CDI Russia Weekly-#189 18 January 2002 Edited by David Johnson Center for Defense Information 1779 Massachusetts Ave. NW Washington DC 20036 phone: 202-797-5277; fax: 202-462-4559 djohnson@cdi.org The CDI Russia Weekly is an e-mail newsletter that carries news and analysis on all aspects of today's Russia, including political, economic, social, military, and foreign policy issues. With support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the MacArthur Foundation, CDI Russia Weekly is a project of the Washington-based Center for Defense Information (CDI), a nonprofit research and education organization. CDI Russia Weekly web page (with archive): http://www.cdi.org/russia/ Visit CDI's web site: http://www.cdi.org Contents: 1. Interfax: Putin would have won convincing victory if presidential election held last Sunday. 2. RIA Novosti: PRESIDENT PUTIN: RUSSIAN ECONOMY IS REVIVING. 3. AFP: Russian rights group accuses military of Chechen killings. 4. pravda.ru: OLEG ARTYUKOV: A CENSUS OF RUSSIA TO BE HELD. 5. RFE/RL: Ahto Lobjakas, Russia: Analysts Ponder Integration Into Euro-Atlantic Community. 6. eurasianet.org: STATE DEPARTMENT REPORT FINDS NEW ATTITUDE IN FORMER SOVIET UNION ON MISSILE DEFENSE. 7. Moscow Times: Megan Twohey, Congressman Defends Storage of Warheads. 8. US Department of State: U.S., Russian Defense Officials Conclude Early Arms Talks. 9. Baltimore Sun: Ivo Daalder and James Lindsay, Playing numbers game with nuclear force cuts. 10. Irish Times: Seamus Martin, Gorbachev - hero or holy fool? - Mikhail Gorbachev's visit to Ireland this week was a reminder of the heroic status the former Soviet leader enjoys in the West. In his homeland, however, most Russians regard him as a villain. 11. Nezavisimaya Gazeta: Vladimir Georgiyev, 2002 DEFENSE BUDGET: IMAGINARY INCREASE. Data on planned defense spending in 2002 has finally been released. 12. Krasnaya Zvezda: Yuri Pankov, NATO: MID-LIFE CRISIS. ****** #1 Putin would have won convincing victory if presidential election held last Sunday MOSCOW. Jan 17 (Interfax) - President Vladimir Putin would have won a convincing victory if a presidential election had been held in Russia last Sunday, with 55% of Russian citizens supporting him. Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov could have counted on 12% of the votes. Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky would have been supported by 4% of voters. Kemerovo governor Aman Tuleyev would have won 3% of the votes. Two percent of voters each would have supported Yabloko leader Grigory Yavlinsky, head of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry Yevgeny Primakov and Minister for Civil Defense and Emergencies Sergei Shoigu. The Public Opinion Foundation released the data on Thursday with reference to a poll of 1,500 people in 100 towns and villages in Russia's 44 regions, territories and republics on January 12-13. As compared to the previous poll done on December 22-23, Putin's rating was up 5%, the rating of Zyuganov was down 1%, that of Zhirinovsky and Tuleyev was up 1%, and the rating of Yavlinsky, Primakov and Shoigu did not change. Forty-one percent of the respondents said President Putin is doing "satisfactory," while 39% of those polled gave him "a good mark," and 8% assessed Putin's activities as "excellent." ******* #2 PRESIDENT PUTIN: RUSSIAN ECONOMY IS REVIVING POZNAN, JANUARY 17. /FROM RIA NOVOSTI'S SPECIAL CORRESPONDENTS NATALIA GORBUNOVA, VICTOR NESTEROVICH/ -- On Thursday Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the Russian economy is reviving and the domestic demand is rising. He spoke up at the second economic forum Poland-Russia in Poznan in Poland. Putin said that citizen accumulations at Russian banks have increased by 46 percent. The growth of the gross domestic product in 2001 constituted over 5 percent, industrial production 5.1 percent and real wages increased by 20 percent. These indicators signify an increase in home demand, said Putin. The revival of the Russian economy is a result of both external factors -- the high prices of energy-carriers -- and internal factors -- the consumer demand is rapidly growing, he noted. The Russian authorities are going to continue with the policy of economic encouragement, said the Russian president. Particularly, it is intended to simplify the procedure of registration of enterprises and licensing of their operation. In the opinion of Vladimir Putin, adoption of the Land Code and reforming of natural monopolies will produce a positive effect. ******** #3 Russian rights group accuses military of Chechen killings January 18, 2002 AFP A sweep by Russian troops through a Chechen town earlier this month left five civilians dead and six others missing, a Russian human rights group said, as separatist rebels inflicted heavy losses on two military convoys. The human rights group Memorial, quoting local witnesses, said Russian soldiers scouring the town of Tsotsin-Yurt, 25 kilometres (15 miles) east of Grozny, also beat up suspects, looted houses and shops, and soiled the local mosque with excrement. Tsotsin-Yurt was the centre of a major operation by Russian troops between December 31 and January 3 that was later extended to the nearby town of Argun. The Kremlin's chief spokesman on Chechnya, Sergei Yastrzhembsky, said the actions at Argun and Tsotsin-Yurt had concluded successfully with the killing of 92 Chechen rebels and the dispersion of scores to other regions. "Memorial can confirm the killing of five civilians rounded up during this operation," the group said of the Russian action at Tsotsin-Yurt. Three of the five have been identified, it said in a statement. Two of the bodies found had been badly damaged by explosions. Of the two others, both of whom suffered serious wounds and had their ears cut off, the human rights group said it was "clear that they had been the victims of summary executions, killed by federal forces after being arrested at their homes." It said it had reports of other killings of civilians which it had not yet had time to verify, and had sent its information to the republic's pro-Russian prosecutor with a demand for an inquiry. A second non-government organisation, the Association for Russo-Chechen Friendship, reported serious human-rights abuses at Argun during the sweep staged their from January 3 to 9. "Local residents said there had been massive looting by the troops," the group said in a statement. One resident quoted in the statement said she had been asked for a 4,000-dollar ransom to ensure that her son was not shot. In a provisional toll, the group said seven local residents had been killed during the sweep. Human rights organisations have frequently denounced Russian military sweeps in Chechnya which they say are often a pretext for looting, abitrary arrests and occasionally random killings. Meanwhile, Chechen rebels killed nine Russian soldiers in two attacks, Russian military officials said. The soldiers died Wednesday in attacks on military convoys in the Vedeno region, in southeastern Chechnya, and near Urus-Martan, in the southwest. Three others were wounded, the officials said, quoted by the Interfax news agency. The military agency Interfax-AVN, quoting Russian officials, said three rebels were shot dead by Russian forces during a sweep Wednesday near Bachi-Yurt, 40 kilometres (25 miles) southeast of Grozny, but rebel sources said the three dead were civilians. The Russian soldiers arrested 20 other civilians, the Chechen radical separatists said on their website www.kavkaz.org. A spokesman for rebel Chechen president Aslan Maskhadov told AFP that around 30 Russian troops died in the rebel attacks. Both rebels and Russian officials inflate losses inflicted on their adversaries in battle reports that are impossible to verify independently. Russian security services warned of a heightened risk of terrorist attacks in Moscow as a result of Russia's military operation in Chechnya and its support for the international anti-terrorist coalition. "There has been a real possibility of attacks with biological, chemical and radioactive weapons in Moscow recently," Viktor Zakharov, head of the FSB (ex-KGB) intelligence services for the Moscow region told Interfax. The FSB head in Chechnya, Leonid Babkin, told ITAR-TASS that around 250 "foreign mercenaries," most of them from the Middle East, were currently fighting in the republic. This was down by about half since last year, most of the others having been killed in special operations, he said. Around 3,500 Russian soldiers and 11,000 Chechen rebels have died since Moscow sent troops into the southern republic on October 1, 1999 to put down a separatist insurgency, according to official Russian figures. ******* #4 pravda.ru January 17, 2002 OLEG ARTYUKOV: A CENSUS OF RUSSIA TO BE HELD The Federation Council has approved the law "On All-Russian population census" on January 16. Thus, a legal base has been created for the organization of a population census in Russia. The necessity of holding a census of the Russian population has appeared a long time ago. Indeed, the exact number of the Russian population is unknown. We often say that the population is reducing, but nobody knows to what extent this is serious. More emotional people would even say that Russia will soon die out, but it is far from being reality. The process connected with the number of Russia's population can be controlled only when statistics is provided. There is no doubt that the further development of the problem requires exact information, which can only be obtained from a population census. The Federation Council decreed that information about the demographic, economic, and social states of the population obtained in the population census would be a basis for demographic forecasts, programs designed for social and economic development, and the calculation of macroeconomic forcasts. The government needs the census to reveal what resources will be necessary for the realization of programs in the social sphere, first of all. The last population census was held in the Soviet Union in 1989. In addition, a so-called test census was twice held in Russia in 1997 and 2000. After these tests, the RF government understood the necessity of an All-Russian population census. 2,9 billion rubles fixed in the budget are to be spent for this purpose. However, there is a problem that requires special attention. This is the Russian traditional suspicion of any initiatives of the state that concern our private lives. Certainly, the problem was touched upon in the law on the population census. The senators decreed that to obtain more reliable information during the population census, personal information is not to be available for any departments and organizations, migration, fiscal, and judicial services. In addition, the document determines the special necessity of preserving private and family secrets. NTVRU.com informs that not only governmental departments but also the mass media will be involved in the propagation of the population census. National public TV channels ORT, RTR, NTV, STS and RenTV – will show short films to urge the population to participate in the census. The radio and the press will join the action a bit later. The governmental officials think that this will have an effect on the population. It is important that the population census is a free-will action and that nobody will force Russians to participate. According to the results of previous populations censuses, there are not less than 10% of such people who are reluctant to provide personal information. Unfortunately, most experts think that it will be extremely difficult to guarantee the confidentiality of the information obtained during the population census. The information may be also distributed on pirated CDs. However, the solution of the problem is important for a successful population census. Therefore, we are now to get ready for census agents to come and ask with whom we live and on what means. ******* #5 Russia: Analysts Ponder Integration Into Euro-Atlantic Community By Ahto Lobjakas Analysts from Russia, the United States, and Europe held a two-day seminar in Brussels earlier this week (14-15 January) to look at the future of Russia's relations with the West. They discussed the motives behind Russian President Vladimir Putin's recent rapprochement with the United States and the European Union, and explored ways the West might compensate. Brussels, 16 January 2002 (RFE/RL) -- Russia's unprecedented willingness to seek closer ties with the West has left European and American officials wondering what to make of Moscow's apparent change of heart and how to respond. President Vladimir Putin has suggested in recent months that Russia is prepared to radically reassess its relationship with Cold War archenemy NATO, and appears to accept the possibility the organization may soon expand into the Baltics. Putin has also offered the European Union opportunities for closer security and political cooperation. And contrary to expectations, Moscow barely reacted when the United States announced its withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty -- long a source of contention between the two countries. Russia's changing relationship with the West was the subject of a two-day seminar held earlier this week in Brussels. Participants at the seminar, organized by the Center for European Policy Studies, seemed to agree that the shift in Russian attitudes has finally made the Cold War a thing of the past. There was some debate, however, over whether the shift is sustainable. Dmitri Trenin, deputy director of the Carnegie Center in Moscow, calls Russia's sudden willingness to establish closer ties with the West the result of strategic calculations aimed at modernizing Russia. This strategy, he says, has led Putin to "let go" of the Cold War and seek integration. Putin, Trenin adds, wants to be seen as one of the great modernizers in Russian history. "What Putin did was to start bringing his foreign and security policy into harmony with [a] 'Russia project' at home. I would submit [that] nothing is more important to Mr. Putin than to relaunch the Russian economy. He may not be known in the future as a great democratizer of Russia. In the order of his priorities, that is certainly not the highest [priority]. But he wants to be known, I think, as the guy who relaunched the Russian economy -- restructured it." To achieve this, says Trenin, Putin has made a rational decision to "move the United States out of the way" and plead "no contest" in the Cold War, in order to close that chapter of history and enable Russia to freely embrace the new global economy. Trenin says this does not mean Putin should be seen as "pro-American," despite his apparent tolerance of NATO expansion and Washington's scrapping of the ABM Treaty. According to Trenin, the focal point in integrating Russia into the broad Euro-Atlantic political and economic structures is the European Union. Integration into Europe will be a long-term project but one which will not lead to Russia's membership in the European Union, at least not in the foreseeable future. But it should result in a close economic, security, and political partnership. Again, says Trenin, this ambition should be viewed as a domestic initiative, a result of Putin's drive to radically modernize Russia. "When one talks about Russia's integration with Europe, I think one has to make it very clear -- above all in Russia -- that what we're talking about is not a foreign policy proposition. Russia's entry into Europe will not be the result of a deal made in Moscow and Brussels. It will be 95, 97, 98 percent made at home. It's the extent of Russia's 'Europeanization,' the depth and breadth of Russia's economic transformation, social restructuring, political [and] legal evolution that will turn Russia eventually -- and I believe it will -- into a European country." Trenin says Putin's modernization drive is supported by the fact that both the elites and the wider public in Russia are beginning to give up the illusion that there is a uniquely "Russian way" to develop. In Trenin's view, Putin's line is domestically sustainable and "sufficiently protected against adverse international political conditions," and the West should reward it by granting Russia closer institutional links. Trenin's belief in the sustainability of Putin's reforms is shared by Angela Stent, director of the Center for Eurasian and Russian Studies at Georgetown University in the U.S. But Stent notes misgivings that still exist in certain Russian military and policy circles. She says a lot will depend on how the West compensates Russia for concessions made by Putin. "There are a number of ways in which the U.S. hopes to encourage Russia's greater integration -- if you like, globally, but also into Euro-Atlantic structures -- and some of these are on the economic side. The United States is now pushing for accelerated WTO [World Trade Organization] membership for Russia -- something that the EU has also endorsed. We're finally getting rid of Cold War legislation, the Jackson-Vanik amendment that tied most-favored-nation status for Russia to emigration policies. The United States is encouraging its business community to become more involved, to invest more in Russia, but obviously that's a longer-term process." Stent says core security relations between the United States and Russia, especially arms control, remain a "more complicated issue." The U.S. withdrawal from the ABM Treaty was followed by an "in principle" agreement with Russia on cutbacks of nuclear warheads, but now disagreement has erupted over numbers. Stent indicates it is in the global interests of the U.S. that both NATO and the EU forge closer links with Russia. She says avoiding regional divisions is a major U.S. concern. "The one area where there is concern as one looks to the future, and this includes the EU and NATO, is the possible effect of the dual enlargements on the wider Europe: Russia, but some of the other countries in the post-Soviet space -- this is a term I know some people don't like, but for want of a better word -- and also in Southeastern Europe. I think the concern in general is that these dual enlargements not create new divisions within Europe [between] the prosperous 'have' countries -- the ones who are in, [who are] full members of these institutions -- and the ones who are not, who have associate membership, who have different forms of association with both institutions." Stent says the United States would "probably welcome" Russia's involvement in the EU's nascent defense project, although there is considerable skepticism in Washington over whether the EU is willing to commit the necessary resources to make a success of the undertaking. Dmitri Trenin echoed Stent's comments, saying both the EU and NATO should set up concrete institutional structures to allow for practical cooperation with Russia. He says the twice-yearly EU-Russia summits should become a permanent EU-Russia Council, overseeing the implementation of joint decisions with special emphasis on "soft security." He says special emphasis should be given to cooperation in the EU's "eastern neighborhood." The EU and Russia could also embark on joint peacekeeping missions in the Balkans, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. However, says Trenin, Chechnya would remain off-limits for foreign military involvement, although the EU could still perform a useful role promoting economic and social rehabilitation there. With regard to NATO, Trenin suggests the alliance should become the main forum of European-Russian security relations. He says that far from withering away, the recent British proposal to involve Russia in NATO could give the alliance a special role in enlarging the "zone of stable peace in Europe." The only European representative at the Brussels seminar, Stephan de Spiegeleire, a researcher with RAND Europe, is the most skeptical about forging permanent institutional links with Russia. He says many governments in Europe are not convinced the new Russian policy is sustainable and fear a backlash if the Russian public finds Western concessions disappointing. This, de Spiegeleire says, could lead to a reversal in Russian security thinking, bringing with it recriminations that would "probably be even more virulent than in previous episodes like German reunification or the first round of NATO enlargement." De Spiegeleire says existing mechanisms of cooperation have not been used to their full potential, and the EU should stick to its policy of slow, organic integration. Arguing against "conjunctural" impulses to change this long-term strategy, he says the EU's low-level engagement reaches "into the fiber of the Russian society and polity in a way that no other external actor could currently come close to." ******* #6 eurasianet.org January 16, 2002 STATE DEPARTMENT REPORT FINDS NEW ATTITUDE IN FORMER SOVIET UNION ON MISSILE DEFENSE Opposition to US construction of a missile defense shield is softening in the countries of the former Soviet Union, according to State Department data. A survey published by the State Department's Office of Research asserts that the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States enhanced the credibility of Washington's arguments in favor of building anti-missile defense system. The report, called Missile Defense in a New Security Setting, seeks to debunk the idea that leadership elites in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus are fearful of a potential American missile shields. The study - which involved polling 1,800 people in the four countries during late September and early October - states: "Plans to develop a system of strategic missile defense…will not be a major cause for alarm among Russian elites, not to mention among those in Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus." US President George W. Bush has so far failed to reach agreement on a missile defense shield with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. [For additional background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Despite the lack of agreement, the State Department study notes that the Russian leadership is open to negotiations on the missile-defense issue. "President Putin apparently came to the United States in November prepared to negotiate on nearly all security issues, including MD [missile defense]," the study says. "Our latest poll of Russian elites find that more say the US rationale for wanting MD is credible than not credible." Opinion in Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus - the other states that inherited weapons from the Soviet nuclear arsenal - is even more disposed to US missile defense intentions than in Russia. In Kazakhstan, for example, 85 percent of the 300 people polled said that US deployment of a missile defense shield would not pose a threat to national security. In Russia, 47 percent said a US missile shield would not create a security threat. The report, released in late 2001, was designed to reflect the opinion of policy-making elites of the countries involved. The report defined the elite as comprising representatives of the "executive and legislative branches of government, national and local; managers of state-run and private enterprises; the military and security services; the media; and the cultural intelligentsia." Some political observers in Russia and elsewhere have expressed concern that an American missile shield would be destabilizing, arguing that it would encourage US unilateralism in the international diplomatic arena. The State Department report, however, claims that only 31 percent of the Russian policy-making elite saw a missile defense shield as an instrument designed to enhance US "world hegemony." Only 23 percent of Kazakhstanis considered a US system a hegemonic move. According to the survey, 39 percent of Russian respondents and 56 percent of Kazakhstanis cited American security needs as the likely impetus for an American missile defense system. Nevertheless, the survey also indicates that mistrust of American power remains pervasive in the former Soviet Union. In all four countries, the elites would rather respond to American missile defense plans by allying with Western European nations than by cooperating with Washington. Given Russia's desire to claim the cultural privileges that come with being part of Europe, this sentiment figures to deepen if American missile-defense plans progress. In addition, the survey found that 54 percent of Russians and 65 percent of Kazakhstanis favor a Russian missile-defense program, regardless of what the Americans do. ******* #7 Moscow Times January 17, 2002 Congressman Defends Storage of Warheads By Megan Twohey Staff Writer As U.S. and Russian military officials held a second-day of closed-door talks in Washington, a visiting U.S. congressman said Wednesday that the United States had good reason for wanting to store some of the strategic nuclear warheads it has promised to cut from its arsenal. "Russia continues to build nuclear weapons," U.S. Congressman Curt Weldon said in a telephone interview. "We don't. For those reasons, we may want to keep some of our warheads." Russia is unhappy with a Pentagon plan to trim the U.S. nuclear arsenal by putting some warheads in storage rather than destroying them, and some officials are worried that the United States will store the delivery vehicles too. "My own feeling is that we should destroy the missiles," Weldon said. Weldon has been in Moscow since Sunday discussing, among other things, the questions raised after Presidents George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin pledged in November to cut their countries nuclear arsenals by two-thirds. The Russian government also is unhappy about Bush's unwillingness to sign a formal treaty on the nuclear warhead reductions. Weldon explained the U.S. position by saying that Bush is trying to avoid locking the United States into a treaty that becomes a "sacred cow," like the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Bush fought Russian opposition for years before deciding unilaterally to withdraw from the 1972 U.S.-Soviet treaty, which sought to prevent nuclear attack by limiting both countries' defenses. With ABM, "the piece of paper became the issue," Weldon said. "The focus should be the substance of what we actually do." Although it won't sign a treaty, the United States will sign some kind of agreement, "sooner rather than later," he said. The Republican congressman said he was briefed on the Pentagon's recently concluded Nuclear Posture Review, which includes the proposal to house the warheads, and that Congress will play a key role in its implementation. "I've asked for more material and will make sure that I'm involved," said Weldon, the chairman of the Military Procurement Subcommittee, which oversees the annual authorization for procurement of American military weapon systems. Weldon, who travels frequently to Russia, said improving relations with Russia is one of his top priorities. He is the founder of the Duma-Congress Study Group, which coordinates legislative efforts. Since his arrival Sunday, he has met with several people in the Duma, addressed students at Moscow University Touro, given an interview on Ekho Moskvy radio station and toured the International Science and Technology Center. At the Pentagon, delegations led by Colonel General Yury Baluyevsky, first deputy of the General Staff, and U.S. Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith met Tuesday for the first of two days of talks. They were expected to meet again for Wednesday, but details were not expected until late in the day Washington time. ******* #8 US Department of State 17 January 2002 U.S., Russian Defense Officials Conclude Early Arms Talks (Delegates agree to series of working groups) By Merle D. Kellerhals, Jr. Washington File Staff Writer Washington -- U.S. and Russian defense officials are setting up a series of working groups to foster cooperation in verifying reductions of nuclear arsenals, in exchanging data on technology, and in joint antiterrorism efforts, Under Secretary of Defense Douglas Feith says. "We agreed to set up a number of working groups to cover various areas of our common interest to see if we can identify new types of cooperation and agreements," Feith said January 16 during a special Pentagon briefing. The delegations -- led by Feith, under secretary for defense policy, and General-Colonel Yuriy Nikolayevich Baluyevskiy, the first deputy chief of the Russian general staff -- held discussions January 15 and 16 in Washington as part of broader diplomatic initiatives between the United States and Russia. These discussions are expected to lead to recommendations for later talks between Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Russian Defense Minister Sergey Ivanov. Eventually, the negotiations are expected to lead to a summit in May or June between President George Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg, Russia. Feith said the talks also focused on transparency and predictability measures in arms control, but without resorting to what he referred to as the formalized, tortuous style of Cold War agreements between the United States and the former Soviet Union, which tended to institutionalize a kind of hostile relationship. "We're not looking to get echoes of that, and we're not looking to recreate arms control-style negotiations or agreements," he said. "We do think there are useful things that we can do so that the possibilities of misunderstanding about each other's force structures are reduced, and that's what we are driving at when we talk about transparency and predictability." Feith said the United States is not ruling out anything as to the form agreements with Russia might take, but wants what is most effective in enhancing cooperation. Baluyevskiy, however, said during a joint briefing he was "talking about a legally binding document" to codify specific nuclear arms reductions. He said Russia was "happy with the specific number within the region of 1,700 to 2,200 warheads" the United States pledged in November to achieve within a decade. Putin, in talks with Bush at the time, also pledged to respond in kind to warhead reductions in a range of 1,500 to 2,200. Baluyevskiy also said "we are for irreversibility of the reduction of the nuclear forces. The warheads dismounted from the carriers should be destroyed and eliminated." The United States, on the other hand, said in its newly released Nuclear Posture Review that the nuclear warheads removed from the strategically deployed U.S. arsenal would be placed in storage and could be retrieved and reactivated on short notice. And Baluyevskiy said Russia considers the United States withdrawal from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty a mistake. The Russian Duma passed a resolution January 16 condemning the United States for withdrawing from the treaty, saying the pullout was destabilizing "since it effectively ruins the existing highly efficient system of ensuring strategic stability and paves ground for a new round of the arms race." However, Feith said the process of improved relations between Russia and the United States has been greatly accelerated by the September 11th terrorist attacks. "We are not hostile. What we are looking to do with the Russians is develop a view of security that allows us to work together to deal with threats that face both of us and not be thinking of each other as the enemy," Feith said. "The world has changed, and the old way of thinking about strategic stability is just not applicable anymore." J.D. Crouch, assistant secretary of defense for international security policy, said that as part of this greater cooperation there will be "regularized data exchanges" on technology. What it will not become, though, is "verifying limits of an arms control treaty," he said. Feith said the goal of these negotiations and working groups "is that we can create a normal relationship with Russia, the kind of relationship that we have with countries all around the world, where they have conventional and in some cases nuclear capabilities, but we have the kind of quality of relationship with them that we don't think that our security requires us to balance our forces against theirs." "That's why, when we talk about measures of predictability or cooperation or transparency with the Russians, we're doing it based on this new concept, not based on the old balance-of-nuclear-terror ideas from the Cold War," he said. Copies of transcripts of the joint media availability between Feith and Baluyevskiy, and Feith's separate Pentagon briefing, can be obtained on the Internet at http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2002/t01162002_t0116fba.html and http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2002/t01162002_t0116fcb.html ******** #9 Baltimore Sun January 17, 2002 Playing numbers game with nuclear force cuts By Ivo H. Daalder and James M. Lindsay Ivo H. Daalder and James M. Lindsay are senior fellows in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution. WASHINGTON -- President Bush announced a widely praised decision in November to unilaterally slash the size of the U.S. strategic nuclear arsenal. His proposal, which would cut the number of U.S. warheads from 7,000 weapons today to between 1,700 and 2,200 warheads a decade from now, was intended to fulfill his campaign promise to "leave the Cold War behind." Two months later, the bloom is coming off the Bush plan. Just last week, the Pentagon made public the main conclusions of the yearlong classified review it undertook to fill in the details of Mr. Bush's vision. According to this Nuclear Posture Review, the administration wants to save rather than scrap many, if not most, of the 5,000 weapons scheduled for retirement. Even when Mr. Bush first announced his plan, there were signs that the 1,700 - 2,200 figures were misleading. To generate these numbers, Mr. Bush abandoned the longstanding rules used to count warheads. Weapons on systems being inspected or refurbished -- and thus not capable of actually being delivered -- no longer show up in the overall tally. Because at any given moment roughly 400 warheads are on systems that are off-line, Mr. Bush's target is actually slightly higher than the 2,000-2,500 level that President Bill Clinton proposed going to five years ago. The Nuclear Posture Review also makes clear that the administration is slowing down previous plans to retire weapons. The 1993 START II agreement, which the elder George Bush negotiated but which never went into effect, called for the United States and Russia to cut their arsenals to between 3,000 and 3,500 weapons apiece by 2007. The Pentagon now expects to have 3,800 operational weapons -- or about 4,200 weapons, using traditional counting rules -- in 2007. So five years from now, the younger Mr. Bush plans to have the United States deploy between 700 and 1,200 more warheads than his father did. Most important, the Nuclear Posture Review confirms that most -- the exact number is still undecided -- of the retired warheads will not be destroyed. Rather, many will be placed in a "responsive force" that will enable the United States to return them to operation in weeks or months, if needed. Others will be placed in the inactive stockpile. So cutting weapons doesn't mean eliminating them. Administration officials defend the decision to save warheads rather than scrap them on the grounds that no arms control treaty actually required the United States to destroy individual warheads. This is an odd defense given the administration's disdain for arms control and its belief that the U.S.-Russian relationship has changed fundamentally. More broadly, the administration justifies the responsive force on the grounds that the world is a dangerous and dynamic place and new threats could arise at any moment. The only sensible way to respond to such danger and uncertainty is to maximize America's flexibility. The problem with this flexibility is that it can help create the very circumstances it is designed to protect against. If Washington reserves the right to rearm, so will Russia. Perhaps the administration is right that our new friendship with Moscow is permanent -- though it is unclear how we can be certain of this if the world is in fact unpredictable. But are we really safer with thousands of Russian warheads sitting in storage facilities vulnerable to theft? Further complicating matters is the administration's commitment to defending America against missile attack. Combining missile defenses with a large, active and responsive nuclear force could be provocative. Russia, and even more so, China, might conclude that Washington is seeking a first-strike capability that it can use to coerce them. This might prompt Moscow to keep more of its own weapons deployed. Beijing is likely to respond by expanding its own missile forces. It is not too late for Mr. Bush to fashion a nuclear weapons policy that truly leaves the Cold War behind. As he has said repeatedly, Washington and Moscow are friends, not enemies. No one worries about the British and French strategic arsenals, and China possesses only two dozen long-range missiles. So Mr. Bush should think in bolder terms. He should work with Moscow to reduce each side's offensive forces to 1,000 weapons or less -- and scrap the rest. The prospect of tens, let alone hundreds, of weapons exploding on one's territory is sufficient to deter anyone. And he should accept Russia's offer to conclude a legally binding treaty to make these truly radical cuts irreversible. The Cold War ended more than a decade ago. The time has come for making sure our nuclear force posture reflects that reality. ******* #10 Irish Times January 12, 2002 Gorbachev - hero or holy fool? - Mikhail Gorbachev's visit to Ireland this week was a reminder of the heroic status the former Soviet leader enjoys in the West. In his homeland, however, most Russians regard him as a villain. By Seamus Martin Mikhail Gorbachev was lionised in Dublin in the course of his visit. An honorary degree of Doctor in Laws was granted by Trinity College. The Lord Mayor, Michael Mulcahy, having ushered Gorbachev on a walkabout through the streets of the constituency he hopes will elect him to the Dail later this year, conferred the freedom of the city after a gushing speech that stopped minimally short of the former Soviet leader's canonisation. On Gorbachev's part, there was the pleasure, he said, of being in a country where people spoke well rather than ill of him. In Russia, things are different. He is regarded there by westernisers as a devious Communist, by Communists as a traitor and by the general public as the man who began a process that lowered their standard of living almost to third-world levels. Only two people that I know of were publicly critical of Gorbachev during his Dublin visit. One was a Russian woman who carried a placard outside City Hall telling him to go home. The other was Gorbachev himself. At Trinity College on Tuesday and again at the Institute of European Affairs on Wednesday, he admitted to making mistakes. Later that day, at lunch in Aras an Uachtarain, he spoke not only of errors of policy but mistakes in the timing of his introduction of reforms in the Soviet Union. All in all, however, as he himself said, it was a pleasant change to be in Ireland where people were friendly and praising compared to back home in Russia, where he is held in extremely low esteem by a large majority of the people. It should be remembered that when he stood for election as President of the Russian Federation in 1996 he managed to achieve just 0.5 per cent of the vote. The question most frequently asked of me during Gorbachev's time in Ireland was the following: 'Why do his own Russian people hate him so much after all he has done?' It was a difficult one to answer. But this is an attempt to do so. Russian views of Gorbachev are based to a large extent on emotion. Image prevails over substance just as it does in Western politics. But there are those with substantial reasons to resent western views of Gorbachev as the saviour of civilisation as we know it, the Soviet leader who freed his country from communism, ended the threat of nuclear war and began the process which liberated the countries of central and eastern Europe. One of these people is a friend of mine called Andrei Mironov. I rang him in Moscow in the midst of the Dublin celebrations in order to detach myself from the paeans of praise being heaped on the former Soviet leader in Ireland. The voice over the long- distance phone line was not slow in putting forward a point of view I had heard so frequently during the years I lived in Moscow. 'Gorbachev once told the world there were no more political prisoners in the Soviet Union, only some 20 or so criminals serving out their sentences in the labour camps,' Mironov recalls. 'I was astonished when I saw him say this on television. I was astonished because I saw him make this statement on the only television set we had in the labour camp in which I was imprisoned.' In one respect, Gorbachev was right. Andrei Mironov was, under the terms of Soviet law, a criminal. He had been given the official title 'Especially Dangerous State Criminal Mironov A'. It is difficult to imagine Mironov, a slightly-built, softly-spoken middle-aged man, as 'especially dangerous' in the physical sense. But the Soviet Union had, since its inception, been the most avid adherent of the belief that the pen is mightier than the sword. Mironov was a human rights activist and a journalist, a lethal combination in the Moscow of the 1980s. He was found to be in breach of the notorious Article 70 of the Soviet Code, which referred to 'anti-Soviet propaganda with the special purpose of undermining Soviet power and the Soviet state'. His crime, he believes - for there was no trial to speak of - was to express in public his belief that elections in which there was only one candidate were not democratic. Years of repression in Russia had created an underground information system of superlative quality. Mironov knew in advance he was going to be arrested. Not only that, he knew precisely to which camp he would be taken. The message was received that his destination would be '385/zh/3/5' and it was to this cryptic destination in the inhospitable climate of the Volga region of Mordovia that he was transported. After the Soviet Union was dissolved the leading dissident, Vladimir Bukovsky, of Memorial, an organisation devoted to the plight of political prisoners, found Mironov's file in the archives. Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev, Mironov was told, had personally signed the papers condemning him to prison. 'Ask him the following when you meet him in Dublin,' Mironov requested. 'You put me in prison and you lied about it. I was your personal prisoner, you signed my prison sentence. Why do you avoid the truth, why don't you confess?' But what, I replied, of Gorbachev's release of the writer, Irina Ratushinskaya, before the summit with Ronald Reagan in Iceland in 1986? What of the release of Andrei Sakharov later that year? What of his own release after serving just a year-and-a-half of his four-year sentence? Surely Gorbachev was a good man? Mironov would not succumb to such Western heresies. 'The only reason we were released,' he said, 'was because the price of oil was falling and they couldn't afford to keep us any longer.' Gorbachev's achievements make him look like a hero to us. But Irish people did not have to live in Gorbachev's Russia nor in the Russia that followed his term of office. In neither case was it a particularly pleasant place to be. For myself, I spent only the last seven months of his presidency there as this newspaper's Moscow correspondent. Most of my time in Russia was spent under the less predictable and considerably more spectacular rule of Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin. It should not be forgotten, therefore, that Gorbachev was the head of a regime that did send people to the camps. He came up through the communist system from the relative obscurity of party boss in Stavropol in the south to take over the reins of power in the Kremlin. You don't do that without being extremely tough. Is it paradoxical that the same man who imprisoned dissidents became a major force in their release and in sponsoring the policy of glasnost that caused an explosion of free speech throughout the Communist-ruled part of Europe? There are those who see no paradox. Gorbachev did bring about the end of the Cold War, the demise of the Soviet Union as a superpower, the end of the communist system in Europe. But was that what he wanted to do? He clearly didn't want to end communism, for he was, after all, secretary-general of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Even in 1991, his final year in office, he spoke of maintaining the communist system. Neither, it is obvious, did he want to bring about the dismantling of the USSR. He may put the case differently now, but at the time it is clear that his goal was a reform of the Soviet system that would, all the same, maintain the Communist Party in power. People would have greater freedom of expression and they might eventually even have a more affluent lifestyle. They might also have elections in which there was more than one candidate, but the communists would remain at the helm. Some people have compared him to Mirabeau, the moderate who, at the time of the French Revolution, wanted reforms that retained the monarchy. Historian Robert Service, more damningly and unfairly, compared him to the 'holy fools' of old Russia, who traipsed around the countryside in God's name but didn't know precisely what they were doing. Orlando Figes, author of the brilliant history, A People's Tragedy - the Russian Revolution 1891-1924, was probably closer to the mark in comparing Gorbachev to Christopher Columbus, who achieved something great but didn't discover what it was until later. In short, the hypothesis runs, Gorbachev did all that we have thanked him for - but that is not want he wanted to do at all. All these arguments may be well above the heads of the robust Russian grandmothers, the babushki, who have been forced to beg or sell their belongings in the underpasses of Moscow. But ask them, too, about Gorbachev and the response will be one of unbridled animosity. Had they, or more especially their husbands, seen this week's Irish Times picture of Gorbachev quaffing his pint of Guinness they would have been very surprised. He did, after all, in his early days, bring in a system akin to the failed US experiment in prohibition. Alcohol became almost impossible to find in the early years of his rule. Fine vineyards in Crimea and Moldova were ripped from the ground. 'Bathtub Vodka', known as samogon, became all the rage, and sugar, one of its vital ingredients, vanished from the shops. No sugar eventually meant no sweets and the great Red October Chocolate Factory on the banks of the Moscow River almost ground to a halt. The sweet-toothed babushki, who at first were grateful that their menfolk had begun to return home sober, gradually became disillusioned. Then there was Raisa, Gorbachev's glamorous wife. In the West, it was a major and welcome change to see the wife of a Soviet leader who dressed with such elegance. The image of Russian womanhood in the past had been based on the peasant dowdiness of Mrs Khrushchev. Once again the view in Russia was different. Raisa Gorbacheva's elegant wardrobe was seen as a symbol of the privileges enjoyed by senior party members and their families. Her appearance conjured up images of the special shops with luxury food items, the polyclinics which gave party members better health services than those available to the general public, the special shops with western clothes. To us, the Gorbachevs may have been responsible for bringing the system to an end; to Russians, they were its most prominent representatives. More importantly, nowadays many Russians are convinced that the penury that bedevils their existence stems directly from the reform process initiated by Gorbachev. But Russians have a long tradition of holding their leaders responsible for all their ills. In 1847, the writer Alexander Herzen posed 'the eternal Russian question' by naming his novel Kto Vinovat? (Who is to Blame?). Many political leaders have been the focus of this question. Mikhail Gorbachev is just one of its many victims. ******* #11 Nezavisimaya Gazeta January 17, 2002 2002 DEFENSE BUDGET: IMAGINARY INCREASE Data on planned defense spending in 2002 has finally been released Author: Vladimir Georgiyev [from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html] THE MILITARY REFORMS WILL PUSH THE MOST EXPERIENCED OFFICERS OUT OF THE ARMED FORCES. THE TOTAL FUNDS SET ASIDE FOR DEFENSE SPENDING IN 2002 ARE OVER 5% LESS THAN WHAT WAS SET ASIDE FOR THE PURPOSE IN 2001. IT AMOUNTS TO ONLY ONE-QUARTER OF ALL BUDGET SPENDING, OR 494.6 BILLION RUBLES. Data on planned defense spending in 2002 has finally been released. Some calculations and analysis of the information to be found in non-classified addenda to the Federal Law "On the 2002 federal budget" show that the total funds set aside for defense spending in 2002 are over 5% less than what was set aside for the purpose in 2001. It amounts to only one-quarter of all budget spending, or 494.6 billion rubles. Meanwhile, the growth is considerable in certain budget items. The Military Reforms item is not a part of the National Defense. The sums set aside for it were quadrupled compared to 2001, to 16.5 billion rubles. Despite the expected reduction of energy prices and sequester, the 2002 budget sets aside more money for Russia's international obligations. Spendings for military hardware dismantlement are 72% higher (they are not accounted for in the article National Defense either and yet amount to 10.3 billion rubles). The part International Activities includes a new articles stipulating spendings for implementation of the country's international obligations in the sphere of military-technical cooperation (1.4 billion rubles). In other words, this is the first time in years that Russia is setting aside some money it will spend on military cooperation with foreign states in the sphere of arms production. Moreover, this is the first time Russia (nonsense!) intends to buy some military hardware and special military equipment which is not produced domestically (no longer produced, or not yet produced). What with the plans to reduce the army in 2002, structural reorganization is planned of the spendings set aside to finance the Armed Forces. According to Deputy Defense Minister Lyubov Kudelina, the military budget is formed in such a manner as to make sure that most money will be spent on combat training and development of the Armed Forces. These purposes will get almost 56% all defense spending. Research, repair, and rearmament will get 27 billion more than in 2001. Compare this sum with the needs of the army and with the prices, and you will see that the increase is meager. The money will not suffice to buy new military hardware for the troops on any noticeable scale. Acquisition is planned for after 2005 when the Kremlin says the national economic might and GDP have grown. Kudelina says that military pay scales in 2002 will be equalized with salaries of state officials, or at least doubled. It may look like that on paper, but when compensations and benefits are abolished on July 1, the pay-rise will be actually infinitesimal. The real increase in officers' salaries will amount to only 35% on average. Firstly, however, this growth does not take inflation into account. Secondly, it does not take into account the money officers will have to pay for housing and utilities. In fact, only low-ranking officers may expect any financial improvement. Lieutenant colonels and colonels, the most experienced officers of the Russian army, will probably have to resign. We have seen what such policies lead to. Take Uzbekistan or Kyrgyzstan, for example. When the Soviet Union collapsed, the new national government did not provide incentives for experienced officers. All of them eventually ended up in the Russian army. These days, security of these countries is provided by the American army and other NATO troops that have come to stay. ******* #12 Krasnaya Zvezda No. 4 2002 NATO: MID-LIFE CRISIS By Yuri PANKOV It has become more difficult for the USA to satisfy its NATO allies, who demand that bombing strikes should be accurate, treaties fulfilled scrupulously and enlargement substantiated. The slightest displeasure leads to scandals and even a kind of fallout. Well, these are the signs of a mid-life crisis. Fifty- three years after the establishment of the bloc, Europeans suddenly felt so independent as to question the decisions of the Big Brother and even attempt to create security structures alternative to NATO. Yugoslav Lesson The first alarm was sounded during the bombing of Yugoslavia, when Europeans openly hinted that they are dissatisfied with the Americans ignoring the opinion of the allies and manipulating with mechanisms of making concrete decisions. The direct prerequisite for this was the progress of the operation. Instead of choosing military targets, the Pentagon bombed peaceful cities and chemical plants. It became apparent that the US generals holding key posts in the NATO hierarchy did not care at all about a potential European ecological catastrophe or humanitarian crisis with thousands of refugees. As a result, the aggression against Yugoslavia, which was a NATO attempt to assume the role of a global punishing sword from beginning to end, not only undermined the bloc psychologically but also split it ideologically. During the April 1999 jubilee NATO summit in Washington France and Germany demonstrated their dislike of the NATO policeman uniform, saying that they would not support the idea of holding Kosovo-like operations without a UN Security Council mandate. The Americans tried to bring everyone to heel, threatening to leave the Balkans in this case and leave Europe face to face with their brainchild - Albanian extremism. This unexpected demarche shocked Europeans but they soon found an adequate answer after a period of embarrassment. They decided to create their own armed forces for the settlement of regional crises. European Alternative to NATO First Paris initiated the creation of a 60,000-strong "European army." Then the EU proclaimed, after years of vacillation, a policy of not only economic and political but also military integration. This was when Washington became worried. It proclaimed that Europeans should have long strengthened their military machine through a more fair distribution of the burden of responsibility in NATO. But the time for compromise was lost. The USA wants butter, money for the butter and the dairyman's daughter to boot, said Paris ironically about Washington's attempt to preserve the status quo. Americans panicked only when the "European army" was created on paper, meaning the official decision to create an instrument of military interference that would be independent of NATO. Although the level of independence of the "European army" was still a moot question, Washington was notified that the top NATO generals would not have the automatic right to attend the sessions of the planning committee of the future EU rapid deployment forces. This meant that the European army would have decision-making and implementation structures independent of NATO. Washington is hardly fooled by the phrase "independent of NATO." It actually means "independent of the USA," because it was the European NATO members who initiated the "European army." Aesopian language is playing a special role in NATO. For example, the phrase "the strengthening of the European component of NATO" has come to mean the creation of the EU military potential. The phrase "in coordination with NATO" means that the bloc's headquarters will be only notified of decisions made in the European defence structures. The Paris-Berlin-London triangle has become the driving force of European integration. It is true that Tony Blair is fighting hard to resist the pressure of British Conservatives, who accuse his Labour government of undermining NATO and endangering the Britain-US strategic alliance. No wonder the Americans are working on Britain as best they can, enticing and threatening it. For example, they threatened to deprive Britain of intelligence information unless London speaks up against the Europeans' plans. The USA dangled a carrot in front of Britain's nose by speeding up the signing of blocks of agreements with Britain and Germany on expanding the mutual export of military technologies and weapons. Meanwhile, US corporations began to more actively invest in European defence consortiums, although the US law says that all defence technologies and products must be created and produced on US territory. Change of Strategy The USA knows very well that Europeans do not want to give up their "trans-Atlantic safety belt" but is worried that they are speaking about a "safety belt" and not the traditional crutch, which the Americans have grown accustomed to using as a big stick. Besides, the USA knows that the role of such a "safety belt" is becoming ephemeral because the threat against which NATO was created is no more. And the ability of adjusting the bloc to the fulfilment of other tasks is questionable, because it is not very easy to convince the allies that US tank corps and bomber squadrons must be deployed in Europe to combat small groups of terrorists and drug merchants. And yet the USA is doing the best it can in this situation. For example, immediately after the September 11 terrorist attacks in the USA the White House announced the need to apply Article 5 of the Washington treaty on collective defence. The situation seems completely transparent to Europeans, as proved by the first ever October session of the EU defence ministers, who had previously gathered only at NATO forums. In this case Europeans not only confirmed their plan of creating joint defence structures but also decided to coordinate the efforts of their countries in the struggle against terrorism. In point of fact, these decisions were a kind of reply to Washington, which had proclaimed the need to employ NATO mechanisms in the counter-terror operation. Here is the essence of the European reply to the USA: yes, we will fight terrorism and will not neglect our allied obligations, but Europe will form a joint front in this struggle and will not allow itself to be manipulated as happened during the bombing of Yugoslavia. This amounts to a serious claim to Europe's intention to speak with the USA in one voice and from a common stand on all other issues within the NATO framework. Until recently, the USA has been trying to enhance its reputation by using Russia to scare Europe. At least observers say that this was the goal of a statement made by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, who said that Russia continued to present a threat to the West because of its nuclear status. This appears to be the most serious argument in favour of a US-Europe friendship in the face of the Russian scare, simply because there are no other arguments. Washington's goal is to make the allies swallow the bait. The sleigh of hands, a technology that the USA can use expertly, will do the rest. One proof of this is the inclusion in the NATO plans of large-scale March 2002 exercises that provide for training in repelling... a Russian aggression. Washington links its plans in this sphere with the creation of an NMD system. The implementation of the NMD plans jointly with Europeans is a good chance to rally the vacillating allies under the US banner and give NATO a new lease on life. Europeans would not be able to create a similar system independently. So if they allow themselves to be convinced of the usefulness of NMD, they will be hooked by Washington. So far Europe has been acting very maturely because the European discord over NMD means nothing other than an adequate answer to the US question. They seem to be saying: we are not against the USA but this does not mean that we will always follow it with our eyes closed. The USA and Europe even made diametrically opposite conclusions from their interpretation of the September 11 tragedy in relation to NMD. The Americans presented the tragedy as a proof of the need for the nuclear missile umbrella, while Europeans saw it as one more proof of the questionable nature of pro-NMD arguments. And here is the last US appeal to the mercantile European mind: why spend so much on defence if "the good Americans" have always provided the money and are ready to continue doing this in the future? A strong argument, indeed, the more so for the small countries which will have to make a much larger contribution to the "European army" while trying to uphold their interests in dialogue with, say, Germany or France. Paper Tiger But the main US argument is that NATO is a well-oiled machine while the "European army" is nothing more than a paper tiger. Besides, nobody can guarantee, say the Americans, that the implementation of European plans would not turn the paper tiger into a clumsy tortoise. The Americans are largely right, though, for the European army exists only on paper. In case of Britain this means that the units that it is prepared - on paper - to dispatch to the European army are already operating as part of NATO forces in, say, Kosovo. This raises the obvious question: who will be their master, NATO or Europe? The core of the European army is to be created this winter and European giants - Britain, France, Germany and Italy - have proclaimed readiness to detail their units to it. However, the main thing is not that Europeans are theoretically ready to replace NATO but that they have recently proclaimed readiness to do this in practice - by replacing US troops in Kosovo with European servicemen. On the other hand, it would be premature and not quite correct to wonder if the Americans will preserve NATO. The thing is that the Americans do not need NATO as such. They need an obedient NATO and they are prepared to pay for such tame bloc. The exact amount of payment is open to bargaining. At the same time, Washington categorically refuses to admit that it is impossible to preserve the NATO of old. For its time, just as the time of bloc confrontation, is long past. ******