The United States is equipping Ukrainian infrastructure with sensors that can identify the perpetrator of an attack using nuclear or dirty bomb radiation bursts.
One objective is to make sure that if Russia were to use a nuclear bomb on Ukraine, the atomic signature would be detectable and Moscow would be held accountable.
Experts have been concerned that Russian President Vladimir V. Putin will use nuclear weapons in combat for the first time since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the United States in 1945, ever since Russia invaded Ukraine 14 months ago. National Nuclear Security Administration, a federal agency under the Energy Department, detailed the preparations on Wednesday. These preparations, which were mentioned in a House hearing last month, appear to be the most concrete evidence to date that Washington is taking concrete steps to prepare for the worst possible outcomes of the invasion of Ukraine, Europe’s second largest nation.
Security agency’s nuclear experts, known as the Nuclear Emergency Support Team (NEST), are collaborating with the Ukrainian government to set up radiation sensors, train personnel, monitor data, and issue warnings in the event of a radiation emergency.
A network of atomic sensors is being built “throughout the region,” the agency claimed in a statement to The New York Times in response to a reporter’s query, and this network would be able to “characterise the size, location, and effects of any nuclear explosion.” Russia would be unable to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine without being caught, it said, because to the sensors already in place.
This comment alludes to the nuclear war haze and the new system’s potential to cut through it for the United States.
In one possible scenario, Washington may utilise the network’s data to eliminate the potential that the perpetrator of a nuclear strike was mistakenly identified. Since a mushroom cloud is so easily recognisable, this may seem like an unnecessary extra step. Instead of a visible missile with a traceable flight path, a weapon may be delivered by a truck, tank, or boat, making it very difficult to ascertain its point of origin.
The public’s awareness of such defensive preparations, say nuclear experts, may send a message to Moscow that the United States is prepared to expose a false-flag operation.
For instance, Moscow may fabricate evidence that Kiev detonated a nuclear device on the battlefield in an effort to enlist more Western military support. In principle, though, with the sensor network in place, Washington would be able to prove that Moscow was in fact the aggressor by pointing to its own nuclear attribution investigations.
Russia made many unsubstantiated claims last autumn that Ukraine was intending to detonate a dirty bomb, or one meant to disperse radioactive material. Washington expressed concern that the Kremlin was planning to intensify the conflict by means of a false flag operation.
After the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks brought attention to the possibility of domestic nuclear terrorism, the field of nuclear attribution saw rapid growth in the United States. The specifics of the research are kept under wraps, but the broad strokes are common knowledge.
In preparation for a possible nuclear war or a Russian strike on Ukraine’s 15 nuclear reactors located across four power producing sites, this newly acquired capacity is now being deployed in a foreign country.
In addition to NEST’s help, the Energy Department says it’s assisting Ukrainian partners in areas including radiation monitoring, air plume modelling, stopping nuclear smuggling, and radiation injury care.
Union of Concerned Scientists nuclear power specialist Edwin Lyman, who has been following the conflict in Ukraine carefully, claims to have heard about a potential danger to a nuclear plant from a government official. Russia may respond by firing on a reactor or its spent fuel storage locations, releasing large amounts of radioactive material into the environment, the article suggests, if it were to suffer a humiliating loss and withdraw from Ukraine.
