At the Valdai Discussion Club, a conference held every year in Russia, someone queried President Vladimir Putin on what Russia’s response would be to a nuclear attack. Below is the text of his response as derived from the video above.

"I don't need to tell those who know. I'll repeat for those who don't. This means that we are ready to use nuclear weapons and we'll do so only once we make sure that someone that is a potential aggressor launches a strike on Russia, on our territory. There's no secret. We have a system that we're constantly improving. It needs to be continuously improved. It's is a MAW system, which is a missile approach warning system. It works globally and, first, detects launches of strategic missiles from the World Ocean or any territory, second, determines the flight trajectory, third, determines where the nuclear warheads are to fall. When we make sure, which takes us a few seconds, that Russia's territory is the target, only after that do we respond with a second strike.



It's a retaliation. The missiles fly towards our territory, and our missiles will fly to the aggressor's. Of course, it means a global catastrophe. But I repeat that we can't be those who initiated this catastrophe because we don't support the concept of a preventative strike. Yes, in this case, it's like we're waiting that somebody will use nuclear weapons against us and doing nothing. Yes, we are. But the aggressor should know that a retaliation is inevitable and they will be destroyed. And we'll be the victims of aggression and rise to the Heavens as martyrs. And they'll just drop dead because they won't even have time to repent". – Vladimir Putin

And we should get this out of the way first. Nuclear weapons are horrible for mankind, but the cat is out of the bag already. So from the perspective of national self-defense, some nations see nuclear weapons as a deterrent to dissuade invading armies, and or, nuclear attacks from other nations.

I agree with Putin, out of the two ideologies MAD vs. a Preemptive Strike, MAD is the best philosophy of the two. He conveyed that a country who would strike another first, is, in fact, the aggressor and the country who launches the counter-strike, they are defending themselves.

I think countries that suggest preemptive strikes against nuclear powers, or those they provide security to, are either bluffing with the intent of cowing a nation into submission. Or they are batshit crazy and playing with fire.