Ukraine cannot strike targets deep inside Russia without NATO ISR capabilities.

That's the problem here - NATO becoming a direct participant in the war by giving Ukraine the targeting data for its long-range strikes.

This would put two nuclear-armed powers in direct conflict with each other.

That's what the recent signaling is about.

The Kremlin keeps playing the nuclear card, because they know they have a much higher stake in this game than the West does.

Ukraine cannot strike targets deep inside Russia without NATO ISR capabilities.

That's the problem here - NATO becoming a direct participant in the war by giving Ukraine the targeting data for its long-range strikes.

This would put two nuclear-armed powers in direct conflict with each other.

That's what the recent signaling is about. — Tzeentch

This simply doesn't really matter.

Giving one party a weapon to then use on another party anyways makes you a party to how those weapons are used.

The status quo that weapon supply is not considered being a party to a conflict is only because they all like selling weapons. However, using this status quo as a loophole to then do critical damage to someone doesn't work. Even if your loophole "works" in terms of international law or whatever that simply isn't worth all that much.

No leader will go "ahhh, yeah, they got us, you see the loophole they used there, that they didn't technically strike us but gave the weapons to a proxy force so there's just nothing we can do".

Whether Ukraine needs NATO or not to technically use the weapons doesn't matter.

I honestly don't think it would be all that problematic for Ukraine to program the weapons themselves using their own spies, surveillance, literally google maps for targeting data. Critical infrastructure is not exactly difficult to find. The only difficulty is that the West would need to provide Ukraine the API interface needed to program the weapons which they don't provide precisely to be in control of what Ukraine uses the weapons for. If I had the API and documentation I would expect to be able to program one of these missiles to hit something like ... oh let's see ... let's say the Kremlin in about a day, week tops if there's some zany math going on to harmonize various sensor inputs. Probably there's some sophisticated simulation software the optimizes performance but I'm pretty sure a good approximation could be worked out by trial and error if we simply fired enough of these bad boys.

But whether it is or it isn't, if the only way to reestablish deterrence is striking a NATO base with a nuclear weapon, that's what Russia would do.

Obviously Russia would anyways claim exactly what you say, that NATO is supplying intelligence thus making them a party (which obviously NATO is doing generally speaking anyways so already a party to the conflict on that definition, also obviously already programming missiles to hit Russian targets "nearish" the front line anyways) but my point is NATO and Ukraine getting into some hair splitting loophole of who exactly is inputting what data into the missile doesn't actually change the situation.

The situation is that Russia and the West have currently an understanding that "what happens in Ukraine stays in Ukraine" but this understanding is founded on the West not going too far and instead letting Russia win. As it stands Russia is gaining territory, gaining people and resources, and so NATO support for Ukraine can be accounted for as a cost of doing business on the imperial profit and loss statement.

What the West is currently doing is playing a bit more footsy to signal to Ukraine to keep fighting because "maybe" they'll let Ukraine do some spite attacks and then they'll feel better (but still obviously lose) ... but they have cold feet this time as it may break the understanding they have with Russia to be cool.

We are in general agreement, but the West will be pushing the envelope because it knows Russia will get more risk averse the closer it gets to victory. Thus, the West could theoretically get away with more blatant belligerence. Russia on its part is signaling it will meet escalation with escalation.

Whether or not NATO is directly involved in the hostilities is not really an interesting practical question (obviously they are deeply involved), but it is an important legal question, and it's important for international perception which is something Russia does care about.

There's a world of difference between Russia being seen as reacting to the West, as oppossed to aggressing the West. This will be vitally important if it ever comes (God forbid) to nuclear escalation.

That's why I think these nuances are worth pointing out.

↪boethius We are in general agreement, but the West will be pushing the envelope because it knows Russia will get more risk averse the closer it gets to victory. Thus, the West could theoretically get away with more blatant belligerence. Russia on its part is signaling it will meet escalation with escalation. — Tzeentch

Yes, we're definitely in agreement, and as you point out the language being used is as part of a signalling exercise.

I just add clarification that the concrete reality doesn't actually matter lest someone get into a zany kindergarten level argument that Russia couldn't retaliate against NATO ... if Ukraine did it.

Obviously you're aware this sort of logic doesn't drive decisions.

Currently Russia doesn't retaliate against NATO because doing so would cause more problems than solve, but if NATO was attacking Russian critical infrastructure (directly, indirectly through Ukraine, with Ukraine programming the weapons or "advisors" or mercenaries or someone's hacker cousin) then the calculus obviously changes.

Completely agree with you that in this theatre there is likely a hard cap on escalation that is unlikely to be breached for the reason you point out that the great powers benefit from the status quo at the end of the day and they don't have an interest to nuke each other.

What's different in the middle-east right now is that Israel is not a great power that benefits from the geopolitical status quo as such, but rather benefits from the American empire and can "draw down" US imperial capital for their own purposes, which could honestly be mostly delusional prophecy fulfillment

A lot of the experts I think we both follow are discussing this pretty intensely right now of whether US is controlling Israel policy for US imperial interests, or Israel is controlling US policy for Israeli imperial interests, or even that it may appear Israel is driving policy at the moment but US imperialists wisely set things up this way decades ago to happen (to act as that cross-roads spoiler you've described, come-what-may style).

It's quite fascinating, but I feel there's just too much long term degradation of US prestige for what we see Israel doing to be some sort of cryptic US policy. General idea, sure, but no one concerned with US imperial interests would want to see a genocide in Gaza; They'd want to see what the US does: insane amounts of damage and suffering ... but aha! not quite genocide motherfuckers! Purposefully starving a population, for example, US imperialists simply view as beneath them (if people are eating while the US drops bombs on them, that doesn't bother them much, it's a sort of "why not?" attitude within the US war machine to people having basic food stuffs supplied by various humanitarian organizations; what we see Israel doing is I think too profoundly different to be driven by US imperialists; certainly enabled by zionists within the US administration, but this I think should be viewed as Israel effectively in control of US policy and not US imperialists, as such apart from being also zionists, view the extremes of zionism as somehow serving US foreign policy).

A lot of the experts I think we both follow are discussing this pretty intensely right now of whether US is controlling Israel policy for US imperial interests, or Israel is controlling US policy for Israeli imperial interests, or even that it may appear Israel is driving policy at the moment but US imperialists wisely set things up this way decades ago to happen (to act as that cross-roads spoiler you've described, come-what-may style).

It's quite fascinating, but I feel there's just too much long term degradation of US prestige for what we see Israel doing to be some sort of cryptic US policy. General idea, sure, but no one concerned with US imperial interests would want to see a genocide in Gaza; They'd want to see what the US does: insane amounts of damage and suffering ... but aha! not quite genocide motherfuckers! Purposefully starving a population, for example, US imperialists simply view as beneath them (if people are eating while the US drops bombs on them, that doesn't bother them much, it's a sort of "why not?" attitude within the US war machine to people having basic food stuffs supplied by various humanitarian organizations; what we see Israel doing is I think too profoundly different to be driven by US imperialists; certainly enabled by zionists within the US administration, but this I think should be viewed as Israel effectively in control of US policy and not US imperialists, as such apart from being also zionists, view the extremes of zionism as somehow serving US foreign policy). — boethius

Personally, I am reserving judgement on this issue, though I am leaning towards the US being in the driver's seat.

The basic question is, could Israel be used to plunge the Middle-East into chaos once controlling it becomes unfeasible?

(That's ultimately why the US is interested in the Middle-East. Oil, yes, but more importantly it is a vital land corridor that connects several geopolitical rivals - plunging it into chaos would be enough to deny that connection)

And I think the answer is yes, especially considering Israel will be a nuclear-armed power that's conceivably fighting for its survival.


Conversely, if Israel is in the driver's seat it's entirely unclear to me what power base they would be deriving that position from.

AIPAC? Ok, then where does AIPAC get its power from? If the Israel lobby is capable of coercing the former hegemon, it must have some practical levers of power that can be discerned, and personally I have never seen a convincing argument to that end.


US prestige taking a hit is certainly a factor worth considering, but once global domination becomes an unfeasible goal, perhaps prestige starts to matter less. We also have to consider the US may be gearing up to play hardball with the rest of the world (thus throwing its reputation out of the window) to protect its hegemonic position.