NATO will hold a long-planned major annual exercise of nuclear forces next Sunday, NATO chief Mark Rute said today.
A few weeks ago, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced changes to Russia's nuclear doctrine to discourage Ukraine's Western allies from supporting attacks on his country.
Exercise "Steadfast Noon" starts on Monday and will last for two weeks. It will be led by Belgium and the Netherlands, will use eight military bases and will include 2.000 people and 60 aircraft from 13 countries. That annual exercise has been held at the same time every year for more than a decade.
Bombers and fighter jets capable of carrying nuclear warheads are participating. No live ammunition is used. The largest part of the exercise takes place about 900 kilometers from Russia, in the North Sea. Moscow has been notified of the exercise, NATO officials say.
Danijel Banč, head of nuclear operations at NATO's military headquarters, said that although dozens of planes will be involved, a large part of the exercise will be "behind the scenes".
"We are trying to check the entire system; putting people in difficult positions, with a fast pace of operations," Banč said, adding that the challenge is to coordinate all of this.
"In an uncertain world, it is vital that we test our defenses and strengthen them so that our adversaries know that NATO is ready and able to respond to any threat," new NATO Secretary General Mark Rute told reporters in London.
The United States and Great Britain, with their strategic nuclear forces, are central to NATO's deterrent tactics. France also has nuclear weapons, but is not part of NATO's nuclear planning group.
Angus Lapsley, NATO's assistant secretary-general for defense policy and planning, said the exercise aimed to demonstrate the alliance's ability to counter any threat to its 32 member nations and that "any adversary would really have to understand that extremely serious".
Lapsli said NATO is monitoring the emergence of North Korea as a nuclear power, the rapid expansion of China's nuclear capabilities and developments in Iran, but "obviously what worries us the most is Russia."
He said that in the last two years, Moscow has been investing in nuclear forces "with increasing intensity" and that it is "introducing many new systems and putting more emphasis on investments in short- and medium-range weapons systems."
Lapsley noted that Moscow has been "talking a lot about its nuclear doctrine and how it's evolving" lately. He said it appeared to be "a pretty clear attempt to influence us" about supporting Ukraine.
Putin and others in the Kremlin have frequently threatened the West with Russia's nuclear arsenal. At the end of last month, Putin said that a conventional attack on Russia by any country, backed by a nuclear power, would be considered a joint attack by those countries.
The goal of this threat is to dissuade the US and its allies from allowing Ukraine to attack Russian territory with longer-range weapons, and it seems that by doing so, Moscow significantly reduces the obstacles to the possible use of its nuclear arsenal. But NATO has seen no real change in Moscow's nuclear posture.
Taking office on October 1, Rute stressed that while Putin's nuclear rhetoric was "reckless and irresponsible", there was no evidence of any imminent threat of nuclear weapons use.
Rute said that it is important to let Putin "talk about his nuclear arsenal", and "he wants us to talk about it, and I don't think we should".
At the same time, Rute said, yielding to any threat "would be a precedent: that the use of military force enables a country to get what it wants, and we cannot".
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