Game-theoretic analysis performed with the Chinese Deepseek
Introduction: The scenario
The cause of this crisis is an escalation in the war in Ukraine. The Netherlands has supplied Ukraine with advanced drones and cruise missiles. These weapons have been used by Ukraine to destroy Russian missile launch installations deep behind the front line. Moscow does not view this as a Ukrainian action, but as a direct, armed intervention by a NATO ally on Russian territory.
In retaliation, Russia decides to fire a warning shot of a very different order: a nuclear weapon with a yield of 50 kilotons at the port city of Rotterdam. Prior to the attack, Russia informs the United States. Washington replies that such an attack will not go unanswered. To this, Moscow responds with an ultimatum: an American nuclear counterattack on Russia will invariably lead to a nuclear attack by Russia on the United States.
In this game, there are five distinct actors: the Netherlands (the victim), Russia (the aggressor), the United States (the nuclear protector), the other NATO allies, and the rest of the world.
Phase 1: The Dutch provocation
The first phase of the game is the trigger. By enabling Ukraine to attack Russian territory, the Netherlands has crossed a strategic red line. From the Russian perspective, the Netherlands is no longer an innocent third party, but has become a legitimate military target.
- Strategic significance: The attack on the launch installations strikes a vulnerable part of Russian deterrence. It is a military and political humiliation that Moscow can hardly accept without losing face.
- Consequence: The threshold for Russia to carry out disproportionate retaliation has been significantly lowered as a result. Russia has an excuse to send a strong signal, not only to Ukraine, but also to NATO: “Supplying weapons comes at a high price.”
Phase 2: The nuclear attack on Rotterdam
Russia carries out its threat and drops a 50-kiloton bomb on Rotterdam. The city is wiped off the map in one fell swoop. This is the central, shocking moment that fundamentally changes the strategic dynamic.
The question now is: how do the other players react to this nuclear transgression?
Response from the United States: The Credibility Dilemma
For the United States, this is the most complex strategic problem imaginable. The President of the US faces an impossible choice: he must maintain the credibility of NATO deterrence, but he must also prevent a nuclear crisis in Europe from escalating into a nuclear war on American soil.
The Russian warning is crucial in this regard: American nuclear retaliation will lead to a nuclear counterattack on the United States. This is no longer a matter of probability, but a certainty.
– The nuclear option (unlikely): The US has the military means to strike Russia, but any form of American nuclear action on Russian territory activates the Russian guarantee of retaliation. This would mean that Washington knowingly accepts a nuclear attack on its own cities, such as New York or Washington, purely to take revenge for Rotterdam.
– Rational analysis: This is essentially a form of national suicide. The strategic gain (punishing Russia) does not outweigh the certain, catastrophic losses for its own population. This option is therefore virtually ruled out, unless the US is in a desperate situation where conventional loss is viewed as even worse.
– The conventional and diplomatic option (very likely): Because the nuclear option is too dangerous, Washington will opt for severe conventional retaliation.
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- Military action: The US will attack Russian forces in Ukraine and on the Black Sea with conventional precision weapons. They may also attack military targets within Russia itself, but with the explicit intention of not striking nuclear installations, so as not to activate the Russian guarantee of retaliation. The goal is to impose maximum military costs on Moscow without crossing the nuclear threshold.
- Diplomacy and economy: The US will lead a global sanctions package that economically isolates Russia.
The American strategy boils down to a paradox: to preserve NATO’s long-term credibility, the US must refrain from the most obvious (nuclear) retaliation option in the short term. Deterrence is not the same as automatic retaliation. It is often more credible to threaten a range of unbearable conventional and economic consequences than a nuclear retaliation that would destroy one’s own state.
Response from the Netherlands: Survival and Restraint
The Netherlands is the direct victim and is in a state of national mourning and chaos.
– Primary need: Survival and preventing a second attack. The priority lies in protecting the remaining population, providing emergency relief, and evacuating affected areas.
– Political stance: The Netherlands does not possess nuclear weapons itself and has no formal say in US nuclear policy. The country will not openly ask Washington for a nuclear counterattack, simply because the Netherlands realizes that this would mean a nuclear war with the United States. Instead, the Dutch government will exert maximum pressure on NATO for immediate and harsh conventional retaliation, to demonstrate that an attack on an ally has unacceptable consequences. Response from the Other NATO Countries: Collective Action and Nervousness
The other NATO members (Germany, France, the UK, Poland) face a collective action problem.
– Solidarity: There will be a wave of anger and solidarity with the Netherlands. The European countries will put their troops on alert and reinforce the NATO eastern border.
– The credibility problem: For countries like Poland and the Baltic states, this scenario is the ultimate nightmare. They will put the US and the other nuclear powers under heavy political pressure to take a very hard line. They fear that a weak American response sets a precedent, allowing Russia to resort to nuclear blackmail more frequently in the future.
– Restraint: Nevertheless, the European nuclear powers (France and the UK) will be reluctant to escalate nuclearly themselves. They understand the Russian guarantee of retaliation and will support the conventional US line, but avoid their own nuclear actions. Reaction from the Rest of the World: Mediation and Ambivalence
Countries such as China, India, and the Global South will formally condemn the nuclear attack.
– Politics: However, they will also be quick to point to the cause of the crisis: the Dutch arms deliveries that led to attacks on Russian territory. As a result, they will be reluctant to completely isolate Russia.
– Role: Their primary objective will be to advocate for a ceasefire and negotiations. They will attempt to mediate to prevent further escalation between the two nuclear superpowers, as this threatens global security.
Why nuclear deterrence does not necessarily protect the Netherlands in this scenario. One of the most striking findings of this analysis is that the classical theory of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) – the doctrine that two nuclear powers will not attack each other for fear of mutual destruction – offered no guarantee whatsoever for the security of the Netherlands.
The reasons for this are twofold:
The asymmetry of interests: MAD works effectively only for the two nuclear powers that can directly destroy each other. The Soviet Union/Russia and the United States were in a stalemate during the Cold War. The Netherlands, however, is not a nuclear power. It does not fall under the direct nuclear umbrella of MAD because it does not have the capacity to destroy Moscow. The Russian calculation was clear: “A nuclear attack on Rotterdam does not lead to the destruction of Russia. It leads to a crisis for the US, but not to a nuclear apocalypse.” The Netherlands is a “safe” target for Russia in the sense that attacking it does not endanger its own state.
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The nuclear umbrella is not absolute: the United States’ security guarantee to NATO allies is not an automatic, irrevocable verdict. As analysis of the American response shows, the US is not prepared to accept a certain nuclear attack on its own territory to avenge a European ally. The American president will not choose the destruction of New York to save the honor of Rotterdam. The Russian strategy aims to exploit this difference in risk tolerance.
In conclusion: the Netherlands did not fall under the protection of MAD, but under the protection of an American security guarantee. In this scenario, this guarantee proved to have only limited shelf life. Nuclear deterrence failed to save the Netherlands because the costs of retaliation for the protector (the US) were simply too high compared to the benefits. The ultimate outcome is that Russia has taken its revenge, the Netherlands has been devastated, and NATO must attempt to maintain cohesion with a massive conventional response, while not exceeding the nuclear threshold.
8 september 2026