Every winter the war in Ukraine reaches an interregnum of sorts as ground conditions become unfavourable for conduct of military operations. This year there is an additional factor of US President elect having vowed to bring an early end to the war.
For Ukraine staunch defence of sovereign territory including the progress made in the Kursk salient assumes importance in such a scenario while the converse may be true for Moscow.
Thus escalation is a sina qua non, but expecting this to be an apocalypse of a Third World War is not logical, yet the escalation denotes more stakeholders engaged in combat another dimension of a global war much less frightening.
Here is an evaluation of the state of the War including concerns expressed, the Russian threat for escalation, ground situation and the Trump factor -
Why Fears of a Third World War
Ukraine’s’ former military commander Valery Zaluzhny’s statement that he "believe[s] that in 2024 we can absolutely believe that the Third World War has begun," were primarily with reference to more states getting involved in the war waged by Russia against his country and came after reports of Russia inducting North Korea, in the counter offensive in the Kursk.
Reports also indicate of Russia having enlisted recruits from Yemen to fight on the Ukrainian front.
Zaluzhny’s context appears to be the involvement of more nations in the War against his country rather than a situation leading to an Armageddon.
This comes even as the United States and UK have provided the green signal to Ukraine to use the long distance ATACMS and Storm Shadow missiles inside Ukrainian territory though with some caveat.
Donald Trump Jr. son of the President elect, criticizing the decision of the incumbent United States Biden administration has said, “The Military Industrial Complex seems to want to make sure they get World War 3 going before my father has a chance to create peace and save lives,” on social media. The second reference to a third great war.
Russia’s Escalatory Rhetoric and Action
These developments come as in response to the go ahead for use of long range – though these are not really long range but have other destructive characteristics that Russia is concern - President Vladimir Putin updated Russia’s nuclear doctrine that will consider aggression from any non-nuclear state – but with the participation of a nuclear country – a joint attack on Russia.
In a phone call with reporters, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov noted the changes mean that “the Russian Federation reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in the event of aggression using conventional weapons against it and/or the Republic of Belarus.”
“An important element of this document is that nuclear deterrence is aimed at ensuring that a potential adversary understands the inevitability of retaliation in the event of aggression against the Russian Federation or its allies,” Peskov said.
However, this update is not new as in September this year Russia has already lowered that threshold, saying Moscow could use nuclear weapons when facing “a critical threat to its sovereignty.”
Backing up the nuclear rhetoric Russia fired the “Oreshnik” missile – which contains multiple warheads – at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro.
“There are currently no means of countering such a missile, no means of intercepting it, in the world. And I will emphasize once again: We will continue testing the latest system,” Russian President Valdimir Putin said.
“Based on the test results, these weapons will also go into production. That is, we are developing a whole line of medium- and shorter-range systems,” he said. The Oreshnik missile can be nuclear tipped once fully developed.
Non proliferation experts had warned of providing Ukraine the go ahead to attack Russia with U.S. and U.K.-supplied long range missiles.
Status of Ground War
The most recent nuclear sabre rattling comes even as Russia is attempting to increase the pace of ground operations before the winter sets in Eastern Ukraine as in the Kursk salient carved by the Ukrainian counter offensive.
The ground conditions and importantly the lack of air cover means that Russian forces will be increasingly, vulnerable to Ukrainian drone warriors who have caused heavy losses to the Russian advances in the Donbass as well as the Kursk front.
The Institute for the Study of War notes that, “Russian forces notably have not been able to restore operational maneuver seen during the initial months of Russia's full-scale invasion, and the current Russian tactical advances, although quicker now than in the months of positional warfare that characterized most of 2023 and early 2024, are still far below the Russian rate of advance in March 2022”.
Russia is also looking at elimination of the Kursk salient established by Ukraine even inducting North Korean forces inducted in this sector.
The Trump Trigger
Apart from the Winter – another trigger is the incoming Trump Administration now less than two months away.
US President-elect Donald Trump and his advisers have vowed to end the War in Ukraine to a swift end.
What a ‘swift end,’ would mean freezing the war territorially with a cease fire and each nation holding territory that was seized earlier.
Why No Third World War Apocalypse?
While Russia is threatening the use of nuclear weapons, the circumstances for the same have been lowered to an extent but still will only be if there is an existential threat to the country.
Use of ATACMS and Storm Shadow by Ukraine is unlikely to lead to Russia facing a sovereign territorial threat even if the reference is to the loss of the salient in Kursk.
Russian President Vladimir Putin will be hard put to explain the logic of use of nuclear weapons in the Kursk scenario given that his closest ally China and India have been consistently been speaking up against the same while denying any substantial advantage to either side.
Moscow’s reaction could be to raise the spectre of a wider war providing Mr Trump grounds to intervene and force Ukraine to accept the status quo.