How 'paranoid' Putin's Ukraine invasion could lead to 'accidental' nuclear crisis: military expert

Tom Nichols, a professor at the U.S. Naval War College and at the Harvard Extension School, has written a lengthy piece for The Atlantic about the potential for Russia's invasion of Ukraine to spiral into a nuclear crisis.

Nichols describes Russian President Vladimir Putin as "paranoid," although he doesn't believe that he's outright insane -- in other words, he does not expect Putin to directly attack a NATO country.

Rather, Nichols thinks the big risk is that a misstep by Russia's military could lead to an escalation that gets out of hand.

"There are countless opportunities for such errors in the chaos now overtaking Ukraine," he writes. "The Russians might shoot at NATO aircraft after misidentifying them. Or they might incorrectly believe that Russian aircraft have been attacked by NATO forces. They might suffer a misfire or a targeting error of some kind that puts Russian ordnance on NATO territory. Europe’s a crowded continent, and no place for a jumpy trigger finger, but accidents are an unavoidable part of warfare."

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Nichols also raises the "frightening possibility that Putin will increase the alert status of his nuclear forces for his own reasons, leaving the Americans no choice but to raise their alert status," and thus set the stage for a nuclear standoff.

Read the whole analysis here.