“No longer unthinkable”: UK official weighs in on nuclear threat
A senior officer in the British Air Force has warned that nuclear war could be “only a few steps away” from becoming a reality, as reported by The Sun.
British Air Marshal Edward Stringer appeared on the British talkback radio station LBC on Tuesday morning local time and spoke about how the possibility of a nuclear war would be a “weight on the minds” of world leaders.
“It’s no longer unthinkable and it clearly be weighing on the minds of those who are making all the political calculations at the moment, hence the very straight and consistent line from Biden and all the other senior heads of state recently,” he said.
“It is in the realm of possibility, and that is what people have to get their heads around.”
Air Marshal Stringer added that it was possible to “sketch a plausible chain of events” that could see the use of nuclear weapons, and that it was “a pretty terrifying prospect for anybody sensible”.
He explained that it was also the reason why world leaders have been hesitant to establish no-fly zones over Ukraine.
“NATO is not constructed to go onto the offensive, if it did it would be taking on another nuclear power - Russia,” he said.
As for whether nuclear war is likely, US intelligence says Russia has a theory called “escalate to de-escalate” to use if in conflict with NATO where a dramatic action of threat is used to frighten opponents and cause them to back down, according to the BBC.
James Acton, a nuclear expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told the outlet it may be a tactic to ensure Russian President Vladimir Putin gets his way.
“I am legitimately worried that in that circumstance Putin might use a nuclear weapon, most likely on the ground in Ukraine to terrify everyone and get his way,” he said.
“We are not at that point yet.”
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