Foreign Affairs

Putin will not be permitted by the kingmakes in the Politburo, er, top house of the Duma to order nukes used anywhere. It's not because Russia would be annihilated by the submarine based arsenal, he's so far gone he doesn't really care about that and it shows. What is stopping him is knowing how fast he'd go out a window if he tried because most of the children of those kingmakers are living in the very western cities he wants to destroy.

I think the only reason he's still drawing breath is that they know he's bonkers and that makes him scary.