>They do care about their citizens.

Omg, you've been in a coma for the last year and just woke up. Let me fill you in on what's been happening to fighting age men in Russia and how little the oligarchs in charge of the country care about the people in it. Lol. What a joke.

>There would be consequences for their use which is why they cannot use them.

What are these great consequences that would punish Russia for using nukes, but not deter them from using in the first place?

>Us nuking multiple of their cities is not "great for them".

No of course it's not great. I meant the sarcastic kind of great. Again, because more than they care about a few cities, they care about their position as a world power. If they use them, they obviously think it will lead to a better position for Russia, despite what would happen to a few of their cities.

>There is zero chance we can prevent them from launching and I give it around a 2% chance to shoot down any incoming nuke. They are mirvs with decoys built to saturate defenses.

You don't know the limits of our defensive systems and I don't either. That's why I said I assume.

>Once again, none of this can be used because of MAD. Even if Putin gives the orders I highly doubt they would be followed as it's MADness.

Perimeter is automatic (that means it doesn't need an order).