Summer 2016. While the Obama administration was still in Washington, the US National Security Council ran a simulation to test how Russia's "

The hypothetical scenario then assumed that Vladimir Putin launched a war against one of the Baltic countries, was defeated in a conventional war against NATO, and used tactical nuclear weapons to turn the situation around.. American political scientist and journalist Fred Kaplan spoke about this in an interview with Die Welt.. According to him, the assembled US military began to discuss the goals that the US could set itself in a potential response to Russian actions..

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“Then Colin Kahl, who was National Security Adviser to Vice President Joe Biden and now serves as Deputy Secretary of Defense, said, “Wait a minute.. When Russia uses nuclear weapons for the first time since World War II, it will become a pariah. So we win with conventional weapons.”. At the level of deputies, it was decided to stop at this result, ”Kaplan said..

He added that when the same simulation was repeated at the government level, members of the National Security Council rejected this outcome.. It was decided that the US should give a nuclear response to the Russian nuclear attack.. Otherwise, America's credibility will be destroyed..

“I am absolutely sure that under the current government, this scenario is being worked out even more seriously.. I also know that there is an additional option on the table in case Russia uses nuclear weapons.. A possible reaction could be the destruction of all Russian positions in Ukraine by conventional means, in particular the Air Force.. It's possible we could do it in a few days or a week.. And if the Russians use a few nuclear weapons, the deterrent value of such weapons will disappear, ”said the American journalist..

Answering the question of Die Welt journalists about how he knows about such plans of Washington, Kaplan recalled his book " According to him, while working on it, he interviewed 160 officials, and also achieved the disclosure of thousands of documents, referring to the law " The book " He added that few documents from the period of these two administrations have been released to the public at this time..

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Fred Kaplan - American journalist and political scientist. He wrote seven books on military strategy. In 1983, Kaplan published the book The Wizards of Armageddon, which talked about the authors of American nuclear strategy in the late 1940s and early 1950s.. In 2008, Kaplan wrote a book called Fantasia Believers about the application of Cold War approaches to the administration of George W. Bush..