Russia has been modernizing its conventional military forces for almost a decade and seeks to prevent any significant collective Western defensive opposition by threatening limited nuclear first-use in response. Russian military officials speak openly of the preemptive employment of nuclear weapons in a conventional war, and Moscow frequently makes direct nuclear threats to U.S. allies and partners.

Russian first-use nuclear threats essentially provide cover for Moscow’s military actions that destroy the post-Cold War settlement and established European boarders. Russia’s coercive use of nuclear weapons is a new reality more dangerous than the Cold War. If Russian planning follows this declared nuclear first-use strategy, then U.S. and NATO deterrence policy already is failing in a fundamental way, and the consequences of that failure could be catastrophic.

Russia reportedly is pursuing specialized, low-yield nuclear weapons to make its first-use threats credible. Such capabilities are destabilizing when developed to support territorial expansion and a strategy of nuclear coercion.

Moscow’s sophisticated propaganda complements this strategy. It vilifies the United States and NATO with what can only be described as a repetition of big lies. Russian defense expert Alexi Arbatov has observed that Russian defense and foreign policies are now based on consensus beliefs in Moscow, including the notion that the United States is using the pro-democracy opposition inside Russia to subvert the Putin regime, and that the U.S. with its allies may invade any time to seize Russia’s natural riches. Noted Russian journalist Alexander Golts rightly calls such views dangerous and self-induced “paranoia.”

Russia’s grand strategy also includes across-the-board nuclear modernization programs and defensive preparations for nuclear war.