By RUBEN BAUER NAVEIRA*

Putin declared the US a “state sponsor of terrorism,” and now two nuclear superpowers dance on the brink while Trump still sees himself as a peacemaker

1.

In contrast to the times of Joe Biden, when the enmity was black and white, since Donald Trump's inauguration the US and Russia have, clumsily or even disastrously, tried to get the dance steps right, to see if they can manage to coexist again in a minimally fluid way as before.

No more.

On June 01, Ukrainian attacks on strategic bombers of Russia's nuclear forces and a passenger train, which resulted in the deaths of civilians, were the final straw. On June 04, Vladimir Putin stated: “These actions only confirm our concerns that the already illegitimate Kiev regime, having seized power by force, is resolutely converting itself into a terrorist organization, while its sponsors increasingly act as accomplices to terrorism.”

This means that Russia has come to consider the United States as a state sponsor of terrorism, and terrorism against Russia.

In this same speech, Vladimir Putin formalized Russia's abandonment of any future peace negotiations with Ukraine, because you don't negotiate with terrorists, period.

But the situation is even worse. Until February 04, 2026, the United States and Russia are bound by the New Start (or Start-3) treaty, which they signed in 2010 and extended in 2021. This treaty obliges the parties to provide transparency, through inspections and satellite monitoring, of their respective nuclear arsenals to each other.

This is why Russian strategic bombers were parked in the open, rather than in secure hangars. The same treaty that requires this transparency also holds the parties responsible for the security of each other's exposed equipment.

Thus, by passing on to Ukraine the geolocation coordinates of the aircraft (which cannot be denied, since neither Ukraine nor any of its European allies have such capabilities), US military intelligence not only made the US participants in the attack but – and much worse – treacherously caused it to break the treaty, using information that it was obliged to protect in order to inflict damage on Russia's nuclear assets. Something like this is, in practice, equivalent to a declaration of war.

As for Donald Trump himself, he may even deny that he had prior knowledge of the attacks on the aircraft, but that doesn't matter to the Russians because, whether he knew or not, he is the one who answers for the United States of America (if he knew, so much the worse, if he didn't know, he proves that he has no control over his own government - which would come as no surprise, given that for decades sectors of the deep state operate by own agenda).

2.

Recently (November 2024) Russia revised its nuclear doctrine, which became establish that: “[…] 11. Aggression against the Russian Federation and/or its allies by any non-nuclear state [in this case, Ukraine] with the participation or support of a nuclear state [in this case, at least the United States, if not the United Kingdom and France as well] is considered a joint attack by both. […] 19. The conditions that allow for the possibility of the use of nuclear weapons by the Russian Federation are the following: […] actions by an adversary that affect critically important elements of the state or military infrastructure of the Russian Federation, the incapacitation of which would hinder retaliatory actions by nuclear forces; […]”. Since this is precisely what happened, the expected response now would be a Russian nuclear counterattack.

Such a nuclear response could even happen, although I doubt it. Nor should a conventional weapons attack on the US or any other NATO country be expected, since that would risk escalating into nuclear war. This anticlimax is a repeat of what happened at the end of the Biden administration, when tensions had reached such a point that Vladimir Putin explicitly threatened: “On November 19 [2024], six US-made ATACMS tactical ballistic missiles, and today [November 21], in a combined missile attack involving British Storm Shadow systems and US-made HIMARS systems, attacked military facilities inside the Russian Federation in the Bryansk and Kursk regions. From now on, as we have repeatedly made clear in previous communications, the regional conflict in Ukraine, provoked by the West, is taking on a global character. […] we are conducting combat tests of the Oreshnik missile system in response to NATO’s aggressive actions against Russia. Our decision on future launches of short- and medium-range missiles will depend on the actions of the United States and its satellites.”

He threatened, but did not follow through – even though, just four days later (on the 25th), American-made ATACMS missiles were once again used in an attack against the Russian rear, hitting the Khalino military airport in the city of Kursk and destroying (according to Ukraine) an S-400 anti-aircraft defense system.

3.

Nevertheless, Russian retaliation for the aircraft strike is still to come. In order for it to be characterized as such (so as to have an intimidating effect on the West), it will have to be qualitatively different from what the Russians are already doing (missiles and drones over Ukraine). And something like that requires time for planning and preparation. We can assume that retaliation will come after the next meeting of the security advice from Russia, when the options will be analyzed and the gavel will be struck.

My view is that this retaliation will fall on Ukraine, not the US or NATO. Perhaps Russia will convert its “special military operation” into a “counterterrorism operation,” whereby the entire Ukrainian leadership would be subject to hunt down and physical elimination. Ultimately, a tactical nuclear weapon could be used against Ukraine, shocking the Western populations into realizing the risks they are already taking.

I may be wrong, but Vladimir Putin will not want to risk triggering a nuclear war against the United States. Several military analysts (Andrei Martyanov for example) argue that, given the technologies currently held by each side, Russia would be in a position to completely destroy the United States, while its anti-missile defenses (composed of systems such as the S-500, S-550 and A-235 Nudol) would be in a position to shoot down most American missiles.

But “most” does not mean “all,” and so even if Russia survives a nuclear war, millions of people would die from those missiles that penetrate its defenses. For Vladimir Putin (and for Russia), something like that would not be “winning” a nuclear war, it would merely be “losing less.”

Russia’s situation is exasperating: it does not want (and will not, I believe) provoke a nuclear war, and so it cannot retaliate against the US or NATO. But, without retaliating, it encourages them to new, ever more bold and reckless provocations, because its caution is mistaken for cowardice. And, while in the United States the bellicosity against Russia is supposedly the responsibility of factions of the government rather than the whole government, in countries such as the United Kingdom, Germany and France the destruction of Russia is already an open state policy.

So the paradoxical picture that has been reached is that the Kremlin understands that the United States is complicit in Ukrainian terrorism against Russia, as well as that the United States has treacherously broken the START-3 mutual nuclear defense treaty that it had signed with Russia. In short, the United States is now at war with Russia.

At the same time, Russia cannot respond directly, so as not to risk provoking a nuclear war (an indirect response, according to analyses, would have been a definitive opposition, possibly in the form of a veto or ultimatum, to both the US and Israel with respect to any military action against Iran).

4.

To adorn this paradox with bizarre and delirious colors, Donald Trump, stuck in his very personal reading of reality, seems incapable of realizing that the United States has ended up reaching a point of war against Russia, and he still continues to see himself as the peacemaker par excellence in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

Em interview On June 05, a reporter asked him if he was considering imposing more sanctions on Russia, to which he replied, “Yes, when I see the moment when we will not reach an agreement and this thing [war] will not stop. At that moment…” The reporter interrupts him: “Is there a deadline?”, and he continues: “Yes, it is in my mind, the deadline. When I see the moment when this will not stop, and I’m sure you will see it too, we will be very, very, very tough. And that may be with both countries, to be honest, you know, it takes two to tango. But… we will be very tough, whether it’s with Russia or any other country, we will be very tough.”

That, for the next day (06), fickle as he is, tell that the Ukrainians, with the attack on the aircraft, “gave Vladimir Putin a reason to go there and bomb them until he could bomb them no more”, that is, legitimizing what he already understands to be Russian retaliation.

Since the mainstream media gives voice not only to Donald Trump but to anyone on the Ukrainian side but to no one on the Russian side, throughout the West (and thus also in Brazil) there is practically no such understanding of the extreme gravity of the situation – a state of war between the United States and Russia is the antechamber of a devastating nuclear war across the entire planet (there are, of course, the usual exceptions, such as Jeffrey Sachs).

Would Russia then have no way out? Would it be condemned to humiliatingly find itself forced to endure, quietly, more and more aggression without being able to react in kind? I don't think so.

Of course, she could reach a point of exasperation such that she decides to escalate against the West, taking all the risks. But I think she wants to look for a more shrewd alternative.

On December 09, 2022, at the end of the Eurasian Economic Union summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, during an unpretentious interview a journalist surprised Vladimir Putin with a tricky question, asking him about what he had said on another occasion, regarding the Russian doctrine of not using nuclear weapons first, that if they were not used first they would not be useful later either.

Vladimir Putin replied that he meant that if a missile attack on Russia was detected, Russian missiles would be fired at the enemy, ensuring its complete destruction, but that this would not prevent enemy missiles from reaching Russia, because, after all, they would already have been fired. In other words, the Russian nuclear arsenal exists to be a deterrent and not for actual combat, or, even, the ultimate purpose of the Russian arsenal is to avoid having to be used.

In developing this reasoning, Vladimir Putin mentioned the device present in the American doctrine (but not in the Russian doctrine) of first strike, a surprise nuclear attack designed to decapitate the Russian leadership and destroy its means of retaliation, using cruise missiles (Tomahawks) fired from submarines near the Russian coast, weapons that at the time when the theory of first strike It was conceived, the Americans had it but the Russians did not (cruise missiles when over the sea fly close to the water, and so are not detectable – see for example this video filmed by Dagestani fishermen in the Caspian Sea, showing missiles Kalibr on the way to Ukraine).

And it was during this tour that he let slip the following fragments: “[regarding] a preemptive disarming strike with hypersonic weapons, the United States does not have such weapons, but we do. So, with regard to a preemptive strike, perhaps we should think about how to use the solutions of our American partners and their ideas on how to ensure their own security. […] The United States […] has this concept of a preemptive strike in its strategy and other policy documents. We do not. […] If a potential adversary believes that it is possible to use the theory of a preemptive strike, while we do not, it still makes us wonder what threat such ideas from the defense sphere of other countries pose to us. And that is all I have to say to you.”

One of the things Vladimir Putin said was “we have hypersonic weapons, and they don’t.” Now, some of the most modern Russian weapons are capable of hitting and destroying American nuclear retaliation weapons without losing the element of surprise, and with conventional ammunition instead of nuclear (just for the sake of public domain information: the cruise missile burevestnik, powered by nuclear energy, overcomes the range limitations inherent in cruise missiles by having potentially infinite autonomy, and thus could be launched from any point in Russia and reach the United States from the Pacific Ocean, undetectable by flying close to the waves; the hypersonic cruise missile Zircon can be fired from submarines near the American coast, it is also low-flying and therefore undetectable, and is estimated to have a range of up to two thousand kilometers; and the hypersonic ballistic missile Oresik, although detectable by satellites, if fired from the far east of Russia it would have an extremely short flight time to the silos housing the intercontinental missiles Minuteman Americans).

Reading between the lines, the key is to associate such technological capabilities with something else Putin also said, “the theory of first strike is part of their doctrine, but not ours” – if Russian missiles are equipped with conventional warheads instead of nuclear ones, then there is no need to inscribe the device of first strike in nuclear doctrine. Total and absolute surprise.

5.

I had kept these ideas to myself without giving them due importance, until in 2024 a article in Russian signed by Timofey Sergeitsev, entitled “Russia will have to deprive the United States of its nuclear weapons”, published on September 17 of that year by the Russian state news agency RIA Novosti and echoed by Andrei Martyanov's English-language blog, highlighted to me the decision by a first strike of disarmament.

By way of justification, the article states: “[…] one should not count [on the United States] the “instinct of self-preservation”, because the subject that claims to have superpower does not possess it by definition. Suicide is precisely its greatest achievement and inevitable prospect. After all, a supersubject becomes such by spending resources uncontrollably. Which one day ends. However, unlike the Soviet Union, which accepted the ideological poison of anti-communism and died peacefully in its bed, the United States will try to take everyone else with it. Because it lives at the expense of others and not at its own expense. And the others will sooner or later stop feeding the dragon.”

The United States must be disarmed before it destroys the planet when it realizes it can no longer prey on it.

Anyway, this is all just conjecture on my part. And why? Because to me it all makes sense. And here it's not just about making sense, I need to believe that the world will not end in a nuclear holocaust even when I see everything heading inexorably in that direction.

Let's hope the Russians are really preparing a first strike for the disarmament of the Americans, that they carry it out in time (before nuclear war occurs), and that they are successful. Otherwise, our (the world's) prospects are not at all, not at all favorable.

If nuclear war does come anyway, I will still leave you with a text I wrote, “Post-Nuclear War in Brazil”, about how it would be possible for us to try to deal with such a reality.

*Ruben Bauer Naveira is a political activist and pacifist. Author of the book A new utopia for Brazil: three guides to get out of chaos, available for download at http://www.brasilutopia.com.br.