In 1945, when the United States destroyed two Japanese cities with atomic bombs, it was the world’s sole nuclear power. And the decisions that would have to be made after a Russian nuclear strike on Ukraine are unprecedented. Although they disagreed on some issues, I heard the same point again and again: The risk of nuclear war is greater today than at any other time since the Cuban missile crisis. During the past month, I’ve spoken with many national-security experts and former government officials about the likelihood of Russia using nuclear weapons against Ukraine, the probable targets, and the proper American response. Nevertheless, there must also be open discussion and debate outside the administration about what is really at stake. President Joe Biden has made clear that any use of nuclear weapons in Ukraine would be “completely unacceptable” and “entail severe consequences.” But his administration has remained publicly ambiguous about what those consequences would be.
And that will raise a question of existential importance: What should the United States do?
The United States will most likely observe the movement of these weapons in real time: by means of satellite surveillance, cameras hidden beside the road, local agents with binoculars. It will take hours for the weapons to be made combat-ready, for warheads to be mated with cruise missiles or ballistic missiles, for hydrogen bombs to be loaded on planes. If Putin decides to attack Ukraine with shorter-range, “tactical” nuclear weapons, they will have to be removed from an Object S site-such as Belgorod-22, just 25 miles from the Ukrainian border-and transported to military bases. According to Pavel Podvig, the director of the Russian Nuclear Forces Project and a former research fellow at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, now based in Geneva, the long-range ballistic missiles deployed on land and on submarines are Russia’s only nuclear weapons available for immediate use. For the past three months, President Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials have been ominously threatening to use nuclear weapons in the war against Ukraine. Known as “Object S” sites and scattered across the Russian Federation, they contain thousands of nuclear warheads and hydrogen bombs with a wide variety of explosive yields. T he 12th Main Directorate of the Russian Ministry of Defense operates a dozen central storage facilities for nuclear weapons.
The good thing is that the friendly staff is on standby should you need help.Updated at 11:30 a.m. Then there are special rooms, like the Anti-gravity Room, where everything seems to defy the laws of gravity, Infinity Disco Room, where fun and dance stretch into infinity, Ames Room where you can grow taller or smaller, etc.Īnd once you are done with the exhibits there’s also a playroom at the end, where you can spend even more time figuring out different mind-boggling games. Yet even as I write these words, my brain is still doubtful. Luckily the museum lets you examine it, so you can be certain. For example, optical illusions: I saw two lines one next to the other and I knew they had to be the same length, but my brain wasn’t buying it. You will see exhibits, some you have maybe encountered before, that will leave you boggled. Well, in this museum you’ll soon discover that might not be such good advice when you see how easily your mind can be tricked. You know how in movies the character is told to not trust anybody but rely only on itself.
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