Coup d’œil

On Sunday, Vladimir Putin ordered his nuclear deterrent forces to be placed on a “special regime of combat duty”. The Russian defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, has now clarified what this meant: the increased manpower devoted to Russia’s strategic nuclear triad: land-based strategic nuclear rocket forces, sea-based nuclear deterrents in the northern and Pacific fleets and its fleet of long-range strategic bomber aircraft that can carry nuclear weapons.