Over time, as Soviet conventional forces expanded, US-aligned nations in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) began to view nuclear weapons as an equalizer, allowing the alliance to compensate for numerical disadvantages in tanks and artillery.Īs both sides developed a range of nuclear weapons, some theorists perceived a need to meet an adversary with equivalent force at every level. Dozens of types were designed and tens of thousands produced, some with very low yields designed to be fired by one soldier. Initially, tactical nuclear weapons were simply another weapon in the US arsenal. Use of any nuclear weapon would break the “nuclear taboo” that has held since 1945, dramatically changing the course of history. Indeed, then-US secretary of defense James Mattis declared in 2018 “I don’t think there’s any such thing as a ‘tactical nuclear weapon.’ Any nuclear weapon used at any time is a strategic game changer.” Today’s stockpiles are smaller but still capable of incomparable destruction.īottomline: there is no universal definition of tactical nuclear weapons. During the Cold War, the US and Soviet Union built up massive numbers of these weapons in their arsenals, many deployed in Europe. While long- and medium-range nuclear systems have been constrained or eliminated by arms control treaties, tactical nuclear weapons have never had verified limits. However, many Russian and US tactical weapons have yields far greater than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, which instantly killed more than 70,000 people. This may make them more militarily useful, and less politically objectionable, and thus more likely to be used. Tactical nuclear weapons can have lower explosive “yield” than strategic weapons, meaning they’re explosively less powerful. Russia’s 2022 war on Ukraine raised serious questions about these weapons, but the weapons themselves have existed since the beginning of the Cold War and their dangers are well known. Some analysts describe tactical nuclear weapons as intended to win a battle, while strategic weapons are intended to win a war. Tactical nuclear weapons, also called nonstrategic nuclear weapons, are generally designed for battlefield use and have a shorter range than strategic, or long-range, nuclear weapons, which are designed to directly attack an adversary’s homeland.
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