Attention to the Unseen

Eric Schlosser writes: The 12th Main Directorate of the Russian Ministry of Defense operates a dozen central storage facilities for nuclear weapons. Known as “Object S” sites and scattered across the Russian Federation, they contain thousands of nuclear warheads and hydrogen bombs with a wide variety of explosive yields. For the past three months, President Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials have been ominously threatening to use nuclear weapons in the war against Ukraine. According to Pavel Podvig, the director…

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The New York Times reports: Reflecting a shockingly barbaric and old-fashioned wartime strategy, Russian forces have pummeled Ukrainian cities and towns with a barrage of rockets and other munitions, most of which can be considered relatively crude relics of the Cold War, and many of which have been banned widely under international treaties, according to a New York Times analysis. The attacks have made repeated and widespread use of weapons that kill, maim and destroy indiscriminately — a potential violation…

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Emily Ferris writes: The war in Ukraine has prompted much soul-searching among Russia watchers and policymakers, to try to consider where we might have got Russia wrong, what we might have missed, and what this now means about how the West looks at Russia. One of the most pressing concerns highlighted by this war has been the growing acceptance in Russia of previously fringe views on both Ukraine and the West. Several particular events in the past few weeks have…

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The Guardian reports: Western leaders have said the war in Ukraine could last for years and will require long-term military support as Russia brought forward reserve forces in an apparent attempt to capture the eastern city of Sievierodonetsk. “We must prepare for the fact that it could take years,” Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, said in an interview with the German newspaper Bild on Sunday. “We must not let up in supporting Ukraine.” The British prime minister, Boris Johnson, echoed…

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Dmytro Kuleba, minister of foreign affairs of Ukraine, writes: As Russia’s all-out war of aggression in Ukraine drags on for a fourth consecutive month, calls for dangerous deals are getting louder. As fatigue grows and attention wanders, more and more Kremlin-leaning commentators are proposing to sell out Ukraine for the sake of peace and economic stability in their own countries. Although they may pose as pacifists or realists, they are better understood as enablers of Russian imperialism and war crimes….

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