Is Ukraine Going Rogue Or Did It Attack Russia’s Early Warning Systems With American Approval? By Andrew Korybko

Trying to take out Russia’s early nuclear warning systems sets a new low for Zelensky, if it was solely his decision, and Zelensky and Biden if the U.S. approved beforehand. From Andrew Korybko at korybko.substack.com:

Russia’s answer to this question will determine its response to any conventional NATO intervention in Ukraine.

Russian-US relations deteriorated further than ever in late May as a result of three developments. First, the US set the ball rolling by more openly allowing Ukraine to use its arms to strike targets inside of Russia, then Poland said that the US will hit all of Russia’s forces in the special operation zone if Moscow uses nukes, and finally, President Putin signaled that he expects NATO to majorly escalate the conflict by sometime this summer. All of this is bad enough, but it’s made even worse by what Ukraine just did.

Russia confirmed that Ukraine hit at least one of its early nuclear warning systems, while Kiev claims to have targeted a second one deeper inside its opponent’s hinterland that hasn’t (yet?) been confirmed. These structures detect incoming intercontinental ballistic missiles of the sort that could be launched by the US in the scenario of a first strike, thus enabling Russia to prepare for an inevitable second strike. They have nothing to do with the Ukrainian Conflict and everything to do with strategic stability.

Both reportedly remain operable, but this nevertheless represents an unprecedented development since never before has any country ever targeted another’s such systems, which could partially blind them to a first strike in the worst-case scenario and thus give the attacking party a huge edge in that event. The further deterioration of Russian-US relations that occurred independently of this development raised tensions to their highest level since the Cuban Missile Crisis so this couldn’t have come at a worse time.

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