Since the occupation of Ukraine by Russian forces, there has been speculation as to whether Russia will use “tactical nuclear weapons” against other countries. In this article, what exactly are tactical nuclear weapons and what they differ from “strategic” nuclear weapons and World War II. We will try to answer the questions of how they differ from those deployed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II.
Strategic nuclear weapons are probably the type you are most familiar with, if not in name. These include “Fat Man” and “Little Boy” (Little Boy), which were dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.
Strategic nuclear weapons are designed to be launched at strategic targets. Strategic nuclear weapons, often far more powerful than tactical nuclear weapons, are designed to be used away from battlefields, away from any potential damage to the civilians and military of the launching state.
Definitions vary from strength to strength, but the term “strategic nuclear weapons” generally refers to nuclear weapons that can be launched at high or intercontinental range.
Although smaller weapons launched from a long distance (used, for example, to destroy an enemy missile silo) can be classified as strategic nuclear weapons, they can cause enormous and indiscriminate damage over large areas.
Tactical nuclear weapons (ie non-strategic nuclear weapons) make up about 30-40 percent of the American and Russian nuclear arsenals and close to 100 percent of warehouses in various other countries. They are designed for shorter-range use than strategic nuclear weapons, including air, sea, and land-launched weapons.
As with strategic nuclear weapons, the definition differs from country to country, with some (for example France, which sees all its arsenals as strategic) define shorter-range weapons as strategic rather than tactical. However, they are generally smaller in payload than strategic nuclear weapons and are designed to be used for attacks on smaller battlefields.
Given their short range, they are not intended to cause extensive nuclear fallout or destruction for tactical purposes or to damage the launcher itself. They can be seen in different forms such as short-range missiles, land mines, artillery shells, sea mines and torpedoes.
Russia and the United States have agreements that limit the strength and size of their tactical nuclear arsenals, but the weapons are not as regulated as their larger counterparts. While their devastation is smaller, they have their own risks, and perhaps the least of these risks is that if used on a battlefield they are quite likely to escalate tensions quickly.
“[tactical nuclear weapons] are in some ways more dangerous than strategic weapons,” says Nikolai Sokov, Senior Fellow of the James Martin Center for Nuclear Nonproliferation Research, in a piece for the Nuclear Threat Initiative. “Their vulnerability and perceived usability make the presence of TNWs in national arsenals a risk to global security. And the new perception of the availability of nuclear weapons in both Russia and the United States, albeit for different reasons, could set a dangerous precedent for other countries.”
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