US prepared ‘rigorously’ for potential Russian nuclear strike in Ukraine in late 2022, officials say

In late 2022, the US began “preparing rigorously” for Russia potentially striking Ukraine with a nuclear weapon, in what would have been the first nuclear attack in war since the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki nearly eighty years before, two senior administration officials told CNN.

The Biden administration was specifically concerned Russia might use a tactical or battlefield nuclear weapon, the officials said.

I first reported US officials were worried about Russia using a tactical nuclear weapon in 2022, but in my new book, “The Return of Great Powers” publishing on March 12, I reveal exclusive details on the unprecedented level of contingency planning carried out as senior members of the Biden administration became increasingly alarmed by the situation.

“That’s what the conflict presented us, and so we believed ­and I think it’s our right ­to prepare rigorously and do everything possible to avoid that happening,” the first senior administration official told me.

What led the Biden administration to reach such a startling assessment was not one indicator, but a collection of developments, analysis, and – crucially ­- highly sensitive new intelligence.

The administration’s fear, a second senior administration official told me, “was not just ­hypothetical —​­ it was also based on some information that we picked up.”

“We had to plan so that we were in the best possible position in case this no‑longer unthinkable event actually took place,” the same senior administration official told me.

During this period from late summer to fall 2022, the National Security Council convened a series of meetings to put contingency plans in place “in the event of either a very clear indication that they were about to do something, attack with a nuclear weapon, or if they just did, how we would respond, how we would try to preempt it, or deter it,” the first senior administration official told me.

“I don’t think many of us coming into our jobs expected to be spending significant amounts of time preparing for a scenario which a few years ago was believed to be from a bygone era,” this senior administration official told me.

Russians surrounded

Late summer 2022 was proving a devastating period for Russian forces in Ukraine. Ukrainian forces were advancing on Russian-occupied Kherson in the south. The city had been Russia’s biggest prize since the invasion. Now, it was in danger of being lost to the Ukrainian counteroffensive. Crucially, as Ukrainian forces advanced, entire Russian units were in danger of being surrounded. The view inside the administration was that such a catastrophic loss could be a “potential trigger” for the use of nuclear weapons.

“If significant numbers of Russian forces were ­overrun —​­ if their lives were shattered as such —​­ that was a sort of precursor to a potential threat directly to Russian territory or the Russian state,” the first senior administration official said.

“In Kherson at that time there were increasing signs that Russian lines could collapse. Tens of thousands of Russian troops were potentially vulnerable.”

Russia was losing ground inside Ukrainian sovereign territory, not inside Russia. But US officials were concerned that Russian President Vladimir Putin saw it differently. He had told the Russian people that Kherson was now part of Russia itself, and, so, might perceive a devastating loss there as a direct threat to him and the Russian state.

“Our assessment had been for some time that one of the scenarios in which they would contemplate using nuclear weapons [included] things like existential threats to the Russian state, direct threats to Russian territory,” the first senior administration official said.

In such an assessment, Russia could view a tactical nuclear strike as a deterrent against further losses of Russian-​held territory in Ukraine as well as any potential attack on Russia itself.