I added the bit about Zhirinovsky and Pandora's Box myself, to give a bit of flavour to the Russian decision to use nukes. In the book there's no mention of Zhirinovsky after 1996, so one can assume that he's President of Russia right until the main nuclear exchange that decapitates the leadership of both the US and Russia. I imagine him to be like Hitler in
Der Untergang, raging in his bunker, only unlike Hitler, Zhirinovsky really does have the power to drag the whole world to hell with him.