His Support Is Dwindling :Jeff McCausland Talks To Armstrong & Getty

have to be nuclear. So that first voice was the guy who runs um what jin Stoltenberg NATO, Oh yeah, yeah, he's the native right, And then then that was General McMaster. After that, the question being asked to a whole bunch of people over the last week or so, do you think he'll use nukes? And what if he does? Too horrible to contemplate, Yet we must, So let's contemplate it with Dr Jeff mccaslins, CBS News, military consultant, founder and

CEO of Diamond six Leadership and Strategy llc UH. Dr mccoughlin also Senior Fellow at the Stockdale Center for Ethical Leadership at the Naval Academy. Jeff, always a pleasure. How are you, sir? Doing well? Great with you guys. So it is practically uncontemplatable, and yet we must the idea that say, let's start with Vladimir Putin conducts a quote unquote nuclear test and blows up something under the ocean. On up through levels key of how what sort of

reaction could we expect to see? Well, if you made an attack on Ukraine, I think the responses could be pretty broad. Albeit it is not going to be totally laid out in advance because one of the things that you want to enhance the terrance to a certain amount of ambiguity. But he will have to calculate how the

West would response. What could the West do well? The first thing, if you would like a no fly zone over Ukraine with NATO airplanes flying over Ukraine, I can't think of a faster way to get there than the Papa nuke on Ukrainian territory. If you'd like to see NATO forces on Ukrainian territory at least providing direct logistical and training support, something they've requested, again, a quick way to get there. If you'd like to see a lot of NATO ships in the Black Sea facilitating the export

of grain out of Ukraine. Two countries around the world, you might get there. And obviously, in addition to that, Mr Putin would have to calculate what would be the response elsewhere. Is support around the world is dwindling as this war goes on. Even the Chinese, I think are providing the best sort of tacit support. There's been no evidence of clear direct Chinese support except they buy a

lot of oil at heavily discounted prices. So if you want to become the next, as Tom Freeman said, next North Korea and totally isolate yourself internationally, that's waiting the way to go. And then, last but not least, Mr Putine might want to calculate the use of the nuclear wepon Kreining a territory the winds blow from west to

east and that part of Europe most generally. So any kind of a radioactive fallout would not only and as Ukraine of course and kill thousands of innicent civilians be a criminal act, but a lot of that radio TV could very clearly end up on Russian territory and on Russian forces well. General Petraeus yesterday on ABC This Week indicated that if he uses a tactical nuke, and he didn't specify of what level, but if Putin uses a tactical new we would wipe out everything on land and

see that we could identify. Do you think we would go that far? And if we did, how long would that take? Well, it depends, of course on what kind of weapon and where it's done. I mean, you have to calibrate response to some degree like that. But clearly you know Dave's not off the mark. That would be one of the calculations. But I come back to what's happened. That is, the Buying administration privately has made it pretty clear. So they claim to the Russians that the response would

be pretty overwhelming. They're never gonna lay it out very close exactly what we're going to do, because to do so undermines your deterrence. Some US suggested, for example, that that Russians might do a demonstration strike. They might drop one over the Arctic, because they might have dropped one over the Black Sea to show how really angry they are. I kind of doubt that's going to happen. When you can I come back to Russian military doctrine, which I

studied a lot. Lessons say in their military doctrine, we use a tax on nuclear weapon an effort to break up, you know, a static line of defense and for our addissary, and then use that to do a rapid armor advance. They don't have the forces left to do that, and and bringing in untrained recruits what they're doing right now is hardly going to enhance that effort. Furthermore, the Russian army in that particular region is in pretty sad shape

right now. As a consequence, I don't think they're sophisticated enough to protect themselves, resupply themselves at the nessary protective equipment, water, et cetera, to protect yourself in close proximity to a

nuclear attack. They would do a great deal of good. So, as a student students of of real politic and UH I have an enthusiasm for studying negotiation, I'm trying to figure out how Ukraine and NATO achieve their goals while giving putin on off ramp as they say that doesn't include the use of nuclear weapons and and that sort of thing. It's a it's a tough needle to thread right now. Giving Putin. Given Putin's disastrous uh moves of light, what do you picture as an end to this? Yeah,

and you're exactly right. Oh, by the way, Well, I think the use of actnutru weapon for a second longer is low probability. It's certainly not zero for sure. And the problem you get into is, at what point does Mr Putin say that, you know, backing off is such a personal or national humiliating catastrophe that I'm willing to you know, roll the cosmic, roll the dice with a nuclear weapon, which might be some degree of success. How

blocked in? And are you Oh, by the way, this is something John Kennedy worried about almost exactly sixty years ago when we were going through the Cuban missile crisis.

Ukrainians in their response to the announcement by the Russians that they have next this territory, you know, by the way, Mr Putin is taking up his offerings, because what he said in his speech on the thirtie was not only these provinces now Russian territory, even though they don't go, by the way, control the territory of those provinces, but

that is permanent. He called on the Ukrainians to go to a ceasefire and come to the negotiations, but they indicated that would be with them accepting the permanence of that territory being transferred to Ukraine. Well, there's no way in health right, frankly, the Ukrainians are going to do that. In the Ukrainian response, again making this even more difficult, was to say they hardly saw any possibility of negotiating as long as Putin was still in charge in Russia.

There are the cons and CBS News military consultant on the line. Go ahead, Jack, there are some headlines that have just come out. Um, they're not from your best media sources, but that a Russian nuclear train militrane has been seen on the move. We'll see that turns out to be verified or not, because that's one of the things I heard Secretary Lloyd Austin and others talking about. We've seen no uh, indication of them moving around the forces or whatever that would lead us believe they're gonna

use nukes. But away from that topic, Senator Marco Rubio yesterday said he's more concerned about a conventional sort of strike on a NATO country, like are we prepared for a response if Russia attacks a train station in Poland that is, you know, where a lot of the supplies are leaving from our that sort of thing, How how do we respond to that because it's not you know, it's not the clear red line of of of nukes that the world might um you know, rally around. Do

we do we attack the same way or what happens? Then? Yeah, of course that would invoke Article five was an attack on one country as an attack on alcohol, and prudent fully understands that. But I mean there's a variety of ways that he can still escalate, and we've seen that played out over the last week or so as well. I mean, and I happen to believe, though I can't absolutely prove it that the attack on this UH pipeline in the ball that he was done by the Russians.

I mean, I can't figure who else would do it. It It was a sophisticated attack, requiring submersible drones or divers. I don't think al Qaeda's got submercible drones in the Baltic right now. So I think that that was clearly the Russians, but it's an effort for them to further

intimidate the Europeans over energy. Oh, by the way, they did it only a day or so after a new pipeline was opened between Norway and Poland, suggesting once again the Europeans it could be a cold winner if you don't force the Ukrainians to in fact come to the negotiating table. They could do the attack, like Rubia suggested, they could do a large scale cyber attack. They could cause problems elsewhere, for example in the Balkans or with Moldova.

There's a variety of other things that Putin can do, and he has in his toolbox to escalate. And I trust that NATO leaders Washington included, are examining each one of those and trying to think through what would be our response and calibrating that based on what the Russians actually do. So my final question is I I was just reading that some of the Kremlin approved the channels in Russia are actually stating that NATO troops are on the ground in Ukraine fighting actively. We are already at

war with NATO. Is that sort of thing going to work? It's all possible. Part of Russian propaganda and Mr Trutin's speech announced in the annexation. He really described this more and more as a conflict between the West and Russia, even described the United States and the West as a tonic. Are you ready for that uh? And suggested that in fact it was the goal of Washington and NATO to destroy Russia. But this is for domestic consumption back home,

don't forget more. Young Russians have fled the country since he announced this three hundred man mobilization, then probably have fought in the Ukraine since this war began, So he's got to pay attention to domestic consumption and painting this as a threat by the West, a threat to the existence, rally to the motherland, all those kind of things. It's the traditional thing the Russians have done, and Putin has done it a couple of times during this crisis to

get the people behind this particular effort. Dr Jeff mccausl and CBS News military consultant Jeff thinks has always really enjoyed it. My pleasure. Armstrong and Jetty