Donald Trump has long used his Truth Social messaging platform to vent his fury at a variety of targets. Until Friday, however, he had not deployed it for the purpose of nuclear sabre-rattling.
In a post which simultaneously caused consternation and the scratching of heads in high offices from London to Moscow, the US president elevated a social media spat with former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev to an exercise in nuclear brinkmanship when he said he had ordered two ballistic missile submarines to change course for Russia.
The manoeuvre, which Trump this weekend doubled down on by confirming in an interview that two US Navy nuclear submarines “are getting closer to Russia”, followed messages from Medvedev, a provocative ally of Vladimir Putin, ruminating on the possibility of war between Moscow and Washington.
Some 72 hours after Trump’s social media post, the wider significance of the move remains obscured by silence from Moscow and disquiet elsewhere over the US president’s intentions.
Here are three scenarios for just how Trump’s submarine threat could develop.
For decades America has operated its “nuclear triad” – a three-pronged system of delivering atomic weapons which includes a fleet of 14 Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines or SSBNs.
The precise details of how many of these vessels are at sea at any one time is a closely-guarded secret, although it is thought that between eight and ten of the submarines are deployed at any one time. Even more sensitive is any information relating to the whereabouts of what Washington calls its core “second strike” weapon – each missile on a Ohio-class sub has a range of some 4,000 miles.
It is these facts which have left experts and diplomats scratching their heads at Trump’s apparent command to shift the course of two of these doomsday boats and at least hint at a new location within the vicinity of Russian territory.
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A Western diplomatic source told The i Paper: “The fact is the deterrent is already there and is a permanent presence. You don’t need to move these vessels anywhere different from where they are already placed.
“Bluntly, an Ohio-class sub could be parked off Kenya and still comfortably wipe out Moscow. It’s the status quo ante. The only thing Trump has done is to effectively weaken his own position by playing a nuclear card when he didn’t need to.”
John Bolton, a former national security adviser to Trump who has since become one of his most trenchant critics, said the MAGA leader’s actions suggested “he doesn’t understand the deterrence posture of our navy’s nuclear capabilities”.
Speaking on CNN, Bolton said: “The Ohio-class submarines don’t sit around in port. To say he’s going to move those kinds of submarines anywhere indicates he doesn’t know how they might work right now. I hope someone from the Pentagon explains our ballistic missile disposition to Trump at some stage.”
Several observers noted that the US president’s response to Medvedev had reversed a long-standing White House and Pentagon policy of refusing to engage with Moscow’s own penchant for nuclear sabre-rattling.
Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, which campaigns on non-proliferation policies, said: “No leader… should be threatening nuclear war, let alone in a juvenile manner on social media.”
Trump’s 21st-century gunboat diplomacy wins concessions
Ever since the Royal Navy developed a penchant in the 19th century for dispatching its war ships to far-flung shores to wring concessions from Britain’s adversaries, gunboat diplomacy has featured in the geopolitical armoury of the world’s great powers.
Trump’s decision to deploy a distinctly 21st–century version of this tool appears to be born from a wider context of the US president’s growing disenchantment with Vladimir Putin and an apparent desire to apply more stick rather than carrot to their increasingly fractious relationship.
Last week Trump drastically shortened the 50-day deadline he had set for Moscow to agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine and peace deal negotiations, bringing the cut-off point forward to this week on pain of as-yet unspecified sanctions and tariffs.
It was Medvedev’s public response to this, stating that “each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war” along with a later reference to a Soviet-era mechanism allowing Russia to automatically retaliate to a nuclear attack, which provoked Trump’s submarine threat.
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The diplomatic source said: “Trump is on an increasingly sticky wicket with Putin. His boast that he was going stop the war in Ukraine in 24 hours has been exposed as nonsense and Putin shows no sign of wanting to stop.
“From Trump’s perspective this could be another roll of the dice, another form of pressure, to throw the Kremlin off balance a little and make it pay attention. The best-case scenario [for the White House] is that Moscow now goes away and comes up with some sort of ceasefire proposal that gives Trump his win. But I’m not holding my breath.”
Indeed, the Kremlin’s stance on Trump’s Truth Social posting has been characterised by silence from the machinery of government in Moscow.
While Russian commentators have mused that the US president’s remarks are him letting off steam – one retired commander this weekend described the submarine threat as “meaningless blather” – the Kremlin, which has also made clear it is still pursuing its war aims in Ukraine, has chosen not to publicly address the matter.
While the Russians have thereby opted for “strategic ambiguity”, experts suggest that Trump has faltered by adding a nuclear dimension to his efforts to bring the Kremlin to negotiating table.
Hans Kristensen, head of the Federation of American Scientists, said the US president had created a “commitment trap” for himself by hinting that nuclear weapons were on the table if tensions with Russia further escalated.
When he made his nuclear submarine remarks on Friday, the US president was careful to point out the perils of verbal threats between nuclear powers.
He wrote: “Words are very important, and can often lead to unintended consequences, I hope this will not be one of those instances.”
Trump was of course referring to the words of Medvedev, who is routinely dismissed as a cartoonish propagandist but nonetheless retains an influential position within Russian power structures as deputy head of the country’s security council.
But experts warned this weekend that the US president should also pay heed to his own ministrations.
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Read MoreBolton said it would be perfectly clear to Moscow that while Washington classes its SSBNs as a “second strike” weapon – to be used as a fail-safe retaliation for a nuclear assault by Russia or China – the vessels could be equally used as a first strike weapon.
As such, Trump’s words are at risk of being interpreted by Russia as a concrete action by Washington to increase its nuclear threat.
Bolton said: “You can see how people in the Kremlin – [who are] obviously always nervous about our capabilities – believe Trump’s trying to insinuate that he may be considering a first strike, which is even more dangerous.”
There were some signs this weekend that behind the scenes Moscow is feeding an amount of diplomatic oxygen to such concerns.
The Washington Post reported that Russian officials were “seeking clarity” from America about just what lies behind Trump’s words while RIA Novosti, a state-controlled Russian news agency, reported that it not received a response to its own enquiries to the White House, Pentagon and US Central Command about any shift in US nuclear posture.
Diplomatic sources nonetheless suggested that Moscow’s public silence on the matter of America’s submarines should be interpreted as a sign that the Kremlin did not consider Trump’s remarks worthy of a response rather than pondering a move up the nuclear ladder.
Evelyn Farkas, a former senior Pentagon official and executive director of the McCain Institute, an international affairs think-tank, said: “It’s really signaling. It’s not the beginning of some nuclear confrontation and nobody reads it as such. And I would imagine the Russians don’t either.”
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