Why Someone that Buys Into the Overexaggerated Threat of Nuclear War Also Shares the Same Mindset With Perpetually Losing Investors
In Part I of this article, I laid out a credible interpretation of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s stance on nuclear conflict. However, this is not to say that other Russian military officials have not historically proclaimed a willingness to execute a pre-emptive nuclear strike. In fact, fourteen years ago, Russian Presidential Security Council chief Nikolai Patrushev, who served under President Dmitry Medvedev, stated that Russian policy officials were considering "a variety of possibilities for using nuclear force, depending on the situation and the intentions of the possible opponent. In situations critical to national security, options including a preventative nuclear strike on the aggressor [were] not excluded."
Declarations of pre-emptive nuclear strikes have been tabled by high-ranking Russian military officials in the past, and Patrushev is widely believed to be the most likely successor to Putin when Putin steps down as Russia’s President. Thus, to explain the threat of a Russian pre-emptive nuclear strike as accurately as possible, it is extremely critical to distinguish between the different individuals that issued such threats, and the power of such individuals to actually carry out such a threat. If parties like Russian Channel One’s news anchor Dmitry Kiselyov issue such threats but have zero power to execute such threats, they should be dismissed under the humor category.
However, other threats of a Russian pre-emptive nuclear strike, like the one issued by Patrushev, would significantly grow were Patrushev to assume the reigns of the Russian Presidency, and should be taken seriously if he were not to denounce his earlier claims. Even then, one would have to analyze the people Patrushev would assign to his cabinet, as no single man ever has the unilateral authority to launch a nuclear strike without the consent of everyone in the chain of command to launch such a strike. Thus, the situation has always been far more complex than as presented by the simpleton-minded mainstream media.