Wargame Scenario
It’s 2037. Putin is dead. His successor, frustrated by the “forced, unjust” armistice reached with Ukraine early in 2024, launches an attack on Southern and Western Ukraine in an attempt to complete Russia’s absorption of Ukraine. Westinghouse has built two of the promised new U.S. reactors in Western Ukraine at Khmelnitsky, which are now on line. Additional U.S. and South Korean power reactors have been built, as promised, in Poland and Romania. After several weeks of fighting, the Russian militarily assaults and occupies the Khmelnitsky plant and garrisons missile strike forces within that reactor site. The Ukrainians precisely target those missile units using weapons the United States has shipped to Ukraine through Romania and Poland. Russia protests, publicly, demanding NATO cease supplying such weaponry through Poland and Romania. Meanwhile, in a repeat of the tactics Moscow used in 2022 against Zaporizhzhya, Russia fires missiles that knock down several power lines into the Khmelnitsky plant. When there is only one power line left, all but one of the reactors at the plant are put on cold shutdown. The plant will require electricity to keep the fuel safe for at least four weeks. Romania and Poland (both NATO and EU nations) encourage their populations to avail themselves of stockpiled iodine pills. The Russians blame the Ukrainians for targeting the felled power lines. The Ukrainians blame the Russians. The last power line into the plant is felled by a missile and the plant is forced to run on its emergency diesel generators (which have enough fuel to operate for roughly ten days). The Director General of the IAEA publicly states that this could result in a Fukushima-like release unless the agency gains access to the facility to assure proper safety measures are being taken. The IAEA sends inspectors to assess the plant’s safety. While the IAEA staff are en route, the Russians bomb the main highway to the plant, deny responsibility, and accuse the Ukrainians of the bombing. The Russian strike glances one of the IAEA vehicles, causing an accident and injuring an inspector. This causes immediate outrage. The Russians, Ukrainians, and the IAEA all call for an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council.