Russian Psychological Operations Rely on Extreme Rhetoric to Deter Western Aid to Ukraine

(KYIV) – Sergey Karaganov, an influential strategic adviser to the Russian dictator, has once again publicly called for nuclear strikes against European nations. Often referred to in Western media as Professor Doomsday, Karaganov stated that Europe would be finished physically and that Germany should be targeted first.

These statements were delivered during a January 2026 podcast interview with American commentator Tucker Carlson and were further elaborated upon in a February 2026 essay published in the journal Russia in Global Affairs.

The essay was subsequently excerpted by the state controlled outlet RT under the headline Fear Is the Only Thing the EU Understands. The 73 year old academic, who has advised administrations in Moscow since the era of Boris Yeltsin, currently chairs the Council on Foreign and Defence Policy. This organisation was founded in 1992 and serves as a bridge connecting the academic, intelligence and political establishments within Russia.

Karaganov has been publicly and repeatedly calling for nuclear strikes on Europe since June 2023, specifically demanding that Poland, the Baltic States, Germany and Britain be targeted. He has provocatively described nuclear weapons as a gift from the Almighty and insisted that Europe must be erased from the geopolitical and geostrategic map because he views the continent as an annoying plague.

In his June 2023 essay titled A Difficult but Necessary Decision, he argued that Moscow should launch preemptive nuclear strikes on NATO countries in Eastern Europe to bring Western populations to reason.

The Russian dictator publicly rejected this proposal at the time, stating that there was no need to use nuclear weapons first as it would lower the threshold for their use. However, Karaganov faced no sanctions, was not removed from his official positions and continued to appear on international media while escalating his extreme rhetoric. This institutional protection indicates that his outbursts are planned and entirely approved by the regime that denies them in public.

In October 2024, Karaganov stated that Moscow must not anger God but should actively use its weapons to save itself. During his January 2026 interview with Carlson, he warned that if Moscow ever faced defeat, Europe would need to be wiped off the map, giving a timeline of roughly one year and describing the continent as a pack of rabid dogs.

His February 2026 essay argued that the failure to use active nuclear deterrence was the primary reason the war in Ukraine had dragged on. He explicitly called for conventional strikes on European command centres, critical infrastructure and military bases, which would be followed by limited but decisive nuclear strikes if necessary. He specified that targets would include places where elites gather, including in nuclear armed states, noting that Western governments must feel personal risk.

Security analysts maintain that Karaganov is not a fringe blogger or a madman ranting into a vacuum, but rather a crucial component in a psychological warfare system known as reflexive control. Developed in Soviet military theory from the 1960s onwards by mathematician Vladimir Lefebvre, reflexive control is the practice of predetermining an adversary decision in your favour by altering key factors in their perception of the world.

By feeding an opponent targeted information, threats and signals, the opponent is manipulated into making decisions that serve Moscow. The Georgetown Security Studies Review has described this concept as a key component of hybrid warfare, which is taught at military academies across Russia. General Mahmud Gareev, the former president of the Academy of Military Science, described the practice as integral to modern military art, and it forms a foundational element of the Gerasimov doctrine.

Karaganov operates in tandem with former prime minister Dmitry Medvedev, who routinely threatens nuclear annihilation on the messaging platform Telegram in posts so extreme that readers often assume he is heavily intoxicated. While Medvedev is performative and inflammatory, Karaganov is academic and systematic, providing the intellectual architecture for the threats and giving them a veneer of strategic rationality.

According to English Pravda in its January 2026 analysis, this tandem articulates positions that the top leadership allegedly keeps in mind but cannot voice openly. The primary audience for this rhetoric is not the domestic public, but rather Western strategic elites and decision makers. An analysis by Dmitry Adamsky in the MIT International Security Journal in 2025 explained that Russian deterrence integrates soft and hard power across various domains, encompassing both military threats and psychological pressure. Karaganov provides the intimidation factor designed to fracture European political consensus and deter military support for Ukraine.

This strategy of manufactured fear has yielded tangible results in Western capitals. The Kissinger Center noted in a 2025 analysis of escalation management that every major Western decision on weapons transfers, including the reluctance to provide Ukraine with long range missiles, tanks and fighter jets in 2022 and 2023, was directly influenced by concern over escalation. This Western habit of self deterrence is the direct operational product of reflexive control.

Furthermore, the line between psychological theatre and actual policy has increasingly blurred. In November 2024, Moscow formally revised its nuclear doctrine, lowering the threshold for use from a threat to the very existence of the state to any threat to sovereignty and territorial integrity. This new ambiguous standard was technically met when Ukrainian forces conducted their excursion into the Kursk oblast. As a Townhall publication noted, the Russian dictator essentially formalised the Karaganov doctrine.

Despite his fervent demands for the annihilation of European civilisation, investigations have revealed a stark hypocrisy regarding Karaganov and his personal finances. As reported by Bild and confirmed by the Romania Journal in January 2026, Karaganov and his wife own a lucrative apartment in Berlin. The property generates approximately 850 Euros, or 920 US Dollars, in monthly rental income.

When Karaganov learned he was likely to face European Union sanctions in 2023, he quietly gifted his share of the property to his wife to shield it from legal seizure. Analysts point to this legal maneuvering as proof that the strategist does not expect an actual nuclear war, but merely expects his words to produce fear that buys time for a struggling military on the battlefield.

Steven Pifer of the Brookings Institution concluded that sober minds still prevail in the actual decision making process in Moscow, and military officials have given no operational indication of preparing for nuclear use. The prescribed response to this systemic psychological operation is not to panic or flinch, but to understand the manipulation and consistently arm Ukraine with what it needs without falling victim to manufactured self deterrence.