By Gordon Hahn, Website, 8/5/25
I noted at the advent of his first term that Mr. Trump would be good for US domestic politics, especially the economy but bad for foreign policy and that is bearing out again in this second term. It is one thing for a political leader to loosely play with language that circles around making a nuclear threat, as Russian Security Council Deputy Head and former Russian President Dmitrii Medvedev has done again recently in a public social net spat with US President Donald Trump. But it is quite another to play global chess with the repositioning of nuclear forces to actually threaten another country, especially another nuclear power of equal if not superior nuclear weapons strength. No matter, that is precisely what President Trump has been doing of late. Not even the clueless, corrupt, and strategically incompetent Biden and Obama administrations made such a foolish move.
Trump responded to Medvedev’s verbal assault by making a material nuclear threat against Russia. He announced he had redeployed to US nuclear submarines closer to Russia – an act of open nuclear threat and intimidation.
But that is not even the whole story. Trump’s nuclear sabre-rattling relates to much more than ‘merely‘ forward deploying two nuclear submarines a spart of a self-declared threatening of Moscow.
In recent weeks, Trump has ordered the deployment of additional American nuclear weapons to Europe for the first time since Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and the Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush administrations concluded treaties leading to massive cuts in Soviet and American strategic, intermediate, short-range, and tactical nuclear weapons in Europe. In other words, he has negated the results of years of arms control efforts and decades of nuclear arms comity with Moscow. As Larry Johnson has noted, the Trump administration has deployed some 100-150 B61-12 tactical nuclear gravity bombs to six bases in five NATO countries: RAF Lakenheath (United Kingdom); Kleine Brogel Air Base (Belgium); Büchel Air Base (Germany); Aviano and Ghedi Air Bases (Italy); Volkel Air Base (Netherlands), and Incirlik Air Base (Turkey) (https://open.substack.com/pub/larrycjohnson/p/trump-escalates-nuclear-threat-to?r=1qt5jg&utm_medium=ios).
All this comes on the background of a NATO(US)-Russia Ukrainian War and an imminent Russian-American nuclear arms race, given the expiration of the New START nuclear arms treaty coming in seven months, not to mention Trump’s apparent last ditch attempt to revive Russian-Ukrainian negotiations and transition to normal US-Russian relations with his roaming negotiator Steven Witkoff’s visit to Moscow this week. Perhaps this is Trump’s provocative way of opening up discussions on renewing or replacing the expiring New START (https://gordonhahn.com/2025/05/23/a-new-new-start-putin-sees-trump-administration-as-a-window-of-opportunity-for-strategic-arms-control/).
Not surprisingly, except perhaps to Trump and his neocon provocateurs, Moscow responded by removing its self-imposed moratorium on forward deploying forward short and medium-range nuclear missiles. This might be a bit of a ruse for now, since in June 2023 Russia deployed nuclear missiles to Belarus, as NATO persisted in conducting the Ukrainian War it clearly provoked and in April 2022 blocked prevention of. Mr. Trump’s deployment of tactical nukes to Europe could be seen as a response to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s earlier nuclear deployments to Belarus (https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/belarus-has-started-taking-delivery-russian-tactical-nuclear-weapons-president-2023-06-14/). But the nuclear submarine redeployment cannot be so viewed, and the redeployment of tactical nukes to Europe comes too long after the Russian deployment to Belarus to be convincing as such.
The Western imperative of escalation in and around Ukraine after provoking the war by way of battlefield and geostrategic escalations in Ukraine is clear and undeniable. From blocking the April 2022 Istanbul peace agreement to providing offensive rather than just defensive weapons, from first providing Ukraine with tanks and armoured personnel carriers, then artillery systems, then fighter jets, mid-range missiles, and soon perhaps longer-range ones, the West has taken every opportunity to escalate the war rather than negotiate an end to it.
The endgame of Western persistence in escalating in order to level a ‘strategic defeat against Russia‘. This can be seen in the US, NOT UKRAINIAN, initiative to send HIMARS missiles to Kiev. For it was not Ukraine that requested the supply of HIMARS to Kiev, but rather it was American generals who did. As the New York Times reported: “Generals Cavoli and Donahue soon proposed a far bigger leap — providing High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, known as HIMARS.” “When the generals requested HIMARS, one official recalled, the moment felt like ‘standing on that line, wondering, if you take a step forward, is World War III going to break out?’” (https://archive.is/Fdwq3). This also can be seen in the proposal by some Biden-era US officials, according to the New York Times, to ‚return‘ nuclear weapons to Ukraine (www.nytimes.com/2024/11/21/us/politics/trump-russia-ukraine-war.html). This would end either in a pre-emptive Russian nuclear strike or massive conventional one, using the likes of Oreshkin missiles, that would finish off the process of Ukraine‘s Second Great Ruin. This is suicidal brinksmanship and over what? NATO’s expansion to Ukraine.
Mr. Trump is returning to this stupid, futile, and dangerous Biden-era escalation policy, even as he ostensibly pursues a Ukrainian peace process. But Trump’s innovation is to escalate at the nuclear level, threatening a security-vigilant Moscow with a nuclear first strike in eastern Ukraine or the homeland proper. Continuing this petulant foolishness, as I have noted repeatedly in the course of the decade-long Ukrainian crisis, cannot end well.
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Putin Subtly Puts the US on Notice… Russia is Locked and Loaded
By Larry Johnson, Substack, 8/5/25
Following two months of provocations and threats from the United States, Vladimir Putin announced a major policy change regarding intermediate-range missiles that pushes the world to the brink of nuclear war. While the mainstream media has largely ignored Russia’s announcement that it would no longer abide by the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), a few podcasters — e.g., Danny Davis and Alexander Mercouris — recognized both the importance and danger inherent in this decision and discussed this at length during their respective shows. This is not Russia going rogue. Putin’s decision was a unambiguous response to a series of foolish and reckless actions by the United States since June 1st of this year.
The Spiderweb attack on Russia’s strategic bomber force on June 1st, using drones deployed from hidden compartments in semi-trucks, was a dangerous provocation, although little damage was inflicted. Twelve days later, Israel launched a decapitation attack on Iran — that too thankfully failed — using the same drove tactic employed in Russia just weeks earlier. In mid-July the Russians listened in shock to General Christopher Donahue, Commander of US European Command (USEUCOM) describe how NATO has tested plans to quickly overrun and capture Kaliningrad, a Russian exclave. At the same time, Trump re-deployed B61-12 nuclear gravity bombs to at least six airfields in Europe, including the UK’s Lakenfield. Lastly, Trump brashly announced the deployment of two nuclear submarines with the specific mission of being in position to strike Russia. [NOTE: This was most likely a symbolic statement because submarines with that mission were already on station.]
The Trump administration also has announced that it will begin deploying intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) and other long-range fire capabilities in Europe starting in 2026, with Germany as the initial host country for these systems. This deployment specifically includes advanced missile systems such as the Typhoon and Dark Eagle, which have been referenced in recent official communications and news reports. The Typhon Missile System (Mid-Range Capability) is a mobile, ground-launched system that fires multiple missile types (not a missile itself, but a multi-missile platform). It can fire the Tomahawk Land Attack Missile, which has a range of 1,500–2,500 km, or the SM-6, which has a range of 320 km. The Dark Eagle is a Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon aka LRHW, with a range of 2,775 km. The Dark Eagle hypersonic missile, after several failed attempts from 2021–2023, has been successfully tested. The system achieved its first successful end-to-end flight test in June 2024, followed by a second successful test in December 2024.
It is worth reviewing the INF Treaty that Donald Trump cancelled in 2018:
Major Points of the INF Treaty
1. Elimination of Intermediate- and Shorter-Range Missiles:
-The treaty required the US and Soviet Union to eliminate all ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges between 500 and 5,500 kilometers (approximately 300–3,400 miles), including both nuclear and conventional variants.
-Intermediate-range (1,000–5,500 km) and shorter-range (500–1,000 km) missiles were targeted, covering systems like the US Pershing II and Soviet SS-20 Saber.
-By June 1, 1991, both parties were to complete the destruction of these missiles and their launchers, resulting in the elimination of 2,692 missiles (1,846 Soviet, 846 U.S.).
2. Prohibition on Production and Testing:
-The treaty banned the production, flight-testing, or possession of ground-launched intermediate- and shorter-range missiles after the elimination deadline.
-This applied to both nuclear and conventional missiles within the specified range, ensuring no new systems could replace those destroyed.
3. Scope and Exclusions:
-The treaty covered ground-launched missiles only, excluding air-launched and sea-launched systems (e.g., submarine- or ship-based missiles like the US Tomahawk).
-It applied to missiles regardless of warhead type (nuclear or conventional), making it comprehensive within its range category.
-Support structures, such as launchers and associated equipment, were also to be destroyed or rendered unusable.
4. Verification and Inspection:
-The treaty established a robust verification regime, including on-site inspections, data exchanges, and continuous monitoring of missile production facilities to ensure compliance.
-A Special Verification Commission was created to resolve compliance disputes, with inspections continuing for 13 years after 1991 (until 2001).
-Both sides provided detailed inventories of their missile systems and destruction sites.
5. Indefinite Duration:
-The treaty was of unlimited duration, meaning it remained in force until a party withdrew (as the US did in 2019, citing Russian non-compliance with the 9M729 missile).
-Either party could withdraw with six months’ notice if they believed their supreme interests were jeopardized.
6. Global Application:
-The treaty prohibited deploying covered missiles anywhere in the world, not just in Europe, addressing concerns about Soviet SS-20s targeting Asia and US Pershing IIs in Europe.
-It applied to missiles stationed in allied territories (e.g., US missiles in NATO countries, Soviet missiles in Warsaw Pact states).
That treaty has prevented nuclear war in Europe for 37 years. Now, with Trump’s nuclear sabre rattling, Putin has put Trump on notice… Any IRBMs introduced to Europe will be destroyed. When that happens — mind you, I don’t say “if” — we will be at the very threshold of a nuclear nightmare. I don’t think Trump will get a Nobel Peace Prize out of this.