Canadian aid and Lukashenko's nuclear claim: 11 and 10 December 2024
What did two reports in the days before 12 December 2024 say about military support for Ukraine and nuclear risk in the region?
What was the picture for Ukraine's security as 12 December 2024 arrived? Two reports from the preceding days, one about money and one about weapons, framed it.
On 11 December 2024, the Parliament of Canada approved the allocation of CA$764 million (US$587 million) in military aid to Ukraine. The approval added to the support Kyiv was receiving during the Russo-Ukrainian War, and it came as a parliamentary decision rather than a promise of future funding.
A day earlier, on 10 December 2024, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko confirmed the presence of nuclear weapons in his country. He said they included Russia's Oreshnik missile system. The statement placed Belarus within the discussion of nuclear risk linked to the war.
A wider debate
That discussion had been running for some time. As later described, several senior Russian politicians, including President Vladimir Putin, former president and prime minister Dmitry Medvedev and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, had made a number of statements widely seen as nuclear blackmail. The possibility of Russia using tactical nuclear weapons, and the risk of wider escalation, had been widely discussed by commentators and in the media.
Assessments differed. US scholars called the invasion the type of scenario most likely to trigger a nuclear war in Europe. British historian Lawrence Freedman argued the risk was low, reasoning that nuclear use is best kept for the most extreme contingencies in which the state faces an existential threat.
Set side by side, the two reports from 10 and 11 December 2024 showed the war's two tracks: continued allied funding for Ukraine's defence, and open acknowledgement of nuclear-capable systems in Belarus.
