Alliance's Response to the Threat of a Potential Russian Nuclear Demonstration

Assignment

Early in the morning of 28 April, you receive a flurry of phone calls that wake you from a deep sleep. Assistant Secretary Wallander sends you a text just after you wake up telling you to report immediately for an emergency meeting in the policy staff secure room in an hour.

You shower quickly, throw on somewhat presentable clothes and fill up your portable coffee thermos. Once you arrive at the Pentagon you are moving quickly through the inner corridors to the secure meeting rooms for the international security policy staff. You tap in your access codes, stare into the facial recognition scanner and move further into the belly of the US national security apparatus.

As you pull up to the assigned meeting room, you see a red light on over the door – a signal the meeting is of the highest security priority, something to which you have never been invited. There are five other policy colleagues already in the room. Dr. Wallander follows not too long after you and she has a concerned look on her face as she closes the door. She begins a security briefing of the kind you have never experienced before – you can feel the tension in the air among your colleagues.

“Ladies and Gentlemen: I will get straight to the point. A few hours ago we received military satellite intelligence indicating Russia has begun to move some of its mobile nuclear strike forces. We have also human intelligence it has also forward positioned some of its tactical nuclear weapons to air and navy bases in Crimea as well as in Belarus.

The placement of these nuclear warheads in the illegally-annexed Russian territory and in Russian-Allied territory is highly disconcerting. During an unannounced televised speech on April 27, Vladimir Putin acknowledged Russian forces’ challenges in Ukraine ‘due to Russia having to fight all of the West at once, as NATO’s 31 Allies have been giving Ukrainians false hope about a chance on the battlefield.’ He also said the Russians should not worry, as he ‘had put in place plans to secure a dramatic turnaround of Russia’s military campaign’. We are increasingly concerned Russia is planning a nuclear demonstration to try to tip the balance of the stagnating war in its favor. We will be briefing our NATO Allies on this in an emergency North Atlantic Council (NAC) meeting in an hour.

NATO SACEUR3 is prepositioning NATO response forces and has put his commanding officers on high alert. He has not been given political clearance for further action. US forces have been placed on higher alert back in the continental United States. Washington will urge caution at the upcoming NAC meeting.

We may be facing a critical juncture in the American-led global order. If Russia moves toward a nuclear demonstration the chances for escalation are significant. The change the use of nuclear force in the post-WWII era would be cataclysmic. It must be prevented.

Your task is to write a memo for the US Ambassador to NATO identifying Alliance options in the face of this now real and present threat to Allied security.

Clearly you agree and tell Dr. Wallander that you will get on it straight away. When you leave the room you realize your heartbeat is up and you can feel a rush of adrenaline. You realize that the next week will be tough as you try to work your way through the gamut of security challenges to come up with some viable options for US policy going forward.

If you’re honest with yourself you are a bit afraid as well. You have no idea if more unknown variables will arise in the coming hours or days.

You look at the team you are assigned to work with and decide to get right to it.

Logistics

Each student wills their own short reaction paper, which will be read and critiqued on by the professor.

Memos should be submitted no later than 6 days after assignment distribution. No late copies will be accepted.

You will have received an instructions sheet about how to write a short reaction strategy paper with this assignment. In addition, you are also required to attach an appendix no longer than one half page that identifies questions of fact or analysis that you do not know the answer to but believe an individual writing the memo in the real world would know or have access to