By Reginald Johnson
As the war
between Russia and Ukraine grows more intense, a former UN weapons inspector
and intelligence analyst is warning that military officials in the United
States are now actively preparing for a nuclear war with Russia.
Scott Ritter,
a former Iraq weapons inspector and intelligence official with the US Marines,
claimed that as one option the United States is considering actually starting a
nuclear war with Russia by firing a preemptive strike to knock out all of
Russia’s nuclear weaponry and emerge victorious, despite maintaining massive
human losses.
“It is high
time for everyone from every walk of life to understand the path we are
currently on,” said Ritter. “Left unchecked, events are propelling us down a
highway to hell that leads to only one destination – a nuclear Armageddon that
everyone agrees can’t be won, and yet the United States is at this very moment
preparing to ‘win.’ “
Ritter added,
“a nuclear exchange with Russia, even if the United States were able to execute
a surprise preemptive nuclear strike, would result in the destruction of dozens
of American cities and more than 100 million Americans.
“And this is if we ‘win,’ ” he said. “And we
know that we can’t ‘win’ a nuclear war. And yet we are actively preparing to fight
one,” he said.
Ritter added, “This insanity must stop. Now.”
Ritter made
his comments in his Substack column “On the Brink” posted November 24.
The former
weapons inspector spoke out as the Ukraine war has taken a dangerous turn after
President Biden gave approval to Ukraine to fire US-made long-range ballistic
missiles at Russia. The green light reversed a previous decision by Biden in
September not to allow Ukraine to use the missiles, out of concern that such
attacks would lead to a confrontation with Russia, which has the largest
nuclear stockpile in the world.
With the approval
granted, Ukraine on November 19 fired six US “ATACMS” missiles at Russia, near the city of Bryansk. On
November 20, Ukraine launched up to a dozen British-made Storm Shadow cruise missiles
against a Russian command post in the Kursk province. Russia responded on
November 21, firing a new intermediate range missile called the “Oreshnik” against
Ukraine, destroying a major arms factory in Dnipropetrovsk. The facility was used
by Ukraine and NATO to produce short and intermediate range missiles.
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| Ukraine has been fighting Russia almost three years. Now there are worries the conflict could go nuclear. (Wikimedia photo) |
Meanwhile,
Russian leader Vladimir Putin announced that his country has changed its
nuclear use doctrine, lowering the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons.
The ATACMS
and Storm Shadow missile attacks met the threshold for a nuclear response by
Russia, Ritter said.
“Russia has
decided not to invoke its nuclear doctrine at this juncture,” said Ritter, “opting
instead to eject the operational use of the Oreshnik missile as an intermediate
non-nuclear deterrence measure.”
But the
question is, how long will the Russians hold off on going nuclear – if
Ukrainian attacks continue?
It’s clear
the risk of a nuclear war starting is the greatest since the Cuban Missile Crisis
of 1962, when the United States and Russia came extremely close to going to war
over the placement of Russian missiles on Cuban soil.
Ritter is a
widely respected analyst and commentator on foreign-policy and military issues.
He gained fame in 2003 when he called out the Bush administration’s bogus claims
that Iraq was hiding weapons of mass destruction. The administration used the
WMD claim to launch an invasion of Iraq, triggering a seven-years-long war, which took 1 million lives.
Investigations after the war began confirmed
what Ritter had said – there were no WMD.
Despite the
severity of the crisis in Eastern Europe – with the possibility that a nuclear
war could take place – American media, including progressive media, don’t
appear to be overly concerned. Most of the press attention in recent weeks has
been focused on the wars in Gaza and Lebanon or Donald Trump’s cabinet picks
and most recently the decision by President Biden to pardon his son Hunter. There
have been few segments on TV concerning the Ukraine War and the imminent danger
of a nuclear confrontation between the US and Russia.
A few commentators in the conservative media
have been sounding the alarm about a possible nuclear war. One of them is Rob
Finnerty of Newsmax, who has spent several recent shows talking about the
dangerous situation in Ukraine.
“Russia has more nuclear weapons than any
other country on the planet and now Ukraine is firing missiles deep into
Russia, and those missiles were made in the United States,” he said.
“Those are
just the facts. The United States is no
longer in a proxy war with Russia. We are at war with Russia,” he said.
Finnerty
criticized Biden for green-lighting the Ukrainian missile attacks, which he
said undermine President-elect Donald Trump’s plans for ending the Ukraine war.
Trump takes office on January 20.
“We are a lot
closer to World War III then we were yesterday,” Finnerty said.
(A panel discussion
about the danger of a nuclear war starting in Ukraine will take place this Saturday in Washington, D.C. The event, called “No Nuclear War --- A Call to Reason” will take place at the National Press Club and run from 4 to 7 pm. Moderated by Ritter, panel participants
include Lawrence Wilkerson, Max Blumenthal, Garland Nixon, Dan Kovalik and
Margaret Kimberley. To reserve a seat, go
to www.nonuclearwar.com)
