Tom Plate

Opinion | No one, China included, wants to see the Ukraine war going nuclear

The longer the war ploughs on, the higher the chance of it turning into a nuclear crisis. To reduce the threat, China must put to good use its access to Russian leader Vladimir Putin and help broker a ceasefire

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A bust of the founder of the Soviet Union Vladimir Lenin sits in a forest inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone on May 29, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Any chances of the Ukraine war growing into a nuclear conflict must be snuffed out. Photo: AFP

Tom Plate

Published: 1:30am, 14 Jun 2022Updated: 2:02am, 14 Jun 2022

Major participants in the Russia-Ukraine war, whether involved directly or by proxy, lack agreement about when and how it must end. These varying perspectives result in an unseemly policy scrum, adding more confusion to this humanitarian tragedy. This obscene war, despite the many ways it presses hard on our conscience, is developing a second dimension of amoral abstraction.

To be sure, the reality could not be more grim. Europe’s two largest countries are in a bloody war. The Russian army has drawn world opprobrium not simply for the brutal fact of invasion but also for its attacks on areas where civilians are concentrated.

For their part, the Ukrainian armed forces have held their ground better than anticipated; perhaps their fighting spirit has been given special life by the rallying charm of their president. Fans around the world easily imagine future historians likening Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president born of Jewish parents, to a second Winston Churchill. By contrast, Russian President Vladimir Putin gets the Darth Vader part, which he fills comfortably.

Still, by moralising, the Russia-Ukraine war offers the narrow absolutism that obviates the need for reason. At this time of great danger – with Covid-19 variants still swirling around – no avenue to a ceasefire should be left unexplored.

A persistent process of entrepreneurial diplomacy is needed. War is not a game; it is deadly. Anger and hatred fuel the feral absolutism of wartime. The longer this war goes on, the greater the risk of an apocalypse.

Certainly, no one can say that the prospect of a nuclear war mushrooming from the current tragedy is inconceivable. On the contrary, it is being thought about with growing intensity. Recall that, early on, Putin pointedly put his country’s nuclear forces on high alert. Can we believe he was merely bluffing?

While Ukraine itself reportedly has no nuclear weapons – Mikhail Gorbachev having arranged their transfer to Russian custody in the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet empire – its primary patron has plenty in reserve, of course.