A former air force chief with Great Britain’s RAF told media that nuclear war is “no longer unthinkable,” several weeks after Russia placed its strategic nuclear deterrent forces on high alert.
Air Marshall Edward Stringer, a former head of RAF Intelligence, told LBC radio station that it could be “only a few steps to get from where we are now to a confrontation that could see the use of nuclear weapons – which is I think a terrifying prospect for anybody sensible.
“It is no longer unthinkable,” he stressed, adding that, “This will clearly be weighing on the minds of those making difficult calculations at the moment.”
Stringer suggested that it was this concern that underlay the unwillingness of global powers to enforce a no-fly zone over Ukraine. “NATO is not constructed to go on to the offensive. If it did, it would be taking on another nuclear power: Russia. Russian nuclear doctrine has within it the use of nuclear weapons,” he explained.
“It is within the realm of possibility. And that is what people have to get their heads around.”