The Kremlin’s attempt to take the chemical weapons issue to the UN security council, claiming that the US and Ukraine might seek to deploy them, is widely seen as a device to distract from any future use by its own forces. The Pentagon has, more credibly, already voiced its concern that Vladimir Putin may choose to use them in the near future. But behind the mass media coverage is a more fundamental matter: why would the Kremlin even think about using chemical weapons?
And the problem for western leaders is that their advisers will be telling them that from Putin’s perspective there may actually be reasons for doing precisely this. Consider the following.
