent,” said Vice President Mike Pence on October 27, visiting Minot air force base in North Dakota, home to Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles and B-52 strategic bombers. According to him, “History attests the surest path to peace is through American strength. There’s no greater element of American strength, there’s no greater force for peace in the world than the United States nuclear arsenal.”

There are signs that a new Cold War is in the air. For instance, the US Air Force is preparing to put nuclear-armed bombers back on 24-hour ready alert.

A future long-range, rapid-strike capability (Prompt Global Strike-PGS) is seen in the United States as a partial alternative to nuclear weapons for hitting important time-sensitive targets. The capability sought by Washington could allow US forces to conduct a non-nuclear strike against any location in the world in one hour or less. The appearance of such weapons may lower the nuclear threshold. Unlike strategic nuclear forces, the development of long-range conventional weapons is uncontrolled. No talks are held to address the problem.

With tensions running high, any exercise, especially a nuclear one, is risky. The failure of the US to warn Moscow as it should, in the case of Steadfast Noon, greatly increases mistrust.

Global Thunder is timed with the exercise scheduled to take place near North Korea and the trip of President Trump across the Asia Pacific. It’s hardly a coincidence.

The original B61 gravity bomb is the mainstay of the Air Force’s nuclear arsenal. Numerous upgrades have been made to improve it. The B61-12 will replace other B61modifications. Moving fins will make the bomb smarter and allow it to be guided more accurately to a target. Furthermore, a yield of 0.3 to 340 kilotons in its various modes can be adjusted before launch, according to the target.

The B61-12 will have both air- and ground-burst capability. The capability to penetrate below the surface has significant implications for the types of targets that can be held at risk with the bomb. Even at the lowest selective yield setting of only 0.3 kt, the ground-shock coupling of a B61-12 exploding a few meters underground would be equivalent to a surface-burst weapon with a yield of 4.5 kt to 7.5 kt. Existing US nuclear bombs have circular error probabilities (CEP) of between 110-170 meters. The B61-12’s CEP is just 30 meters. A combination of its accuracy and low-yield makes the B61-12 the most dangerous nuclear warhead in America’s arsenal.

There is a plethora of conventional weapons to counter the North Korean threat but using low yield variable nukes is a great temptation. General James Cartwright, the former commander of US Strategic Command and former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has said that the increased accuracy of the new guided B61-12 nuclear bomb could make the weapon “more useable”.

This month, Air Force Gen. Paul Selva, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, confirmed that as part of the Pentagon's ongoing nuclear posture review, it is looking at a new generation of low-yield "mini-nukes" in order to ensure that the threat from America's nuclear arsenal remains credible.

The first production of the bomb is scheduled for March 2020. The bomb will be air-delivered in either ballistic gravity or guided drop modes, and is being certified for delivery on current strategic (B-2A) and dual capable aircraft (F-15E, F-16C/D & MLU, PA-200) as well as future aircraft platforms (F-35, B-21). Once the bomb is authorized for use in 2020, the US plans to deploy some 180 of the B61-12 precision-guided thermonuclear bombs to European NATO allies, including the U.K, Belgium, the Netherlands and Italy.

It’s important to note that the US plans to arm tactical aviation in Europe with modernized B61-12 guided warheads will virtually nullify all the benefits of the INF Treaty from the point of view of Russia’s security. The aircraft could fly from bases in Lithuania, Estonia and Poland to Russia’s largest cities in 15-20 minutes – not that much longer than the flight time of the missiles scuttled by the INF treaty. The United States is the only nuclear power to deploy atomic weapons abroad. Poland wants to join the US NATO allies that have American nuclear weapons on their territories. Tactical nuclear weapons are not covered by any international treaty.

Now the plans of the new weapon deployment go beyond Europe to encompass the Asia Pacific. For instance, the North Korean missile tests made the main opposition Liberty Korea Party put forward the idea of bringing back US tactical nuclear weapons pulled out in 1991. On August 16, the party adopted a demand for the redeployment of US tactical nuclear arms as its official party line during a general meeting of its lawmakers. Leaders from the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan have argued in favor of producing tactical nuclear weapons for self-defense purposes.

During the election campaign, US president Donald Trump put forward the idea that more countries, such as Japan, South Korea, may need to develop their own nuclear weapons.

The deployment of such weapons in South Korea or Japan would pose a threat to Russia’s Far East to make Moscow take appropriate steps to respond. The US forward-based tactical nuclear weapons in the Asia Pacific will be considered by Russia as an addition to the American strategic arsenal that is capable of striking deep into its territory. Moscow will certainly take steps to counter the threat. The deployment will also greatly complicate further arms control efforts with the New START Treaty expiring in 2021.

The North Korean threat may be used as a pretext for deploying nukes in Asia-Pacific. The danger of arms race in the region is looming. And there is one more thing to remember. Allowing deploying nukes on its soil or going nuclear turns a country into a target for a nuclear strike. Nobody with foreign nukes on its territory has ever enhanced its national security. 

The Kazan’s armament includes 3M22 Zircon – a hypersonic cruise capable of speeds of around Mach 5.0-Mach 6.0 (7,400 kilometer per hour (4,600 mile per hour) expected to enter into production in 2018. At a cruising altitude of 30,000 m its kinetic energy at impact is 50 times higher than existing air-ship and ship-to-ship missiles. The projectile can travel covering 155 miles in 2.5 minutes, which is faster than a sniper's bullet. The enemy will not have enough time to get scared, let alone react.

For comparison, the sea-based Kalibr cruise missile travels at a Mach 0.9 speed, but while approaching the target, its warhead speeds up to Mach 2.9.

The Zircon missile needs no electronic countermeasure warfare and complex trajectory of flight. The sheer velocity makes it almost immune to interception by contemporary conventional technology. The Zircon can be programmed during its flight to search out and attack its target and could even reach a distance of about 500 kilometers, or even more.

The hypersonic weapon is almost invulnerable. The only air defense system that can strike targets capable of speeds of around Mach 5.0-Mach 6.0 is the Russian S-500.

The missile employs scramjet technology to reach its hypersonic speeds whereby propulsion is created by forcing air from the atmosphere into its combustor where it mixes with on-board fuel.

It uses an inlet where air is compressed and a combustor where the air is mixed with fuel. The acceleration is carried out via a reactive solid booster, with a scramjet used as the main engine. The missile has no moving parts.

The Zircon has both radar target seeker and an optical-electronic complex in charge of tracing and detecting targets also at hypersonic speed.

The missile is likely be fitted to Pyotr Velikiy, and Admiral Nakhimov – the nuclear-powered Kirov class battleships as well as Tu-160M2 Blackjack and PAK-DA strategic bombers and submarines, including the next generation Husky-class vessels.

According to the Independent, the Royal Navy’s new aircraft carriers will not be able to stop new high-speed Russian missiles by the time they enter service. It means the two ships, the first of which is not expected to be fully operational before 2020, could be rendered obsolete by this new development in hypersonic warfare despite costing up to £7 billion to build.

In its 2016 report, the US National Academies of Science concluded that America was falling behind Russia and China in the hypersonic weapons race. «The value of extreme speed coupled with maneuverability and altitude constitutes a potential threat to US capabilities», the paper reads.

The aircraft carrier strike groups (CSG) the US has relied on for dozens of years to ensure sea dominance will become vulnerable, with their relevance questioned. The Zircon will force CSGs to stay hundreds or even thousands of kilometers from the enemy's coast, which would make strikes from their carrier-based aircraft against ground targets ineffective. Harry J. Kazianis, executive editor of The National Interest, believes that such missiles «could turn America's supercarriers into multi-billion dollar graveyards for thousands of US sailors».

It’s worth to note that the new Russian weapon will render useless the NATO ballistic missile defense (BMD) program in Europe. The interceptors cannot counter such fast missiles as Zircon. Admiral Cecil Haney, the head of US Strategic Command, warned that American anti-missile and anti-aircraft defense systems would be virtually incapable of intercepting the Russian hypersonic systems. Perhaps, the advent of hypervelocity weapon will make the US more pliant on the BMD – a controversial issue to hinder the prospects for arms control agreements between the US and Russia.

Hypersonic missiles are game-changing weapons to make contemporary missile defense systems ineffective. Experts of the Air Force Association's Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, think they will «revolutionize military affairs in the same fashion that stealth did a generation ago and the turbojet engine did a generation before».

The success of Zircon program makes Russia the leader of the race. When Zircon enters into production in 2018, Russia will be the only nation in the world to launch serial production of hypersonic weapons, leaving the US far behind. The United States is also developing its own hypersonic weapons; they are not yet believed to be close to production. The ability to produce hypersonic weapons demonstrates Russia’s global leadership in missile technology.