> I can't conceive of a valid reason for shelling a nuclear power plant.

The classical excuse (see Operation Opera) is that it is part of an enemy weapons program from an enemy intent on nuking you. It would only be a small step from current propaganda for Russia to make this claim, having recently added the claim of an offensive Ukrainian nuke program to their propaganda.

It's an awfully effective way to distract people from focusing on defending the perimeter of whatever city they're trying to defend

If it provides 1/4 of the country's power, couldn't they leave the containment domes alone, and just hit the lines coming out of the plant? If you're the invading country, it'd be nice to have that power later when you're in charge, wouldn't it?

Doesn’t the power has to go somewhere. I don’t know what would happen to a nuclear power plant operating without a load to take the generated power.

Maybe the steam just vents? Or bypasses a turbine? Hopefully it can operate without being connected to the outside, but I’m not sure.

> I don’t know what would happen to a nuclear power plant operating without a load to take the generated power.

The same as any other power plant: the generator is automatically shut down by its safety systems (if it didn't shut down, the generator would overspeed and violently break apart). Once the generator shuts down, the safety systems for the reactor itself should either automatically shut down the reactor too, or somehow bypass the steam to the generator and reduce power to idle (I thought they would always shut down, but recently there was a failure on the generator of the nuclear power plant near where I live, and the reactor went to idle instead of shutting down, so it seems nuclear power plants have this mode too).

The issue is what happens after a shutdown; as seen at Fukushima, the cooling pumps in the reactor need external power for a couple of days until the decay heat reduces enough that passive cooling is sufficient. Without power from the outside, the emergency generators take over; if these are damaged or out of fuel, and backup generators can't be brought by truck from outside after a couple of hours, disaster happens.

Reactors can be shut down gracefully. The generated power can be shunted to ground from the turbines without risk.

If they were to spring a leak then it would be impossible to hide their activity from the population at home, so my guess is that's something they would try to avoid.

Elevated radiation levels originating from a significant distance away from measurement are not going to be the thing that breaks through the fog of Russian propaganda, for anyone who's along for that ride.

That almost seems irellevant, even if Putin cared what people think (I don't think he does for the most part), he controls almost all of the media in the country. He can just tell people "Ukraine did it" and they can believe him or not, it doesn't really matter.

The Russian government has already claimed that Ukraine is seeking nuclear weapons with US aid [0]. If it doesn't find a way to fit it's attack on, the fire at, and any resulting radiation release from the plant into that narrative with massaged details that make it both a heroic action by Russia and a dastardly one by Ukraine compounded by a Ukrainian propaganda effort to blame it on Russia...well, they aren't following the propaganda style they have been this whole invasion.

[0] https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj.com/amp/articles/ukrain...

A large ecological disaster from an open air uncontrolled nuclear power plant fire would be a European wide concern. The results could be considered a WMD.

> results could be considered a WMD

What rubbish. This looks like Putin found a way to tactically deploy dirty nukes within the West’s red lines.

I expect if the invasion is protracted, Putin will at a minimum detonate a demonstration nuke. The downside consequences for Russia are modest at this point, and it'll be very terrifying to the people of Ukraine (and the world generally).

>I expect if the invasion is protracted, Putin will at a minimum detonate a demonstration nuke.

Given the widespread reports during this war of Russian equipment in poor condition, I've been thinking about this possibility for a while:

* Putin fires tactical atomic weapon at some empty plot of Ukrainian land, and announces it as a "demonstration" of Russian might.

* The weapon is a dud.

I'm not sure whether this outcome might not be worse in the long run, in terms of geopolitical stability, than if the weapon performs as expected!

There is no “demonstration nuke”. If Putin sets off a nuke it’s doomsday.

The time between Russia being the second country to use nuclear weapons and our current concept of countries becoming totally irrelevant would be measured in minutes.

Having said this he might still do it.

The rest of the world isn’t going to say “whelp, I guess it’s time to kick off the extinction of our species” and do a full set of city strikes over a tactical nuke being used. That would be absurd.

It looks like you are using salami tactics. Salami tactics works in both ways.

You say that nobody will went crazy when a tactic nuke will be used against RF army. Right?

Can you draw the line, please? When this war between two nuclear states will be nuclear, if even use of tactical nuke is not enough for you?

Ukraine isn't a nuclear state. They destroyed their nukes and joined the non-proliferation treaty in 1994.

Ukraine is a nuclear state[1] that temporarily doesn't have nukes - they gave all to Russia.

[1]Budapest Memorandum was not fulfilled, so Ukraine regain their status of nuclear state.

I’m just saying that the US isn’t going to engage in a massive species-ending strike over the Russians using a tactical nuke in a conflict with a non-NATO country.

No idea what salami tactics means.

The idea is that a tactical nuke requires at a minimum proportionate response. The history of large attacks is that the response is always disproportionate. A German plane accidentally drops their bombs on London leads to a dedicated air raid on berlin leads to the blitz.

A tactical nuke used against Kharkiv would certainly lead to either a Ukrainian dirty bomb strike against Moscow and or a NATO intervention. Why would Russia stop at one nuke when fighting NATO? For each tactical nuke against NATO you would expect at least one in return, or worse a megaton +x% for megaton exchange.

This spirals into full nuclear war very quickly once one side believes that they are going to lose without strategic weapons, or one side believes they have been or will be the victim of a strategic attack.

Speaking of, how long until the country with all of the old Soviet weapons facilities decides to re-enter the nuclear club?

Even total nuclear war (probably) wouldn't end the species. Just civilization as we know it.

That opinion is contrary to over 70 years of geopolitical and military strategic thinking.

I’m no expert, but my understanding is that thinking was based around a tactical nuke being used on US or Russian forces, leading to escalation and eventual use of strategic weapons, not against a non-nuclear power like Ukraine.

AFAICT, the person you were responding to wasn’t talking about a nuke being used against NATO forces.

If nuclear weapons are used it is doomsday. There are no qualifiers. The idea of getting away with a "tactical" nuke is fantasy. Our response would be total and immediate. There's no time to hesitate or wait for the effects.

If "tactical" nukes are a thing why hasn't anyone used them since 1945? Seems like they could have been handy in Syria or Afghanistan. There's no shortage of examples of nuclear powers going to war with non-nuclear non-NATO countries in the last 77 years. None of them involved nukes in any capacity.

demonstration nuke - it's called tactical nuke, which is different to strategic nuke. Imagine Ukrainian army winning and move towards Russia and Belarus. Putin may decide to fire a tactical nuke to "escalate to de-escalate"

If the Ukrainians push the Russians back to Russia then that is a de-escalation. The Ukrainians are not the aggressors here. I see no reason Ukraine would cross their own borders.

If Putin decides to escalate to nukes as a final act of failure then the de-escalation would be the complete annihilation of Russia as a country. In minutes.

The idea of getting away with a tactical nuke strike is insane.

> I see no reason Ukraine would cross their own borders

to strengthen their negotiation position "We give you back X, you give back Mariupol"

> complete annihilation of Russia as a country

you think US would die for some village in Ukraine? They were plenty of US politicians and generals which were against nuclear umbrella for West Germany.

None of what you are describing makes sense.

If the Ukrainians can push Russians back why wouldn’t they do the same everywhere? Crossing the border becomes an act of aggression, only Russia has acted aggressively here. Everyone else is trying to avoid conflict.

If Russia detonates a nuke in Europe the entire country will be obliterated immediately.

Ukrainians already have, there was a counter attack in the north of Dombas

That was a tactical strike on an airfield. They don’t hold Russian territory. They have not secured a bargaining chip.