#9
Izvestia
No. 166-M
September 2002
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
STRATEGIC OFFENSIVE REDUCTIONS TREATY WILL NOT IMPAIR RUSSIA'S MILITARY MIGHT
By Yuri BALUYEVSKY, First Deputy Chief of the Russian General Staff

The first session of the Russo-American consultative group set up after the May summit of the Russian and US presidents in Moscow will be held in Washington on September 20. The defence and foreign ministers will discuss the fulfilment of the strategic offensive reductions treaty signed during the May summit.

The new treaty is a non-standard document, as proved by its name, Treaty on Strategic Offensive Reductions, that covers the reduction of warheads, delivery vehicles and all other systems and equipment that determine the ability of strategic offensive weapons to fulfil their tasks.

The treaty was signed after a period of intense discussions in all sections of Russian society. The thing is that the preceding treaty, START-2 signed in January 1993, has not come into force. And Russia's attempt to develop dialogue on this issue with the Clinton administration failed, which halted and threatened to cut short the nuclear disarmament process.

The situation changed dramatically after the September 11, 2001 tragedy in the USA. It showed that the issues of national security of any state in the modern world cannot be regarded separately from the development of the world community as a whole and that the world should join efforts to combat new threats and challenges. Non-proliferation of mass destruction weapons is a key element of this struggle, which paved the way to a new Russia-US dialogue.

The fundamental principle that guided Russian negotiators has been and still is the principle of ensuring national security. Russia proceeded from the belief that the nuclear arsenals of Russia and the USA were excessive and hence it would be reasonable to agree on the mutual reduction of nuclear weapons of the strategic deterrence forces. This is why the other principle underlying the new treaty is the principle of equal security of the sides.

Unlike its "predecessors," the new treaty is a short document of barely three pages that formalised several key provisions on which the sides had come to the agreement. They are:

- the mutual pledge to reduce and limit their strategic nuclear warheads to a ceiling of no more than 1,700-2,200 on either side within ten years (by 31 December 2012);

- the agreement of Russia and the USA on the need to keep the START-1 treaty "in force in accordance with its terms";

- the creation of a special Bilateral Implementation Commission for tackling issues of its further development and strengthening;

- the right of either side to withdraw from the treaty "upon three months written notice to the other Party." Any treaty that was hammered out as a result of difficult negotiations is a compromise document. For example, the new treaty did not cover such elements of strategic stability as space-based weapons, anti-submarine operation and precision weapons, to mention just a few. But we keep these issues in mind and will continue dialogue on them.

The analysis of Russo(Soviet)-American agreements on strategic offensive weapons prompts the following conclusion: all of them are based on a certain strict logic but it is the logic of the time when these agreements were made.

At the initial stage of negotiations, the sides calculated the number of warheads and delivery vehicles, the geometrical size of missiles and their throw-weight. As they accumulated experience, strengthened mutual understanding and learned to better see the role and place of nuclear weapons in the system of international relations, they went over from the limitation to reduction of their strategic offensive weapons. But either side used the principle of "mutual assured destruction" when determining the parameters of these reductions.

Today we have passed over from the logic of might and confrontation to the logic of interests and cooperation. The new treaty has taken a vital place in the system of Russia-US relations. From this viewpoint, the new treaty can really become the last in the series of traditional disarmament treaties. It bears special significance against the background of other vital international events of the recent past, in particular the Russia-NATO and Russia-EU summits. The decisions that were made during these summits gave the green light to the creation of a new collective security system in Eurasia and the rest of the world.

We believe that the military aspect of this work should first and foremost ensure:

- the development of relations above all between permanent UN Security Council members, NATO and EU member countries, as well as between all other world countries on the principles of cooperation, mutual respect for the positions of each other and mutual advantage, and a pledge not to try to gain unilateral advantages;

- the continuation of the process of radical, controlled and irreversible reductions of strategic offensive armaments in conjunction with the approval of limits on strategic defensive systems and the strengthening of the non-proliferation regime;

- the elaboration and coordination of measures designed to build up predictability and trust in military-strategic operations.

Of course, this calls for hard work by all countries of the international community. Russia is ready for such work.

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