A close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened nuclear war against European nations if Moscow fails to conquer Ukraine.
During an appearance on The Tucker Carlson Show, Sergey Karaganov indicated that if Ukraine manages to defeat the Russian invasion, Moscow could resort to nuclear attacks, according to The Hill.
An ally and former adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin and former President Boris Yeltsin said the country could use nuclear weapons against Europe should Russia ever be on the verge of defeat in its ongoing war with Ukraine.
“What is defeat of Russia? If Russia comes ever close to a defeat, that would mean that Russia now would use nuclear weapons, and Europe would be finished physically,” Sergey Karaganov told Tucker Carlson on his podcast “The Tucker Carlson Show,” in comments first highlighted by Mediaite. “So I mean, it’s simply impossible even to think about it, but they have been talking because they need a war to rationalize their stay in power, to rationalize their existence.”
Karaganov, the head of Russia’s Council for Foreign and Defense Policy, an entity close to Putin, said a Russian defeat would be a “fantastical illusion” and that such comments were based on an “intellectual incapacity” of European leaders.
“Everybody in the world now laughs at Europe, which used to be, by the way, one of the core centers of world power,” Karaganov said during the interview. “Now it’s a joke. And of course, I am not speaking of all Europe. We know that there are decent Europeans. There are smart Europeans.”
Karaganov also criticized the Russian government for being “too patient” with Europe.
“Sooner or later, if they continue to support this war, sacrificing numerous of the Ukrainians and others … We’ll have to punish them severely. Hopefully in a limited sense,” Karaganov said.
Karaganov also sits on Russia’s Security Council’s scientific subcommittee. He does not have an official government position, but remains close to Putin. He is known for drafting the “Karaganov Doctrine,” which insists that Russia should defend ethnic Russians in former Soviet territories — even if it results in the use of force.
This ideology became mainstream under Putin after 2012. Karaganov’s views have grown even more radical after 2023 when he published “A Difficult But Necessary Decision,” which lays out the case for nuclear war. He argued that because the West had “lost its fear of nuclear war,” Moscow should lower its threshold for the use of nuclear weapons to “arouse the instinct of self-preservation that the West has lost.”
He even went so far as to advocate for possible nuclear strikes against Poland and Baltic states to push the West into bending to Moscow’s will.
Putin formalized the Karaganov Doctrine in November 2024, approving a revised nuclear policy that lowered the threshold for using nuclear weapons. The previous policy required a threat to “the very existence of the state.”
Now, it allows for the use of nuclear weapons in response to threats against “sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
The doctrine includes an “aggregation clause,” designating any NATO member providing military support to Ukraine as a potential target for nuclear strikes. Russia could also employ nuclear weapons in response to a “massive launch” of aerospace attacks involving cruise missiles or hypersonic vehicles.
So far, Russia has given no indication that it might use nuclear weapons if it fails to take Ukraine, and Karaganov’s comments could be mere saber rattling, given that Russia’s government would also be concerned about retaliatory nuclear strikes coming from the West. Still, if this ideology continues to gain traction among Russia’s government, it could significantly raise the stakes.
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