Are you nervous about a nuclear war yet?
I’m co-teaching a survey course this quarter on 20th Century American History for my high schoolers. We’re trying to cover one decade per week. We can only scratch the surface this quarter, but the students will choose one event for us to investigate deeper next quarter.
After surveying the Progressive Era, World War I, the Great Depression, and the New Deal, we just finished summarizing World War II. We used this interactive timeline to guide our discussions.
Here’s what I want you to remember:
- Spring 1936, Germany began its occupation of Austria and the Rhineland.
- Late 1938, Hitler (with British permission) annexed part of Czechoslovakia.
- September 1939, the Germans invaded Poland, starting World War II in earnest.
- November 1939, US manufacturers began selling arms and supplies to Great Britain.
- December 1941, Japan attacked the US, after which Germany declared war on us, and we returned the favor.
These things don’t happen all at once. Five years passed between Germany’s first acts of international aggression and the United States’ declaration of war.
In 2014, the Russian Federation annexed Crimea from Ukraine, setting off the still-ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War. For the first eight years, the war was relatively underground. The Russian Federation claimed the Ukrainian people in the eastern regions were rising against the “neo-nazi” government in Kyiv, a puppet regime installed by Western elites.
But in February 2022, the Russian Federation openly invaded its neighbor after months of military buildup. Contrary to all expectations, the Ukrainian people put up an impressive defense and counteroffensive, and now the army of the Russian Federation seems in disarray.
As the right-centered Atlantic Council recently wrote:
More than six months since the onset of Vladimir Putin’s Ukraine invasion, it is now obvious that his army is in fact a deeply flawed institution that bears almost no resemblance to the immaculate fighting force of Red Square parades and Kremlin propaganda. Instead, the Russian military suffers from endemic corruption, low morale, and poor leadership, with individual initiative in short supply and commanders deeply reluctant to accept personal responsibility.
In response to these defeats, President Putin annexed four more regions in Ukraine. He gave a speech earlier this week celebrating and defending the annexation, using the opportunity to denounce “the western elites” who have united against the Russian Federation’s efforts.
Meanwhile, Western elites heard in his words a defeated man willing to do anything to hold on to power. According to Foreign Policy, hardliners in Russia’s government have increased their pressure on President Putin to unleash hell on Ukraine. The pressure led to the federation’s attempted mobilization of 30,000 more troops.
With the Russian Federation now claiming sovereignty over the four eastern regions, we must view Ukraine’s attempt to recover them through President Putin’s latest speech, where he said, “In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country…we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us [emphasis added]. This is not a bluff.”
In response, the United States (in the form of President Biden) warned that the Russian Federation would face a “consequential” response if they introduced chemical or nuclear weapons to the battlefield.
President Biden did not elaborate, so neither the American public nor the Russian Federation knows what he meant by “consequential.”
I fear the threat may become the equivalent of President Obama’s “red line” in Syria.
But I fear even more that the criticism of President Obama’s failure to act in Syria will persuade President Biden to go the extra step and respond to the Russian Federation’s use of nuclear weapons with nuclear missiles of our own.
No one knows.
No one knows.