That ignites a nuclear black market---extinction.
Joseph Cirincione 23, national security analyst and author with 40 years of experience in DC, member of the Council for Foreign Relations, author or editor of seven books including Nuclear Nightmares: Securing the World Before It Is Too Late and Bomb Scare: The History and Future of Nuclear Weapons, served on the International Security Advisory Board for Secretaries of State John Kerry and Hillary Clinton, 6/25/2023, "Russia Mutiny Is More Proof the World Needs to Get Rid of Nuclear Weapons," Daily Beast, https://www.thedailybeast.com/russia-mutiny-is-more-proof-the-world-needs-to-get-rid-of-nuclear-weapons, christian, edited for language
With Putin now gravely weakened, the Russian state again appears unstable. But there is no guarantee that such an effort could be repeated. A nuclear black market could spread weapons, material and scientists to the far corners of the globe.
The final terror was that an insane [unstable] Putin might explode the weapons in revenge. If the coup succeeded and he was going down, would he take the nation down with him? Or worse? A nuclear version of Hitler in the bunker asking “Is Paris burning?”
As in all nine nuclear-armed states, the decision to launch nuclear weapons is left to one or two leaders. There is no democracy in nuclear use. No vote required. No debate. No court decision can block it. The military is drilled daily to follow a launch order immediately, without question. Only a far greater mutiny than we saw June 24 could prevent it.
Although there have been dozens of computer and machine failures that brought us perilously close to mistaken nuclear launches over the decades, the weakest link in the nuclear command and control chain remains the humans who manage them. Many of these leaders have been considered mentally unbalanced, including in our country. It takes a committed optimist to believe that we can leave thousands of nuclear weapons in fallible human hands indefinitely and something terrible won’t happen.
Something terrible will happen. It just didn’t happen this time.