There is no precedent in the history of wars for what is happening right now in Zaporozhye. Never before has a nuclear power plant been at the forefront of a war, as well as an important object in the strategy of the belligerents..

How Russia, Ukraine and the whole world deal with this moment on the edge of the abyss will determine how wars in our time will be. And is it possible to limit them at all, writes journalist and writer Andreas Kluth on the pages of Bloomberg. He recalls that during a conversation with French President Emmanuel Macron, Russian leader Vladimir Putin allegedly agreed to let an international team into the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant for the sake of ensuring safety.. And it's encouraging if it's true. Because Putin has a habit of lying about his intentions. This is what he did before the invasion of Ukraine six months ago.

ZNPP is the largest nuclear power plant in Europe. Before Putin's attack, it generated a fifth of the electricity in Ukraine. Russia took it over in March and has been in control ever since.. Previously, 11 thousand people worked at the station.. Many have already fled the war. But the staff currently serving ZNPP is still Ukrainian. These engineers became hostages. They keep the power plant safe and running, but at gunpoint. Tactically, Russia uses Zaporizhzhya NPP as a shield. Russian troops placed their soldiers, weapons and ammunition near the reactors and nuclear waste storage, hoping that the Ukrainian army would not dare to bombard them with artillery. After all, explosions can lead to radiation leakage or even melting of the active part of the reactor.. By shelling the Ukrainian military from the power plant, Russia is also trying to slow down the Ukrainian counter-offensive aimed at regaining control of the south of the country..

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From a strategic point of view, Moscow wants to disconnect the Zaporizhzhya NPP from the Ukrainian power grid and connect it to its own. In fact, she hopes to steal much of Ukraine's energy supply.. Russian military trying to blow up transmission lines at power plant. And it's very dangerous. Ukraine pursues completely opposite goals.. She wants to free her citizens who have become hostages at the ZNPP, as well as to keep the flow of electricity to the Ukrainian grid.. Kyiv wants to free the power plant from Russian occupiers so that it can regain control over other areas in the south.

But, above all, Ukrainians want to prevent a nuclear catastrophe like the one that occurred in Chernobyl in 1986.. And here the interests of Kyiv coincide with the interests of the UN, the IAEA, as well as the countries of the West, East, South and North, of all mankind as a whole. The very nature of the threat makes the situation unprecedented.. In the event of an accident, a radioactive cloud from the Zaporozhye NPP will fly to where the wind will take it. It may appear in Western Europe, the Middle East, Belarus, Russia or somewhere else. Such a catastrophe cannot be isolated geographically.. Therefore, it can provoke a widespread panic, due to which other countries will be involved in the war..

In order to prevent such a nightmarish scenario, IAEA Director Mariano Grossi repeatedly asked to stop operations around the ZNPP so that an international organization could send its specialists there to take care of safety at the power plant. After speaking with Macron over the weekend, US, British and German leaders also urged Putin to allow such an inspection.. But the problem is that even though the situation is completely new, human nature in it is the opposite.. The author writes that truth is always the first casualty of war.. And therefore, no one can confirm which of the armies is “actually shelling” the ZNPP.

Of course, Russia blames Ukraine for everything.. But it's incredible. Yes, the Ukrainian side would liberate the nuclear power plant with the help of special forces if it could. But in this way she would destroy a large source of electricity in her country, while putting the whole of Ukraine under a radioactive threat.. So such Ukrainian shelling would be mass suicide.

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Kyiv, in turn, claims that it is the Russian army that is deliberately provoking the escalation and even preparing a “false flag” operation.. Given that Putin is a KGB agent who has manipulated reality through disinformation and lies for most of his career, the Ukrainian version of events seems more plausible.. This leads to another perennial problem that exacerbates the current crisis.. It's about internal tension, as described by the Prussian veteran of Napoleon's wars Carl von Clausewitz: even if the generals want to make the conflict limited, the war itself seems to want to become absolute..

Ukraine, obviously, does not want to cede the ZNPP. Because it would be a big defeat in the battle for the existence of the country. However, Putin cannot afford to retreat from the power plant, because that would make a Russian victory in Ukraine even more unrealistic.. And defeat can lead to his overthrow.

Since the beginning of the senseless attack on Ukraine, Putin's personal interests have been at odds with the interests of the Russians or any other people, not to mention the Ukrainians.. He is only interested in whether he will be remembered and how. And no matter how many people he will pull to the next world for him. That is why, if the situation is really bitter for him, Putin may decide to escalate by using chemical or even nuclear weapons.. On the issue of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, Putin, no matter what he said to Macron, can take the risk of provoking a meltdown of the active part of the reactor in order to force Ukraine into submission.. Therefore, the whole world, from Paris to Ankara and Beijing, must stop him.. Although the success of these efforts is not guaranteed.