CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

“We Are in a Good Place”: NATO, Europe and the Dangerous Illusion of Nuclear Security

Photograph Source: Estonian Foreign Ministry – CC BY 2.0

‘I think when it comes to nuclear, we are really in a good place.’ With these words, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte described the state of the Alliance’s nuclear strategy at the pre-Summit press conference in Ankara on 6 July 2026. The phrase was intended to project stability, confidence, and reassurance. Yet, to anyone familiar with the history of the nuclear age, it reveals something far more disturbing: the dangerous normalization of the belief that more nuclear weapons, more deployments, and greater confrontation can somehow produce greater security.

This is precisely where the greatest paradox of contemporary European security policy (if there is any) lies. A continent devastated by two world wars, a continent that built its post-war institutions precisely to overcome the cycle of military rivalry, is once again embracing a logic in which military power, deterrence, and strategic confrontation are becoming the foundations of political order. Particularly alarming is the fact that the nuclear dimension of this transformation has scarcely become the subject of any meaningful debate.

Europe is gradually turning into a space where nuclear powers are moving ever closer to one another. The accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO has significantly altered the strategic geography of Northern Europe. Finland, a country that for decades based its security policy on military neutrality and careful balancing vis-à-vis the Soviet Union, has, following its NATO membership, amended its legal framework to allow for the potential deployment of nuclear capabilities on its territory. At the same time, the Baltic region is becoming one of the most heavily militarized areas in Europe.

At the centre of this new geopolitical anxiety lies Kaliningrad, the Russian exclave situated between Poland and Lithuania and surrounded by NATO member........

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