NSNWs include all nuclear weapons with a range of up to 5,500 km (3,400 miles), starting with tactical arms designed for use on the battlefield - as opposed to longer-range strategic nuclear weapons that Russia or the U.S. could use to strike each other's homeland.
"The Russian perception of the lack of credible Western will to use nuclear weapons or to accept casualties in conflict further reinforces Russia's aggressive NSNW thought and doctrine," it said.
But he has shifted Russia's stance on key nuclear treaties and said he is deploying tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus.
NUCLEAR DEBATEWestern analysts and policymakers have been closely tracking a debate among Russian military experts about whether Moscow should lower its threshold for nuclear use.
William Alberque, author of the IISS report, said Karaganov was part of a wider discussion in Russia on the failure of its military to win the Ukraine war decisively and quickly.
Persons:
Mark Trevelyan, Vladimir Putin's, Putin, hawkish, Russia's, Sergei Karaganov, William Alberque, Karaganov, Alberque, Mark Heinrich
Organizations:
Mark Trevelyan LONDON, NATO, International Institute for Strategic Studies, Russian Federation, Pentagon
Locations:
Ukraine, Moscow, Western, Russia, U.S, West, Russian, Belarus, Europe, United States