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STRATEGIC

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INSTITUTE

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Strategic Studies Institute Monograph

RUSSIA AND THE CURRENT STATE

OF ARMS CONTROL

Stephen J. Blank

Editor

September 2012

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classified information, jeopardize operations security, or misrepresent official U.S. policy. Such academic freedom empowers them to offer new and sometimes controversial perspectives 

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ii

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ISBN 1-58487-540-2
iii

CONTENTS

Foreword ........................................................................v

1. Russia’s Future Arms Control Agenda 

 and Posture ................................................................1

Jacob W. Kipp

2. The Russian Arms Control Agenda 

 After New START ..................................................63

Steven Pifer

3. Russian Views on Nuclear Weapons 

 and Global Zero: Implications and 

 Consequences ..........................................................93

Peter R. Huessy

About the Contributors .............................................101

v

FOREWORD

Arms control remains the central issue in U.S.-Russian relations. This is so for many reasons, not least 

of which are the respective capabilities of these two 

states and their consequent responsibility for preventing both nuclear proliferation and the outbreak of war 

between them. Thus the state of the bilateral relationship is usually directly proportional to the likelihood 

of their finding common ground on arms control. To 

the extent that they can find such ground, chances for 

an agreement on what have been the more intractable 

issues of regional security in Eurasia and the Third 

World grow, and the converse is equally true.

Because of the centrality of this issue for Russian 

and U.S. defense and foreign policies, we are pleased 

to offer this volume, the second in a series of monographs that originated in the third annual conference 

on Russia held by the Strategic Studies Institute (SSI) 

at Carlisle Barracks on September 26-27, 2011. The 

chapters focus on Russian developments in the light 

of the so-called New Start Treaty that was signed by 

Russia and the United States in Prague, Czech Republic, in 2010 and ratified by both states later that year. 

This panel, like the others at the present and previous 

conferences, allowed experts from the United States, 

Europe, and Russia to gather together for a candid 

and spirited discussion of the issues. In this panel, we 

assembled three well-known U.S. specialists, Former 

Ambassador Steven Pifer (Ambassador to Ukraine) of 

the Brookings Institution; Dr. Jacob Kipp, formerly of 

the Army’s Command and Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, KS; and Peter Huessy of the Air Force Association, to discuss these perspectives. As could be 

expected, their views often diverge, but are also far-
vi

ranging and frank, as befits scholarly discussion and 

expert debate.

SSI is pleased to present this monograph dealing 

with such a critical issue, and we hope that readers will 

engage us further in the kinds of issues and debates 

that surfaced at the conference and that the chapters 

presented here capture and extend. The overriding 

importance of nuclear issues for both national and 

international security mandates our continuing close 

scrutiny of other nuclear states’ outlooks on the entire 

range of issues associated with nuclear weapons.

DOUGLAS C. LOVELACE, JR.

Director

Strategic Studies Institute
1

CHAPTER 1

RUSSIA’S FUTURE ARMS CONTROL AGENDA

AND POSTURE

Jacob W. Kipp

THE ARMS CONTROL CONTEXT: 

2 DECADES OF U.S.-RUSSIAN RELATIONS 

AFTER THE COLD WAR

Until the end of the Cold War, arms control and 

disarmament were dominated by the United States 

and the Soviet Union, with the two superpowers possessing nuclear arsenals of such scale and sophistication as to make their bilateral arrangements the center 

of gravity of the international system. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia inherited the Soviet 

part of that arsenal and continued to follow a line of 

arms control and disarmament as a means to pursue 

a geostrategic partnership with the United States. In 

January 1993, Presidents George H. W. Bush and Boris 

Yeltsin signed the second Strategic Arms Reductions 

Treaty (START II), which called for a reduction of strategic nuclear arsenals on each side to 3,500 warheads. 

Ultimately, Russia’s internal crisis and American 

sentiments of exceptionalism precluded such a partnership. The ratification of START II was delayed, 

the U.S. Senate did not ratify the Treaty, even with 

conditions, until 1996, and the Russian Duma did not 

ratify the agreement until 2000, making that ratification contingent upon the United States upholding the 

Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. Washington saw 

itself as the sole surviving superpower and set itself 

up as the center of a unipolar world. In this world, 
2

Russia would be treated as just another power with 

which Washington would deal on a regional basis 

framed largely by North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) expansion and transformation into an 

instrument of collective security with the capacity to 

engage in out-of-area crises. Russia’s initial cooperation in such ventures, which included NATO Implementation Forces (IFOR) in Bosnia, came to be seen by 

Moscow as a mistake when it found itself dealing with 

instability in its own territory and in the near abroad. 

At home, the Russian economy declined until 1996, 

when it began a slow recovery, which was wiped out 

in the August 1998 collapse of the ruble. Russia appeared to be a marginal international player economically and militarily after the humiliation of its armed 

forces in Chechnya. Any concern that Washington 

had about maintaining the appearance of partnership 

disappeared when it and its NATO allies moved towards overt intervention against Serbia in response to 

a growing insurgency inside Kosovo and Belgrade’s 

moves to crack down in the province. 

Bilateral relations reached a particularly low level 

when NATO conducted this intervention. When the 

U.S.-led NATO air campaign did not conclude with 

Serbian submission after 5 days of bombing, U.S.-

Russian relations declined precipitously. When the 

conflict did end in June 1999, Moscow played a role 

in brokering the armistice, and its troops, deployed as 

part of the Stabilization Force (SFOR) in Bosnia, made 

a symbolic march to Pristina to assert Moscow’s status 

as a player on the ground. That same month, the Russian military conducted its first strategic exercise since 

the end of the Cold War, Zapad (West) 99, involving 

simulated nuclear first strikes to counter a NATO intervention against Belarus, which Russian convention-
3

al forces could not counter. Late that summer in the 

face of terrorist actions in Chechnya and elsewhere, 

Russia intervened to restore Russian sovereignty. At 

the same time, Vladimir Putin rose rapidly within the 

Kremlin hierarchy from Chief of the Federal Security 

Service (FSB), to chair of the Security Council, to Prime 

Minister, and finally to appointment as President. The 

Second Chechen War became Putin’s war, and it was 

prosecuted ruthlessly. Putin was elected President of 

Russia in March 2000. Russian-U.S. relations, which 

deteriorated during the NATO campaign against Yugoslavia, did not recover during the last years of the 

Bill Clinton administration. During that period, Putin 

put Russia on a new path aimed at strengthening state 

power and bringing about an economic recovery after 

the decade of crisis associated with the end of the Union 

of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), the attempt to 

build a market economy, and creation of a democratic 

polity. Putin proclaimed his goal to be stability and 

sustained economic development. Democracy would 

be managed. There was minor progress on some arms 

control issues late in the Clinton administration. On 

December 16, 2000, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine 

K. Albright and Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov 

signed the Memorandum of Understanding on Notifications of Missile Launches in the last days of the 

administration, but progress was not made under the 

Bush administration, and indeed not until Presidents 

Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev discussed its 

implementation in June 2010 as part of Obama’s Reset 

policy towards Russia. 

A new round of U.S.-Russian relations had to 

await the outcome of the 2000 U.S. elections, which 

brought to power George W. Bush. The Bush administration proclaimed the end of the Cold War. Russia 
4

did not figure as the chief focus of U.S. foreign policy 

in the first few months of the Bush administration as 

it looked to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as 

an emerging peer competitor. This focus never developed into a sustained policy because of September 11, 2001 (9/11), when U.S. foreign and security 

policy shifted to the War on Terrorism. Putin’s Russia embraced the idea of a common struggle against 

terrorism and demonstrated a willingness to support 

strategic arms control if it would provide greater stability and enhance Russia’s position as a great power. 

In December 2001, the Bush administration informed 

Russia of its intent to withdraw from the ABM Treaty, 

which the Bush administration described as a relic 

of the Cold War. Russia’s response to the announced 

U.S. withdrawal was to declare it a “mistake” and to 

reaffirm the capacity of its strategic nuclear arsenal 

to remain a viable deterrent force. The State Department under Colin Powell successfully negotiated the 

Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (SORT), which 

was signed by Presidents Bush and Putin in May 2002. 

The treaty, which limited strategic offensive nuclear 

weapons on both sides to 1,700 to 2,200 operationally 

deployed warheads, was quickly ratified by the U.S. 

Senate and the Russian Duma in 2003. In the spirit of 

the post-Cold War era, the treaty did not provide for 

verification, only bilateral consultations on its implementation. Defenders of withdrawal from the ABM 

Treaty presented it as a necessary action so that the 

United States could be free to pursue what the administration described as a limited missile defense capability intended to reduce the risk of attacks from rogue 

states, who, it was pointed out, were in no way capable of challenging the deterrent capacity of Russia’s 

still extensive strategic nuclear arsenal. In May 2003, 
5

Bush and Putin released a joint declaration aimed at 

“strengthening confidence and increasing transparency in the area of missile defense.” The SORT contained 

a time limitation of December 31, 2012, when it would 

expire unless “extended by agreement of the Parties 

or superseded earlier by a subsequent agreement.”

The Treaty survived, but U.S.-Russian relations 

were particularly rocky during the rest of the Bush administration. Russia had originally supported U.S. intervention in Afghanistan, but when it appeared that 

intervention would lead to the long-term deployment 

of U.S. forces, Russia and its partners in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), formed in 1996 

as the Shanghai Five and becoming the SCO in 2001 

with the admission of Uzbekistan, began to express 

their concerns over such a long-term presence. Russia 

expressed its hostility toward the U.S. intervention in 

Iraq, which Moscow saw as an exercise in American 

unilateral power. Russia expressed its objections to the 

further expansion of NATO to the east and saw various 

“color revolutions” in Ukraine, Georgia, and Uzbekistan as subversive attempts to destabilize states within 

the Russian sphere of influence. NATO discussions of 

the admission of Ukraine and Georgia to the Alliance 

brought strenuous objections from Russia. Russia began to pursue arrangements with regimes that had 

poor relations with Washington, including Venezuela, 

Syria, and Libya. The U.S. plans for the deployment 

of radars and interceptor missiles in the Czech Republic and Poland brought another round of debates 

in Russia over the stability of its deterrent forces and 

calls for the deployment of short-range, dual-capable 

Iskander Missile systems to Kaliningrad Oblast’. In 

August 2008, U.S.-Russian relations reached a particular low when fighting erupted between putative 
6

Russian peacekeepers and Georgian Army units in 

South Ossetia. The direct intervention of the Russian 

armed forces brought a quick and decisive end to the 

fighting, with Russian forces occupying Georgian territory outside of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Russia 

in its turn recognized the independence of these two 

regions from Georgia and stationed military forces on 

their territory. Prospects for the development of U.S.-

Russian relations would depend on the outcome of 

the U.S. Presidential elections in 2008, although they 

hardly seemed a major topic in an election dominated 

by concerns over two ongoing wars and a major financial crisis that was just breaking. The larger question 

of the U.S. role in the international system did engage 

both candidates, but the end of a unipolar Pax American, the subtext, was hardly recognized.

THE RESET AND U.S.-RUSSIAN RELATIONS: 

START III AND GLOBAL ZERO

In keeping with tradition, we found ourselves 

once again assembled at this august institution, the 

U.S. Army War College, examining the status of U.S.-

Russian relations in anticipation of presidential elections in both states. Four years earlier I suggested 

there were good prospects for a strategic arms control 

agreement.1

 Indeed, such an agreement was negotiated by the Obama and Medvedev administrations in 

2009 and signed in 2010. This event took place in spite 

of a major U.S.-Russian confrontation as a result of the 

August 2008 Russo-Georgian War over South Ossetia 

and Abkhazia. The Obama administration adopted a 

policy of “Reset” in U.S.-Russian relations, and much 

ink was spilled over whether the Reset was real or just 

for show. Judged by the agreement on strategic offen-
7

sive arms, the Reset was real. But a bilateral strategic 

offensive arms control agreement proved far easier to 

achieve than other parts of the arms control agenda. 

In part, this was because the Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on 

Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation 

of Strategic Offensive Arms (START III) addressed 

well-covered ground from past arms control efforts 

and reflected a desire by both sides to reduce their 

strategic nuclear arsenals. This singular achievement, 

however, was taken to mean different things in Washington and Moscow. This divergence of interpretations is one manifestation of very different views of 

the international security system and of each power’s 

understanding of its national interests. 

From the very beginning of the negotiations, there 

were very different expectations as to where these 

negotiations would lead. There were signals from 

the Obama administration that it was willing to look 

more pragmatically at U.S.-Russian relations. Missile 

defense in Europe, which had become a major sore 

point in relations between Moscow and Washington, 

was open to reconsideration. In a confidential letter 

to Medvedev, President Obama had signaled that the 

United States was willing to give up the interceptor 

system, which the Bush administration had pushed to 

deploy in Eastern Europe, in exchange for Russian assistance in limiting arms shipments to Iran, the state 

whose nuclear ambitions had served to justify the 

original deployment concept. Washington spoke of 

deploying other assets and said that it would be willing to consider Russian cooperation in a European 

missile defense system.2

 Washington signaled a new 

era of pragmatism in bilateral U.S.-Russian relations, 

and Moscow greeted the Reset in relations as promis-
8

ing but not proven. For Moscow, the most important 

product of Reset would be the confirmation of Russia’s status as a great power in Eurasia. For the Obama 

administration, initial pragmatism was a necessary 

first step to a much more ambitious set of multilateral 

objectives, of which strategic nuclear weapons reduction was only a part.

On the eve of the meeting of Presidents Obama 

and Medvedev in London, England, on April 1, 2009, 

there was significant pressure to tie the bilateral strategic nuclear negotiations to a larger, more ambitious 

nuclear arms control agenda associated with the Global Zero movement, which had emerged as an international lobby composed of political, military, business, 

faith, and civic leaders in late 2008. That group mounted an international campaign for the elimination of 

all nuclear weapons as the best means to end nuclear 

proliferation, reduce the threat of nuclear terrorism, 

and eliminate the prospect of nuclear war.3

 Russian 

commentators noted that the Global Zero movement 

intended to challenge both presidents to embrace the 

abolition of nuclear weapons as the most effective 

means to reduce nuclear proliferation and the threat of 

nuclear terrorism.4 Obama and Medvedev did agree 

to begin negotiations of a new strategic arms control 

treaty that would cut each nation’s long-range nuclear 

arsenal further than previous agreements. Both Presidents promised a new era in their bilateral relations 

based upon a more pragmatic relationship.5 

President Obama used his speech to the Czech 

people in Prague on April 5, 2009, to declare a U.S. 

commitment to total nuclear disarmament in the 21st 

century:
9

So today, I state clearly and with conviction America’s 

commitment to seek the peace and security of a world 

without nuclear weapons. (Applause.) I’m not naive. 

This goal will not be reached quickly—perhaps not 

in my lifetime. It will take patience and persistence. 

But now we, too, must ignore the voices who tell us 

that the world cannot change. We have to insist, “Yes, 

we can.”6

By boldly embracing Global Zero, the President 

set out a longer strategy of great complexity requiring cooperation with a broad range of powers, including Russia. The International Global Zero movement 

was launched only a few months before the Prague 

speech by over 300 political, military, business, faith, 

and civic leaders in December 2008 to mobilize mass 

opinion to support a phased and verified elimination 

of all nuclear weapons worldwide. It held out the 

prospect of Global Zero as a way “to eliminate the 

nuclear threat—including proliferation and nuclear 

terrorism—to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, 

secure all nuclear materials, and eliminate all nuclear 

weapons: global zero.”7 Given the problems afflicting 

the remaining Russian nuclear arsenal, Moscow was 

expected to share Washington’s long-range goal. The 

Russian response to Global Zero, however, reflected a 

very different military-technical and political appreciation of Global Zero. The devil was in the details, and 

the first detail was the ratification of START III by the 

U.S. Senate. Short of the ratification, Moscow simply 

did not want to talk about other arms control issues.

By June 2009, the divergence of Russian views on 

Global Zero had emerged with some clarity. Sergei 

Karaganov, the head of the Council on Defense and 

Foreign Policy, organized a conference on the issue 

and invited leading specialists to speak at the con-
10

ference, which was held at the Higher School of Economics, on “nuclear disarmament and U.S.-Russian 

relations.” Global Zero provided the context for the 

discussion of one of the most complex aspects of the 

international system, embracing the security regime, 

the nature of the international system, the diversity 

of interests among nuclear powers, and the economic 

ramifications of general nuclear disarmament. Some 

analysts, like Aleksei Arbatov, treated the global initiative as the logical extension of bilateral nuclear 

arms control and a means to ensure the uninterrupted 

nature of the process of continuing bilateral cooperation in the sphere of nuclear weapon reduction and 

limitation. 

Karaganov, one the most prominent Russian commentators on international security, warned against 

giving up the deterrent role of nuclear weapons, saying “the world with nuclear weapons is better than 

the one without them or with them kept at the minimum.”8

 He described nuclear weapons as a restraint 

during the Cold War and noted that the nuclear club’s 

growth was precisely congruent with the post-Cold 

War period. Noble sentiments and the Non-Proliferation Treaty had not prevented this. Indeed, the two 

major nuclear powers reduced their arsenals to minimal levels that would increase incentives for third 

states to acquire a credible deterrent force. Moreover, 

the absence of nuclear weapons or their reduction to 

minimal levels could create an incentive for more risky 

behavior by states, especially the United States, when 

such adventures carried no risk of strategic retaliation. 

Karaganov concluded that it would be more useful to 

pursue a comprehensive bilateral agenda, not tied to 

Global Zero, to improve U.S.-Russian relations.9

 
11

Nikolai Spassky, Assistant Director of Rosatom, 

outlined the many difficulties that would be involved 

in general nuclear disarmament but warned that Russia had no alternative but to pursue such reductions 

because progress in military technology would make 

current arsenals obsolete. This was, so he argued, owing to the fact that “the United States needed but 15 

years or so to advance military technologies to the 

level where availability of nuclear arsenals to its opponents or lack thereof would stop being a factor of 

deterrence.”10 Other commentators took up this issue, 

pointing to the abolition of nuclear weapons as robbing Russia of its position as a great power and thus 

rendering it essentially helpless—first and foremost 

due to its technological backwardness and slow development.”11

When the Global Zero movement had its second 

international summit in Paris, France, in February 

2010, both President Obama and President Medvedev 

expressed support for the general goal of eliminating nuclear weapons. Obama’s text spoke of Global 

Zero as one of his administration’s highest priorities. 

Noting the progress made on the negotiation of a new 

Strategic Arms Reduction treaty (START) agreement, 

he laid out a major agenda for the upcoming Nuclear 

Security Summit in April: 

We will rally nations behind the goal of securing the 

world’s vulnerable nuclear materials in 4 years. We 

will strengthen the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty 

and work with allies and partners to ensure that the 

rights and responsibilities of every nation are enforced. We will seek to ratify the Comprehensive Test 

Ban Treaty and negotiate a Fissile Material Cutoff 

Treaty. And our Nuclear Posture Review will reduce 

the role and number of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy.12
12

The focus was on the upcoming Washington Summit and the multinational character of progress towards Global Zero. At the same time, the President 

said that such progress would not be easy and that the 

ultimate goal might not be achieved “in our life time.” 

President Medvedev emphasized the diplomatic 

context of the meeting, the new content of bilateral 

U.S. and Russian relations, which included the end of 

the Cold War, and “an atmosphere of trust and partnership in the relations between leading world powers.” Medvedev stressed Russia’s commitment to the 

Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons 

but stressed a contractual path to nuclear disarmament and identified the Russian objective in such 

negotiations as “a comprehensive long-term strategy 

of balanced and stage-by-stage reduction of nuclear 

arsenals under conditions of equal security for all.”13

Nothing would be accepted that endangered the security of Russia. Equal security was not confined to just 

abolishing nuclear arsenals. Russia required a new 

security regime which would embrace all of Eurasia.

Progress in the negotiation of START III was significant. Within a year of the meeting of Presidents 

Obama and Medvedev in London, the negotiators 

on both sides had a draft treaty ready for the heads 

of state, and in April 2010 the heads of state met in 

Prague to sign the treaty, which fostered the impression that the Treaty was a harbinger of what Obama 

had promised in Prague the year before. The terms 

of the treaty provided for reduction of each power’s 

number of strategic nuclear missile launchers by half. 

The treaty limits each side’s number of deployed strategic nuclear warheads to 1,550 deployed on bomber 

aircraft, land-based missiles, and submarine-launched 

missiles. The cuts were significant when compared 
13

with the levels of the original START Treaty of 1991 

and the 2002 Moscow Treaty. The treaty also provided 

for verification by national technical means and by 18 

on-site inspections per year.14 The details appeared in 

sharp relief during the ratification process in Washington and Moscow. 

START’S PROGRESS AND THE ISSUE OF 

RUSSIAN MILITARY DOCTRINE

As the U.S.-Russian negotiations on START III 

moved forward, Moscow was also deeply involved 

in the articulation of a new military doctrine and a 

nuclear policy document. By the end of 2009, it was 

clear from the Russian news media that President 

Medvedev was deeply involved in both processes. 

The press was full of leaks from leading officials in the 

Security Council that the military doctrine would contain a statement on first or preemptive use of nuclear 

weapons. In the immediate aftermath of the signature 

of Russia’s new military doctrine by President Medvedev, most attention focused on the fact that a first 

nuclear strike was not mentioned in the document 

and on the charge that NATO was the chief source of 

“dangers” to the security of the Russian Federation. 

Comments by NATO’s leadership that the doctrine 

was not a realistic portrayal of NATO were reported 

by the press, but there was no strong criticism of that 

aspect of the doctrine. Instead, Russian authors drew 

attention to the problem of the gap between Russia’s 

conventional military capabilities vis-à-vis NATO 

and its consequent reliance on nuclear weapons in a 

conventional conflict. On the day that President Medvedev signed the new military doctrine, Oleg Nikiforov, however, addressed the issue of NATO-Russian 
14

relations and explored Western assessments of Russia’s military power in a review of a recent article 

titled “Russian’s Military Capabilities: Great Power 

Ambitions and Reality,” by Margarete Klein for the 

German publication, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik. 

In that article, Klein came to the conclusion that Russia’s great power pretensions were not based on real 

military capabilities, and that economic and demographic problems made it unlikely that Russia would 

achieve such military modernization. Nikiforov noted 

the prominent place of Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik

among German think tanks and its close relationship 

to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government. 

For Nikiforov, the article asked the question 

whether Russia was a “paper tiger or a real threat” 

and answered the question with a qualified “both.” 

Russia’s military modernization will not create a direct threat to NATO members, but increased capabilities will permit it to intervene more effectively on its 

periphery, where it will be a real threat to successor 

states and to the possibility of NATO intervention on 

the periphery. In this regard, the Russian-Georgian 

conflict of 2008 appeared to signal the willingness of 

the Russian government to act even at the risk of creating an international crisis. He also called attention 

to Klein’s negative prognosis on the likelihood of success for the “New Look” of the Russian armed forces, based upon the inability of the arms industry to 

produce modern weapons in a timely fashion, which 

leaves the prospect of conflict high and the ability to 

manage it at the conventional level low. In this regard, 

Klein recommended a revival of conventional arms 

control talks in order to reduce the risks of escalation 

in such conflicts. Nikiforov concluded that under the 

present circumstances, the West still considers Russia 

to be a “paper tiger.”15
15

An article appearing after the publication of the 

military doctrine explored the same theme in relation to the doctrine’s content. Writing for Moskovskii 

Komsomolets, Olga Bozheva noted that the doctrine appeared on the eve of the Munich Conference on Global 

and European Security and created quite a stir. There, 

Russia had raised concerns about the U.S. plan to deploy elements of an ABM system in Rumania, while 

the West expressed concern about the role of nuclear 

weapons in Russia’s military doctrine. Citing reduced 

capabilities of early warning in case of nuclear attack 

and declining offensive nuclear capabilities, Bozheva 

depicted the doctrine’s nuclear pronouncements as a 

de facto admission of Russia’s military weakness. The 

doctrine, in her view, offers nothing but fine words 

about the New Look of the armed forces promised by 

Minister of Defense Serdiukov, and Western leaders 

are likely to read the Russian defense posture as nothing more than a bluff seeking to conceal real weakness.16 The bluff will not work for long. At the same 

time, the new doctrine proclaimed NATO expansion 

to be the primary danger to Russian security, and the 

President approved the decision to purchase one of 

the helicopter amphibious assault ships of the Mistral class from France. This contradiction revealed the 

deeper problem of Russian defense, the absence of 

a “machine-building complex” to support domestic 

military requirements. Bozheva labeled the new military doctrine an “anti-military doctrine”17

A day before publication of the new military doctrine, Aleksandr Khramchikhin, Deputy Director of 

the Institute for Political and Military Analysis, drew 

attention to a potential conflict on the border of Russia 

which had nothing to do with NATO, but was likely, if 

unleashed, to lead to a much wider war. Khramchikh-
16

in pointed to increased tensions between the Republic 

of Korea and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. While noting that such tensions have been a common feature of relations between the two states since 

the 1953 armistice ending the first Korean War, he sees 

the present tensions as reflecting the breakdown of 

the Six Power Talks on the elimination of North Korea’s nuclear arsenal and signs of increasing tensions 

between Beijing and Washington. Khramchikhin declared that neither Seoul nor Pyongyang, and neither 

Beijing nor Washington, wanted to start a fight, but 

the large arsenals and the higher tensions could lead 

to uncontrolled escalation bringing in other powers.

Khramchikhin, who has written extensively over 

the last few years on China’s emergence as a regional 

superpower and modern military power, notes a basic asymmetry between the armed forces of the North 

and South Koreas, with the South enjoying technological superiority, but the North prepared to conduct 

a dogged defense using terrain, engineering obstacles, 

and tunneling to prevent an early and easy victory. 

U.S. intervention on the side of South Korea would 

not fundamentally change that military balance, and 

would not bring the war to a rapid conclusion. U.S. 

forces currently are overcommitted in other combat 

theaters and lack the strategic reserve to occupy the 

North. In any territory of the North occupied by South 

Korean and U.S. forces, a partisan movement would 

emerge to continue the fight. Khramchikhin characterized such a conflict as a catastrophe for everyone, including Russia, except China. Moreover, North Korea 

could make use of its nuclear arms delivered by shortrange missiles and aircraft or as nuclear mines. Such 

an escalation would demand that China act.

Khramchikhin sees Beijing as moving units into 

North Korea to occupy those areas still under North 
17

Korean control and backing those elements of the 

North Korean elite willing to greet Chinese People’s 

Liberation Army (PLA) occupation as a national salvation, with Beijing demanding restoration of the border 

on the 38th parallel. Khramchikhin foresees this conflict leading to the end of the North Korean regime, 

huge losses for the Republic of Korea, and serious 

costs in blood, treasure, and prestige for the United 

States. “Only China has any prospect of coming out 

of this war as a victor, but even for it, it would be a 

very risky and costly game.” Khramchikhin makes no 

mention of the consequences for Russia of such a conflict, even though it borders both North Korean and 

the PRC.18

Just a week after Khramchikhin’s article appeared, 

a group of “NATO Elders” charged with developing 

NATO’s new strategic concept visited Moscow. The 

group, headed by former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, stated that they were there to listen. 

In addition to meeting with Foreign Minister Sergei 

Lavrov, Albright also spoke at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations and Institute of International Relations and World Economy. The elders 

did not address the proposal by President Medvedev 

for a new treaty on European security, but they did 

show considerable interest in Russia’s new military 

doctrine and took repeated opportunities to remind 

Russian audiences of the challenge that China posed 

for international stability. The elders pointed out that 

the new Russian military doctrine did not even mention China, while naming NATO’s expansion into 

post-Soviet space as the primary danger for Russian 

security interests. Andrei Terekhov, citing Russian 

specialists, explained these remarks as being a result 

of the increased tensions between Washington and 
18

Beijing after the U.S. announcement of the sale of F16s to Taiwan, and characterized the new relationship 

as a “cold war.”19

The official silence about China’s rise and its implications for Russian national interests has been deafening. Sino-Russian cooperation to counterbalance a 

U.S.-dominated unipolar order made some strategic 

sense when direct tensions between the United States 

and China did not seem to carry a risk of conflict. 

However, Russian observers now see the new tensions as amounting to a “duel” between China and the 

United States for leadership. So far, there was no great 

risk that the two powers would come to blows, but 

it was clear that the two sides were heading towards 

chilly relations, with Beijing responding to the announced F-16 sale by cutting military-to-military contacts and threatening sanctions against the American 

firms involved in the arms sales to Taiwan. Vladimir 

Kuzar’ saw the present tensions as marking the end of 

the mutually advantageous economic partnership between Washington and China, characterized by Niall 

Ferguson as “Chimerica,” as Beijing asserts its regional power and seeks its own solutions to such global issues as Iran and North Korea. He concluded his article 

by warning that the Sino-American duel “can create 

new and dangerous tension in world politics.” But he 

does not address the implications of those dangers for 

Russia’s own security.20

MOSCOW’S PERSPECTIVE ON START III: 

TACTICAL GAMBLE AND STRATEGIC 

CONSEQUENCES 

After intense negotiations and the interventions of 

both President Obama and President Medvedev, Moscow and Washington announced in early 2010 that a 
19

new treaty limiting strategic offensive weapons would 

be signed in April in Prague, replacing the START 

agreement signed in 1991 and which had lapsed in 

December 2009. President Medvedev expressed his 

satisfaction with the pace and outcome of the negotiations: “The draft treaty reflects the balance of interests 

on both sides and . . . though the negotiation process 

was not always easy, the negotiators’ constructive 

mindset made it possible to achieve a tremendous result in a short time and produce a document ready for 

signature.”21 In the Presidential statement describing 

the treaty, the same press release outlined the chief 

features of the treaty, mentioning the limits in deployed warheads and on deployed and nondeployed 

launch vehicles—1,550 deployed nuclear warheads; 

800 deployed and nondeployed intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launchers, sea-launched ballistic 

missiles (SLBMs) launchers, and heavy bombers; and 

a separate limit of 700 deployed ICBMs, deployed 

SLBMs, and deployed heavy bombers equipped for 

nuclear armaments. 

It then added a statement not found in U.S. official 

commentary on the Treaty: “The provisions on the 

interrelation between strategic offensive and strategic 

defensive arms, as well as on the growing significance 

of such interrelation in the process of strategic arms 

reduction, will be set in a legally-binding format.” No 

such statement was contained in the White House’s 

press release on the Treaty, which stated: “The Treaty 

does not contain any constraints on testing, development, or deployment of current or planned U.S. missile defense programs or current or planned United 

States long-range conventional strike capabilities.”22

Moscow press accounts speculated on this difference, 

subjecting it to close examination. 
20

For the last 8 years, the Russian government has 

made clear its objections to the decision of the Bush 

administration to withdraw unilaterally from the 

ABM Treaty of 1972, emphasizing the relationship between strategic offensive and defensive systems. In 

an interview published 2 days before the official announcement of the agreement, Sergei Rogov pointed 

to the disagreement between Washington and Moscow over this relationship between strategic offensive 

and defensive systems and spectulated on whether 

Washington would accept the inclusion of any such 

statement in the treaty:

All previous START documents acknowledged this 

link but that was a link to the erstwhile ABM Treaty. I 

do not think it possible to put any parameters of ABM 

systems into a treaty dealing with strategic offensive 

arms. All the same, Obama did acknowledge this link 

in London last April, so that it might be acknowledged 

in the preamble after all.23

Rogov was suggesting that Moscow would be 

happy with a statement about the relationship without any explicit treaty article defining the technical 

features of their relations. He did point to Obama’s 

decision to forgo the Bush administration’s plans for 

a limited ABM system in Europe and its replacement 

with a theater missile defense system designed to deal 

with intermediate range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) and 

not strategic ballistic missiles. Rogov did not see such 

a system as a threat to strategic stability and noted the 

possibility of U.S.-Russian cooperation in this area. 

As to the overall role of the new treaty in the diplomatic Reset between Moscow and Washington, Rogov 

did not see many signs of deep progress. Russia has 

agreed to a new START because it has to reduce its 
21

own strategic nuclear arsenal, and Washington has 

agreed because the strategic focus of U.S. relations has 

shifted away from Moscow and toward the Pacific and 

China. Rogov expected the United States to continue 

the development of non-nuclear strategic strike systems and the reshaping of its nuclear arsenal toward 

more flexible forces. 

In the wake of the announcement of the agreement, the Russian press focused on the fact that the 

treaty reduced the strategic offensive nuclear arsenals 

of the only two powers possessing such capabilities, 

seeing it as a reaffirmation of Russia’s international 

position as a major power. They praised the verification provisions, which, while being less intrusive and 

costly than those in the original START agreement, 

guaranteed transparency, effectiveness, and increased 

confidence in the process. Finally, the treaty was expected to serve as an example to other nuclear powers 

and support both the letter and spirit of the Nuclear 

Non-Proliferation Treaty and serve as a step toward 

a world without nuclear weapons. The author noted 

that in the declaration by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, he expected speedy legislative approval of the 

treaty: “Following the signing, the treaty will be submitted for ratification without delay. As is expected, 

this will also be done by the American side.” The author, however, did not expect the ratification process 

to be smooth, pointing to the current conflict between 

the two political parties in the U.S. Senate. He anticipated that Republican opposition would be concerned 

about the handling of the issue of the mutual relationship between strategic offensive and defensive systems mentioned in Russian official commentaries and 

the U.S. position that no binding reference to ABM be 

included in the Treaty. The author expected a political 
22

fight on the U.S. side over the content of the Preamble, 

which will declare such a relationship but provide no 

binding technical constraints beyond the terms for termination of the treaty by either party.24 Certainly, the 

claim by Chief of the Russian General Staff General 

Nikolai Makarov, that the treaty language reduced 

mutual concerns and met Russia’s national security interests, seemed to suggest a different interpretation as 

to its political salience and technical ambiguity. “The 

treaty clearly defines the mechanism for the control 

of the entire life cycle of nuclear means, and sets the 

connection between strategic offensive and defensive 

armaments.”25

While the Russian press noted the pledges from 

Senators John Kerry and Richard Lugar, the ranking 

members of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, to begin the ratification process on the treaty immediately following its signing in Prague, the deeper 

issue remained as to whether Lugar could bring with 

him sufficient support from other moderate Republicans to ensure a two-thirds vote for ratification. Given 

the commitment of the Republican Party since Ronald 

Reagan to strategic defense, they expected the Senate 

hearings on the treaty to focus on any hidden agendas 

that would limit U.S. freedom of action in this area. 

While former diplomats and arms control experts 

from both Republican and Democratic administrations 

have endorsed the treaty as a necessary step towards 

the development of the Reset in U.S.-Russian relations 

and toward a global regime to remove nuclear weapons, others have questioned the wisdom of both goals. 

There exists a significant chance that the current bitter 

partisan conflict in Washington will reduce any prospect of a speedy, bipartisan ratification process. Nikolai Snezhkov called attention to the remarks of Repre-
23

sentative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the ranking Republican 

member on the House Committee on Foreign Relations. She cast the issue of ratification in the context of 

the emerging competition between the United States 

and China, asking: “Why limit our military potential 

by a treaty which completely ignores the capability of 

China, which, if it decided to do it, could rapidly develop its own large nuclear arsenal?” She went on to 

promise a detailed review of the treaty’s provisions 

and warned that Republicans would “not permit the 

slightest harm to America’s interests in missile defense.” Snezhkov concluded that the fate of the treaty 

was subject to U.S. partisan politics and the emerging 

nuclear calculus between Beijing and Washington.26

Fedor Lukianov, the editor of Russia in Global Politics, provides a deeper explanation of what he calls 

“the last treaty” from the Cold War era. He notes that 

since the signing of START I, Moscow has sought to 

continue the arms control focus of U.S.-Russian relations as a way of assuring its own international position in the face of economic realities to reduce its 

strategic arsenal. The Bush administration, which declared the Cold War over and then withdrew from the 

ABM Treaty in 2002, saw no reason to continue such 

a regime because it limited U.S. freedom of action as 

the sole superpower. The Obama administration on 

the other hand, in a reassessment of the U.S. global 

position, has made the Reset of relations with Moscow part of its national security strategy. This Reset is 

not between geostrategic equals but between a global 

power and a regional power, where conflicts threatened to undermine the very flexibility that the Bush 

administration had so treasured. Both sides engaged 

in serious negotiations and reached compromise 

solutions. 
24

Lukianov sees the current treaty as part of a larger 

strategy associated with moving toward a nuclear-free 

world, pointing towards the advantages the United 

States would derive from concluding the treaty as it 

moved into the April Nuclear Summit and the May 

conference to review the Nuclear Non-Proliferation 

Treaty. If Russia sees its position as a leading power 

confirmed by the treaty, the United States sees it as a 

tool to shift the focus of nuclear arms reductions to a 

global forum. 

Here, however, Lukianov doubts there will be 

much progress because the driving force shaping the 

nuclear arsenals of other parties is not the U.S.-Russian 

strategic balance, but regional conflicts where nuclear 

weapons permit weaker powers to maintain credible 

deterrence against opponents with stronger conventional forces, as is the case of Pakistan vis-à-vis India. 

Long-range ballistic missiles (LRBMs) are not needed 

for such deterrence, and tactical nuclear disarmament 

raises the risk of an intense conventional arms race, 

including one for Russia when it seeks to secure its 

own territorial integrity in the case of Chinese aggression. In this sense, Lukianov sees the current treaty as 

the end of one era of arms control and the beginning 

of a new and more complex process with global ramifications. So far, he does not foresee the emergence of 

any sort of global security regime that would justify 

trust in its ability to manage regional conflicts. Short 

of the emergence of such a mechanism, the treaty will 

be seen as a tactical political success in Moscow and 

Washington but not a breakthrough in global security.27

Melor Sturua, the U.S. correspondent for Izvestiia, 

focused on the tactical success of the negotiation process and praised Obama and Medvedev for finding 
25

the ways and means to reach workable compromises. 

In the face of each roadblock, the Presidents used personal meetings and phone conversations to find a way 

around it. Although both had heavy domestic agendas 

and other foreign policy concerns, they contributed 

their time and good will to concluding the negotiation 

process. Among the compromises to which Sturua 

draws attention are those associated with Obama’s 

admission of the mutual relationship between offensive and defense strategic weapons systems and the 

problem of a verification regime. Sturua correctly noted that Obama conceded the mutual relationship but 

did not agree to technical language that would resolve 

the issue. 

On the verification regime, Sturua noted the claim 

by Russian negotiators that the concessions made by 

Soviet negotiators in this area in 1991 were both excessive and costly. The result was a compromise in which 

Americans agreed to accept changes in such areas as 

the exchange of telemetric data from missile flights. 

High-level involvement in the negotiation process 

brought about progress towards an agreement because 

both Presidents put a priority on success and were 

willing to engage their opposite number to resolve 

difficulties. As to the significance of the agreement, 

Sturua emphasized the very nature of the process as 

symbolizing the end of one era and the beginning of 

another. “The new agreement is not perfect but the 

fruit of compromise. However, its historical and symbolic significance is huge. It puts an end to the epoch 

of the Cold War of the 20th century and opens a new 

page in the area of disarmament in the 21st century.”28

The problem with this tactical focus on the negotiation process itself is that it ignores the limited significance of the cuts both sides will make. Polina Kh-
26

imshiashvili and Natal’ia Kostenko, noting comments 

by experts on strategic nuclear arms, called the actual 

reductions of offensive strategic arsenals minimal, 

involving no limitations on current plans for military 

modernization.29 Moreover, even before the treaty 

was signed in Prague, concerns about the ratification 

process in Washington were being voiced. 

The signing in Prague put an end to U.S.-Russian 

strategic arms negotiations. It is still unclear whether 

it will deepen the bilateral Reset in relations or open 

what the Obama administration seeks to be the first 

step towards a global nuclear arms reduction regime. 

Moscow understands that it will not be at the center of 

this activity but will become another regional player 

in a complex process. If that process fails, Russia will 

have much to lose because of the geostrategic dynamic of nuclear proliferation in Eurasia. Both Medvedev and Obama have made a tactical deal to serve 

each country’s national interests and both have much 

to fear if the treaty is not ratified and does not bring 

about the desired response by other powers to agree 

to limits on their arsenals. 

In April 2010, Russian Foreign Minister Sergii 

Lavrov put the recently signed START document in 

a global security context, which he saw as increasingly dominated by “interdependence and indivisibility.” He called attention to the preamble to the treaty 

which spoke positively of “the historic goal of freeing humanity from the nuclear threat” and repeated 

President Medvedev’s statement to the Global Zero 

Forum in Paris: “Today our common task consists in 

undertaking everything to make deadly weapons of 

mass destruction to become a thing of the past.”30 At 

the same time, Lavrov depicted a globalized security 

environment wherein the Cold War instruments for 
27

maintaining strategic stability stagnated or corroded. 

The Treaty held out the promise of a new security 

environment. START 2010, as Lavrov referred to the 

agreement, achieved three objectives: “To draw up an 

agreement that would, firstly, ensure Russia’s national security, secondly, make our relations with the U.S. 

more stable and predictable, and thirdly, strengthen 

global strategic security.”31 Lavrov focused upon the 

reaffirmation of international law as applying to all 

conflicts among nations so as to exclude the use of 

force or the threat of the use of force. Lavrov pointed 

to the need for a new security regime, not the abolition 

of nuclear weapons, as the critical first step towards 

greater strategic stability. He also called attention to 

President Medvedev’s proposal for a “comprehensive 

European security treaty” which would provide a security regime for the Euro-Atlantic world extending 

from Vancouver to Vladivostok.32

START 2010 was an important first step in this 

process. It could not be conceived as the final product. It had to be developed within the broad context 

of military security issues, including the systemic 

relations among “strategic nuclear systems, missile 

defense, and conventionally armed strategic weapons 

systems,” an indirect reference to U.S. programs to develop global immediate-strike conventional systems.33

The inclusion of such conventional ICBM and SLBM 

systems before they have become operational was a 

de facto recognition of their potential impact upon the 

strategic nuclear equation. The inability of sensors 

to discriminate between conventional and nuclear 

armed warheads would be a highly destabilizing development.

Taking into account the shift in the Obama administration’s approach to European missile defense, 

with the abandonment of the Bush’s administration’s 
28

deployment program and substitution of Patriot and 

Aegis systems, Lavrov embraced the possibility of a 

multilateral approach involving Russia, the United 

States, and “other states and international organizations.” Lavrov defined the Russian objectives to be the 

creation of an evolving security system: 

Our goal is to create a multilateral security regime, the 

so-called antimissile pool. In practical terms it would 

become a collective system to respond to missile 

threats by countering missile proliferation, preventing 

the existing missile challenges from growing into real 

missile threats, and neutralizing them with priority 

being given to politico-diplomatic and economic measures of impact.34

This effort would have several parallel tracks: 

“joint assessment of existing and potential challenges,” a system of collective monitoring measures 

permitting “prompt and effective response,” and the 

formulation of “rules of the game” in the sphere of 

missile defense.35 He did not speak of a timetable for 

these measures but clearly saw progress in this area 

as a high priority for Russian diplomacy, since success would ensure the stability of START 2010 from 

the Russian perspective.

Finally, Lavrov addressed the issue of tactical/

nonstrategic nuclear weapons, accepting the topic as 

a logical one following the ratification of the START 

2010. But Lavrov did not limit such discussions to 

bilateral conversations or to Europe. Instead, he proposed the establishment and expansion of nuclearfree zones as one of the most promising ways to move 

toward Global Zero. He emphasized the cuts made 

in the Russian tactical/nonstrategic nuclear arsenal 

since 1991 and pointed out that these cuts had been 
29

made on a unilateral basis. “Presently, Russia’s nonstrategic nuclear capability is not more than 25% of 

the Soviet capability in 1991.”36 Follow-on progress 

would depend upon a shift from a balance based on 

deterrence and fear to one based upon “the power of 

our trust in one another.” This would require “a harmonious combination of cooperation, based on trust, 

and legal checks and balances, based on the global 

security matrix.” This matrix would not be built on a 

unipolar or bipolar order but a mulitpolar system, in 

which Russia would play a key role in Eurasia.

Russian commentators and experts provided intellectual support for Medvedev’s position and laid out 

their case against Global Zero. In July 2010 Karaganov 

issued an extended critique of Global Zero. However 

noble the sentiments that stimulated the effort, he 

labeled its objective as utopian and dangerous. Beginning with a review of trends reshaping the international environment, Karaganov depicted a system 

that is in flux and inherently unstable. The sources of 

potential conflict are increasing as the center of the 

world economy is shifting to the East. At best, nuclear 

proliferation will be managed and not stopped, and 

the sources of international conflict are increasing, 

not diminishing. In this context, Global Zero has no 

chance of success and can, in fact, increase the risks of 

conflicts:

I believe this movement makes no sense. Nobody is 

going to give up nuclear weapons. Nor is it feasible—

technically or politically. One might close the issue 

by offering a proof of this stance. But I must say that 

the anti-nuclear movement is harmful. Firstly, it may 

result in the reduction of nuclear armaments to a dangerous minimum, as it opens the Pandora’s Box of negotiations over the reduction of non-strategic nuclear 

armaments. Secondly, it distracts from the search for 
30

new ways of setting peace and stability in the new 

world.37

Karaganov did not go on to explain what he meant 

by “opening the Pandora’s Box of non-strategic nuclear armaments reductions,” but he did point to a 

conspicuous decline in enthusiasm for Global Zero 

among the American foreign policy elite, who were 

now focused on nuclear modernization and remained 

committed to a system of ballistic missile defense 

against so-called rogue states. Karaganov described 

the current environment as one of both “increasing 

political instability and, worse, a tumult of minds.” 

The increased risks were very close to the instability 

in the international system prior to World War I and 

could even be considered “a theoretically pre-war situation,” which, however, is still held in check by the 

existing U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals.38

The existence of the U.S.-Russian nuclear arsenals, 

when supplemented by the Chinese, French, and British nuclear forces, simply makes general war too risky 

for any power. Karaganov sees China as a particular 

beneficiary of this situation since its own nuclear arsenal made impossible a military challenge to China’s 

emerging political-economic power: 

One can hardly conceive China’s skyrocketing economic upturn if there had been no Russian-U.S. nuclear parity in the world, which makes any full-blown 

war inadmissible due to the possibility of its escalation. I will remind that big-time players have been 

suppressing China’s development militarily for about 

150 years. At present, this kind of policy appears unthinkable.39
31

Nuclear weapons to Karaganov become that force 

which Goethe uses to describe Mephistopheles in 

Faustus and which Bulgakov cited at the beginning 

of Master and Margarita: “ I am part of that power 

which eternally wills evil and eternally works good.” 

The immorality of nuclear weapons is unquestioned, 

but their power imposes restraint upon the actions of 

princes by holding out the prospect of Armageddon. 

“They are an effective means of preventing large-scale 

wars and mass destruction of people—something that 

humanity has engaged in throughout its history with 

surprising perseverance, destroying peoples, countries, and cultures.”40

Humanity has not yet created any other means to 

prevent such general wars, and so Karaganov sees 

nuclear weapons as the only existing check on such 

destruction. “The world has survived only thanks 

to the nuclear sword of Damocles hanging over it.” 

Karaganov’s interpretation of the international system during the Cold War identifies nuclear deterrence 

as the chief factor that limited conflict and prevented 

a general war. The nuclear arsenals of the two superpowers had what he calls a “civilizing effect” because 

it strengthened the hands of pragmatists set on avoiding nuclear war and cautious of allowing local wars to 

turn into major conflicts with their risks of escalation. 

He doubts that the new nuclear powers will be willing to give up their arsenals without a fundamental 

shift in what he calls the “moral environment,” which 

he does see as forthcoming. Moreover, in looking at 

the decades since the end of the Cold War, Karaganov 

sees a dangerous transition in NATO from a defensive 

alliance into an instrument for out-of-area intervention. In the context of Russian weakness, NATO intervened against Yugoslavia in 1999 over Kosovo. But 
32

with Russia’s recovery, such a course of action is now 

unlikely. “Now that Russia has restored its capability, such a move would be unthinkable.”41 Instead, 

NATO is now involved in more distant out-of-area 

operations, which carry their own risks of escalation.

Against what Karaganov labels as “antinuclear 

mythology,” he posits a hard-headed realism which 

rejects the ideas that nuclear arms reductions by the 

major powers will convince lesser powers to give up 

their nuclear arms, or convince other states threatened 

by outside powers or internal instability to give up 

nuclear weapons. Such arrangements might be in the 

interests of the two powers but cannot be justified by 

some supposed state of moral transcendence. States 

must act in their own interests in the absence of an 

international regime preventing the intervention of 

other powers. Libya’s giving up the goal of nuclear 

weapons after the U.S.-led coalition’s campaign 

against Iraq did not protect that state from external intervention into what was a civil war. The presence of 

nuclear weapons imposes restraint. It did so upon the 

Soviet Union when it possessed conventional superiority in Europe during the Cold War. In the post-Cold 

War period, it has been the compensation for Russia’s 

weakness in conventional forces in the west and east.

Were it not for the powerful nuclear (especially tactical) armaments, many in Russia would be alarmed 

over the growing potential of the Chinese general-purpose armed forces, and the specifics of certain military 

exercises whose scenarios include offensives stretching to hundreds and even more than one thousand 

kilometers.42

What Karaganov describes here is the geostrategic concept underlining Russia’s current position in 
33

Eurasia. On the one hand, Russian strategic nuclear 

weapons deter the United States and NATO from adventures at Russia’s expense and provide China with 

an element of security that permits it to play the role 

of economic engine of Asia without the risk of American military intervention against it. At the same time, 

Russia’s tactical nuclear weapons deter China from 

intervention in the Russian Far East and Siberia. This 

view certainly can be seen as providing Russia with 

some immediate security and even some leverage on 

its periphery. But it does not deal with a future where 

nuclear weapons might lose their deterrent capability 

in the face of more advanced conventional weapons, 

which was the prospect that Nikolai Spassky mentioned in June 2009.

Karaganov ended his essay with a distinctly Russian perspective on Global Zero, which he labeled a 

myth and a harmful one at that, which could unleash 

the dogs of war. Russia experienced two utopian visions in the 20th century. The first came with the 

Bolshevik Revolution and the promise of building 

worldwide socialism; the second occurred in 1991 

with the impulse to dismantle the Soviet Union and 

replace it overnight with a democratic, capitalist Russia. Both dreams had tragic consequences. Contemporary Russians will not be swayed by the idealism of 

Global Zero. Russia can and will pursue arms control 

agreements that serve its national interests by making “the situation in this field more transparent, and 

also by building confidence between the great powers 

and their ability to work together.” Karaganov rejects 

Global Zero and proposes another avenue: “To launch 

an international discussion about the role of military 

force, including nuclear weapons, in the contemporary world.” Such a discussion might just conclude 

that nuclear weapons did have a civilizing purpose.43
34

Such sentiments did not preclude support for 

START III, which was waiting for ratification by both 

states’ legislative bodies, but it did mean that there 

was a fundamental disconnect over where arms control and bilateral relations would go after ratification. 

On April 23, 2010, Karaganov endorsed ratification 

of START as a bilateral agreement, while restating 

his opposition to any multilateral move towards a 

nuclear-free world. “Work on the document and its 

signing normalized bilateral relations and made continuation of bilateral interaction and rapprochement 

all the more probable.”44 The treaty would lead to the 

dismantling of “surplus weapons,” with the strategic 

offensive nuclear arsenals of both powers being reduced by one third. “Ratification of the document by 

the U.S. Senate and the Russian Federal Assembly will 

make the situation somewhat more stable.”45 Russia 

got what it could get from the negotiation. It did not 

make any progress towards a European Security Treaty, which President Medvedev had proposed in 2008. 

Washington did agree to use its influence to support 

the concept. Nor was there any meaningful progress 

made on the issue of European missile defense. Nor 

was there any movement in limiting U.S. efforts to develop conventional strategic strike systems. Progress 

in those areas was simply precluded by the existing 

political balance in the U.S. Senate.46

Karaganov even spoke positively of the followon nuclear summit in Washington as a valuable step 

towards limiting nuclear proliferation, which was, 

because of Russia’s geostrategic location, a matter of 

utmost importance. But Karaganov painted a picture 

of proliferation which was already under way, and 

spoke of a need to control the process. In a dynamic 

international situation, Karaganov sees an absence of 
35

new concepts for a strategic order. The Obama administration’s fixation on Global Zero was a manifestation 

of a failure of political logic. No nuclear power was 

likely to give up its arsenal. Russia could support efforts to reinforce nonproliferation and take part in the 

struggle against nuclear terrorism. But Global Zero 

was not part of the solution to current geostrategic 

instability. Indeed, pursuing it was likely to increase 

that instability. Karaganov went on to explain:

The Nuclear Zero concept is an anachronism. No 

owner of nuclear weapons will ever part with them. It 

is a sheer impossibility, technically and politically. In 

the meantime, this anti-nuclear movement is actually 

harmful. First, it might result in reduction of nuclear 

arsenals to a dangerously low level and in negotiations 

over reduction of nonstrategic nuclear weapons. Second, it distracts the international community from the 

search for new ways to ensure peace and stability.47

Karaganov returned to his assumption about the 

amorality of nuclear weapons and repeated the point 

that their very destructive power made them instruments which deterred and prevented wars. The fear of 

mass destruction had inhibited actors during the Cold 

War. Since its end, NATO and the United States have 

shown a continuing willingness to intervene militarily 

in out-of-area conflicts, which increases international 

instability. Russia’s geostrategic location, potentially 

near such conflicts, carries serious risks:

Geopolitically, Russia is in trouble. Its modernization 

is impaired by corruption and wishes on the part of 

the population and the elites to be given some time 

to recover from niceties of the Soviet era. The situation being what it is, elimination of nuclear arsenals is 

tantamount to suicide. After all, nuclear arsenals are 
36

the main guarantee of Russia’s security and the main 

source of its political and even economic positions in 

the world.48

And it was this profound asymmetry that undercut 

U.S.-Russian cooperation in seeking Global Zero. The 

United States wants to return to a time before the first 

Soviet atomic bomb test on August 29, 1949. America 

in a world of Global Zero hopes it would achieve invulnerability, even after the interconnectedness of the 

global order had demonstrated its inherent vulnerability on 9/11. Russia, in all its manifestations and 

with all its territorial extent, has never adopted a myth 

of national invulnerability. The last 2 decades have 

left Karaganov responding to a very different imperative: the need for international discourse regarding an 

emerging international order which will be very different from what we have experienced, and regarding 

the role which all forms of military power will play in 

that order to enhance stability. 

Rejecting Global Zero while promoting the ratification of START III, left Russian analysts with the 

immediate problem of enhancing strategic stability in 

the increasingly complex international environment 

in which Russia found itself. The discussions that followed in 2010 and 2011 focused on maintaining nuclear deterrence as the prospects of NATO-Russian cooperation on a joint missile defense system declined. 

More and more, Russia came to focus on the role of its 

entire nuclear arsenal in the absence of a program of 

modernization of conventional forces. Andrei Kokoshin, former First Deputy Minister of Defense, former 

head of the Defense Council, former head of the Security Council, and member of the state Duma, took 

the opportunity to emphasize the real origins of Rus-
37

sia’s deterrence capabilities, not the testing of the first 

atomic bomb in 1949, but the detonation of RDS-57, 

the Soviet Union’s first thermonuclear weapon, in November 1955. Marking the 55th anniversary of the testing of that device with a yield of 1.6 megatons, Kokoshin stated: “Systems and means of nuclear deterrence 

for the foreseeable future will remain the keystone of 

our security.”49 Kokoshin went on to mention the 

pride he felt regarding his efforts within the Russian 

Ministry of Defense and national security apparatus 

to ensure the modernization of Russia’s nuclear forces 

in the 1990s. Furthermore, he observed that there appeared to be no alternative to nuclear deterrence even 

in the distant future. Russia would have to maintain 

its nuclear triad.50

Speaking to a meeting of the Social Science section of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow 

in June 2011, Kokoshin drew upon materials from 

his 2009 study of Strategic Stability, Past and Present to 

call for the integration of experts from various backgrounds in the study of problems of national security, 

especially the problem of a reliable and convincing 

nuclear deterrent. Outlining foreign experience in this 

area, Kokoshin called for cooperation among scholars 

and experts in the various scientific, technical, political, and strategic aspects of the problem. Such an approach would be necessary to ensure a reliable nuclear 

deterrent and global and regional strategic stability. 

The objective of this effort would be to develop an 

asymmetric and indestructible response even in case 

the United States went ahead with a global missile defense system and sought to achieve a breakthrough in 

the development of offensive armaments.51
38

CONTEMPORARY THREATS AND NUCLEAR 

WEAPONS: THE RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE— 

CONTINENTAL, GLOBAL, AND REGIONAL

Russia is a continental power with enormous natural resources but declining technological capabilities 

and a serious demographic crisis that is most serious 

in its Far Eastern domains between Chita and Vladivostok. Its threat environment is largely defined by 

its own periphery and the instability associated with 

the collapse of the USSR and the emergence there of 

states that are weak or hostile to the Russian Federation. It has sought to compensate for its relative 

weakness by geopolitical engagement across Eurasia 

through arrangements like the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the NATO-Russia Charter, the 

Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), and the 

BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) 

colloquium, the latter having held a summit in April 

2011 in Senya in Hainan, China.52 Russia has pursued 

strategic arms reductions with the United States and 

cooperates in nonproliferation efforts. As Nikolai Zlobin has recently pointed out, however, the current international system is deeply unstable. 

Russia’s elite sees very low risk of an intentional 

use of a core strategic arsenal against Russia—deterrence at the bilateral U.S.-Russian level still works 

with regard to 5th generation warfare (nuclear), offensive systems still have a sufficiently high level of 

survivability to ensure deterrence against a marginal 

ABM system, while Russia pushes its own ABM development in the S-500 which is supposed to enter 

the prototype stage in 2012.53 Russia is in the process 

of rearming its triad with more advanced systems—
39

achieving great progress in surface-to-surface (S-to-S) 

ICBMS (Topol [SS-25], Topol-M [SS-27], and RS-24 

Yars missiles), but encountering serious delays in development of the SLBM solid-fuel system RSM-56 (Bulava) for Borea-class ballistic missile submarine (SSBN). 

Additionally, it has announced plans for a stealth-like 

manned bomber (PAK DA) for deployment by 2025. 

The Russian Navy is pursuing the acquisition of a 

new, liquid-fueled SLBM, which is supposed to be capable of carrying 10-15 warheads. “Liner,” which was 

first test-fired in May 2011, was originally reported to 

be a modernized “Sineva,” but shortly thereafter press 

reports confirmed it was a new heavy, liquid-fueled 

SLBM that was twice as powerful as the solid-fueled 

Bulava.54

Aleksandr’ Khramchikhin discussed the development of this new missile as part of an ongoing competition between solid-fuel and liquid-fuel missile 

design bureaus and warned of the destabilizing consequences of pursuing this line of development under 

START III, since it would feed the paranoia between 

Russia and the West.55 These systems are expected to 

be able to penetrate even more advanced ABM systems.56 Aleksei Arbatov has written critically about 

the risks of pursuing heavy, liquid-fueled ICBMs with 

multiple warheads and based in silos under START 

III because of its impact on the development of U.S. 

missile defense and strategic nuclear forces, but he did 

not examine the implications of a submarine-launched 

heavy missile fitted to the existing Delta-class SSBNs.57

Arbatov’s point, however, remains valid. Nuclear 

Reset depends upon the enhancement of strategic 

stability and the avoidance of moves that look like efforts to achieve a strategic first-strike potential with 

nuclear or precision-conventional weapons. Strategic 
40

precision-strike systems are, however, still under development. They include U.S. prompt global strike 

capabilities based on conventional warheads for an 

ICBM/SLBM or an advanced hypersonic cruise missile. Senator Kerry’s report on the START III Treaty 

discussed Russian concerns about strategic conventional precision strikes as manifest in the Treaty’s 

preamble, “Mindful of the impact of conventionally 

armed ICBMs and SLBMs on strategic stability, . . .” 

and included a statement on Russian concerns about 

strategic stability in case of the deployment of large 

numbers of such systems and assurances from U.S. 

officials that such a program was only under development, would not be aimed at Russia, and would not 

affect strategic stability for the duration of the treaty 

to 2020.58

There do exist, however, usable conventional 

capabilities that can be applied in local conflicts to 

achieve operational-strategic results via revolution in 

military affairs (RMA)-based, precision-strike forces 

via no-contact warfare or warfare of the 6th generation. Kosovo served as a case study with variations 

in Afghanistan, Iraq (initial campaigns), and most

recently Libya, where effects-based operations and 

network-centric warfare are applied to achieve rapid 

decision. Russian conventional weakness makes this 

point of paramount importance and is currently driving renewed effort at military reform, or New look 

(Novyi Oblik), under Minister Serdiukov and Chief of 

the General Staff Makarov. This New Look emerged 

after the Georgian-Soviet conflict of August 2008 over 

South Ossetia and Abkhazia that has been called “The 

Tanks of August,” suggesting the 4th generation of 

warfare character (mass-mechanized forces) of that 

conflict.59 Makarov and Serdiukov are pushing for a 
41

brigade-based professional force capable of networkcentric warfare to be developed over the next decade. 

It is unclear whether this will be achieved. Growing 

recognition of low-end asymmetric counters by insurgents-terrorists to 5th generation warfare has led to 

discussions of a new look at the relationship between 

terrorism, insurgency, and conflict escalation.60 The 

lesson in the case of out-of-area intervention by Western powers with advanced conventional capabilities 

(6th generation warfare) is that nuclear weapons are 

the most reliable check against them. This led Aleksei 

Bogaturov in 2009 to observe that while prospects for 

nuclear war with the United States are low, the chances of the use of nuclear weapons are higher: 

The likelihood of a nuclear war with the U.S. is estimated, by and large, as fairly low, while the likelihood 

of the use of nuclear weapons by various countries 

of the world, including the United States and, probably, Russia itself, is now higher than 15-17 years ago. 

Admittedly, what is implied is a limited use of such 

weapons.61

Bogaturov specifically mentioned a new generation of low-yield nuclear weapons playing a role in 

such operations. Limited nuclear first strikes with 

nonstrategic forces as a means of de-escalating local 

wars have been acknowledged as part of Russia’s deterrence posture where Russian and allied interests or 

Russian statehood are threatened. The Russian Military 

Doctrine of 2010 stated that nuclear weapons would be 

used: “In reply to the use of nuclear and other mass 

destruction weapons against it and (or) its allies, as 

well as in reply to a large-scale aggression with the 

use of conventional weapons in situations critical for 

the national security of the Russian Federation.”62
42

These threats are seen as lying on the Russian periphery and are connected to instability in the near 

abroad and NATO expansion. Strategic exercises with 

an anti-NATO focus since Kosovo (Zapad 1999 to Zapad 2009) have emphasized Russia’s limited conventional force capabilities and a nuclear option of first 

use to de-escalate an intervention on the periphery. 

Russian military and political specialists treat Operation ALLIED FORCE (the air campaign against Yugoslavia) as a miscalculation by Allied leaders on the 

feasibility of a short, decisive air campaign to achieve 

decision without the combat employment of ground 

forces, which carried grave risks of escalation into a 

wider conflict. The Russians foresaw the same problem with the decision to impose a no-fly zone over 

Libya and the employment of air power to protect the 

civilian population. President Medvedev responded 

to Security Council Resolution 1973 by urging the 

international community to cooperate in ending the 

conflict, but stated: “We will not participate in any of 

the no-fly zone operations [in Libya], we will not send 

any troops, if, God forbid, this operation goes on the 

ground, which I cannot rule out.”63

China represents an ambiguity in the nuclear 

equation. The best case is China as a regional power 

with the capacity to organize a zone of influence in the 

Far East to counterbalance U.S.-Japanese interests, in 

which China seeks Russian support as giving it strategic depth. The SCO as both anti-Islamic terror and 

anti-hegemon policy serves this purpose. Ideally, this 

would involve collaboration of the Russian Federation, China, and India. Russia needs Indian support 

to avoid the trap of serving as junior partner to China 

in the case of a Sino-U.S. conflict, where Russia would 

be drawn in. It sees a Sino-Indian conflict as detri-
43

mental to Russian interests. Worst cases are a SinoAmerican deal at Russia’s expense, where China can 

effectively penetrate and woo away the Russian Far 

East to Lake Baikal in a deal over spheres of influence; 

and a Sino-American confrontation over the integration of Taiwan into the PRC, where the United States 

would be forced to use nuclear weapons. Moreover, 

an American policy to contain China as a rival, given 

the shifting balance of economic power, could create 

an even greater role for nuclear weapons with associated risks of conflict and Russia being drawn in as a 

pawn between the two rivals. 

The Russian military assessment of China’s military potential has stressed the evolutionary nature of 

that transformation. In this analysis, the Chinese mass 

military has been modernized but is far from becoming a 6th generation force. Therefore, 5th generation 

capability trumps 4th generation numbers, so long as 

China is not a geostrategic partner of the United States 

as existed in the 1980s. Russia’s fear is that Chinese 

military modernization will reach a plateau where 

Russian arms and technology assistance will no longer be needed for sustained modernization.64 Russian 

arms deals with India have taken on the character of a 

bet against such a development. The Sukhoi aircraft 

plant at Komsomolsk-an-Amure is morphing from 

producer of aircraft (SU-27M) for the PRC to partner 

with Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) in the development of the 5th generation fighter (FGFA/PAK 

FA), which began taxi tests in January 2012. Vostok 

2010 was a major exercise testing the New Look for 

Russia’s conventional forces, but it ended with a simulated nuclear first-strike.65

This is supposed to be the exact focus of 

Vostok-2010.66 The New Look military which the Min-
44

istry of Defense has set out to create via a brigadebased ground force capable of launching precision 

strikes and conducting network-centric warfare faces 

a particular challenge in Siberia and the Far East, 

where Chinese military modernization has converted 

the PLA from a mass industrial army built to fight people’s war to a force seeking to rearm as an advanced 

conventional force and able to conduct its own version of network-centric warfare. Until 2010, informed 

Russian defense journalists still spoke of the PLA as a 

mass industrial army seeking niche advanced conventional capabilities. Looking at the threat environment 

that was assumed to exist under Zapad 2009, defense 

journalist Dmitri Litovkin spoke of Russian forces 

confronting three distinct types of military threats: 

[In the West] an opponent armed to NATO standards 

in the Georgian-Russian confrontation over South 

Ossetia last year. In the eastern strategic direction, 

Russian forces would likely face a multi-million-man 

army with a traditional approach to the conduct of 

combat: linear deployments with large concentrations 

of manpower and fire power on different axes. In the 

southern strategic direction Russian forces expect to 

confront irregular forces and sabotage groups fighting 

a partisan war against “the organs of Federal authority,” i.e., Internal troops, the border patrol, and the 

FSB.67 

By the spring of 2011, a number of those involved 

in bringing about the New Look were speaking of a 

PLA that was moving rapidly towards a high-tech 

conventional force with its own understanding of network-centric warfare.68 Moreover, the PLA conducted 

a major exercise, “Stride-2009,” which looked like a rehearsal for military intervention against Central Asia 
45

and/or Russia to some Russian observers. PLA units 

engaged in strategic-operational redeployments of 

units from Shenyang, Lanzhou, Jinan, and Guangzhou 

military commands by air and rail movement.69 Aleksandr’ Khramchikhin in the fall of 2009 warned that 

China and its military were well on the way to becoming a real military superpower combining numbers 

and advanced technology. The PLA no longer needed 

to go hat-in-hand to the Russian defense industry for 

advanced weapons but was set upon building its own 

in partnership with other powers. Looking at the geostrategic situation in the Far East and Central Asia, he 

warned:

I repeat once more: it is possible to assert that the 

leadership of the PRC and the PLA high-command are 

seriously considering the possibility of conducting in 

the foreseeable future offensive actions against Russia 

and the states of Central Asia. To some degree, precisely such a scenario of war is considered the most 

probable. At the same time, operations for the forceful 

seizure of Taiwan have been removed from the order 

of the day.70

Speaking of Russia’s deployment of two newlyorganized brigades along the Russian-Chinese border 

on the Irkutsk-Chita axis, Lieutenant-General Vladimir Valentinovich Chirkin, the recently appointed 

commander of the Siberian Military District, stated 

that the brigades were deployed there to counter the 

presence of five PLA combined arms armies across the 

border. From 2003 to 2007, Chirkin commanded an 

army in the Siberian Military District. On the rationale 

for the deployment, Chirkin stated: “We are obligated 

to keep troops there because on the other side of the 

border are five Chinese armies and we cannot ignore 
46

that operational direction.” He added that the Ministry of Defense intended to develop an army headquarters for command and control of the brigades.71

In a related report, Chirkin described the PLA forces 

across the border as composed of three divisions and 

10 tank, mechanized, and infantry brigades, which he 

described as not little but also “not a strike force.” As 

to the role of the new Russian brigades, Chirkin described them as part of a deterrent force aimed as a 

friendly reminder to the PRC: “Despite the friendly 

relations with China our army command understands 

that friendship is possible only with strong countries, 

that is, [those] who can quiet a friend down with a 

conventional or nuclear club.”72

The gamble on the nature of future war described 

by A. Kondrat’ev in supporting the development of 

network-centric warfare capabilities comes down to 

the issue of Russia’s capacity to arm, create, train, deploy, and maintain in combat readiness forces capable 

of conducting advanced conventional warfare. In the 

absence of such forces, the deterrence equation is reduced to the credibility of the nuclear option in deterring conventional attacks. Given the economic and 

demographic realities of Siberia and the Russian Far 

East, Russia seeks by nonmilitary means to preclude 

the emergence of a Chinese military threat. However, 

Russian observers are also aware of the fact that an imminent military threat from Beijing can emerge from 

regional instability which is beyond Russia’s unilateral means to control. As the most recent Russian Military Doctrine of 2010 explains, nuclear weapons remain 

the primary instrument of deterrence against both 

nuclear and conventional attacks upon Russia and in 

defense of Russian interests, territorial integrity, and 

sovereignty.73 The doctrine does not explicitly declare 
47

that Russia will use nuclear weapons in preemptive 

attacks against such threats, as had been discussed by 

senior members of the Security Council in the fall of 

2009, but it leaves the decision to use such weapons in 

the hands of the President of the Russian Federation. 

The context of such use, however, is defined by the 

nature of the challenges and threats that Russia faces 

across Eurasia. A second classified document, The 

Foundations of State Policy in the Area of Nuclear Deterrence to 2020, which was issued at the same time as the 

Military Doctrine, has been leaked in part to the mass 

media. These parts describe two types of threats that 

could lead to the use of nuclear weapons: 1) attacks 

upon vital economic and political structures, early 

warning systems, national command and control, and 

nuclear weapons systems, all of which would seem 

to envision a U.S.-led NATO threat involving conventional forces capable of conducting global strikes 

against such targets; and, 2) an invasion by an enemy’s ground units of Russian territory in which Russia’s armed forces fail to stop their progress deep into 

the country through conventional means, all of which 

suggests more closely an assault by the PLA against 

the Russian Far East.74

The first conceptual threat resembles one popularized by General-Major Vladimir Slipchenko in his 

discussions of 6th generation warfare and no-contact 

warfare on the model of NATO’s campaign against 

Kosovo but applied on a global scale.75 The second 

one, which was not contained in the 2000 version of 

Russian military doctrine, is quite new, reflecting 

what the Russian military recognizes is an emerging 

threat from the PRC. Relying upon nuclear deterrence 

in such a conflict with China is not considered by 

some Russian military observers to be a viable course 
48

of action. Khramchikhin has expressed this view in a 

debate with Aleksei Arbatov, one of Russia’s most respected commentators on nuclear issues and a strong 

believer in the continued utility of nuclear deterrence 

even in the face of the spread of advanced conventional capabilities. Khramchikhin’s answer has been to 

call nuclear deterrence an illusion. The illusion arises 

from Russia’s general weakness in conventional forces, its limited mobility in supporting forces in distant 

frontiers, and the inappropriateness of nuclear strikes 

for resolving limited conflicts over border issues. Advanced conventional capabilities will soon make possible global conventional strikes with the effects of 

nuclear weapons. In the case of China, Khramchikhin 

argues that there is a great need to protect Siberia and 

the Far East as key sources of critical raw materials 

and energy for the future development of the country, 

but demographic weakness, obsolete infrastructure, 

and weak conventional forces make that task nearly 

impossible, with nuclear deterrence in this context 

a shallow hope. Khramchikhin leaves one with the 

impression that the situation confronting Russia in 

the Far East is not too different from that confronting 

Pakistan, given India’s development of advanced conventional capabilities to strike towards Islamabad. In 

neither case does nuclear retaliation become a solution 

for confronting slowly mobilizing conventional forces 

in the hands of a more developed and more populous 

opponent.76

All these strictly military calculations cannot deal 

with the full dynamic of threats confronting Russia. The wild card in the nuclear environment is the 

threat of what Andrei Kokoshin identified as megaterrorism, the mass casualties and destruction from 

terrorist actions like that of 9/11 which could drive 
49

political-military responses in directions not foreseen 

by political-military planners.77 Kokoshin includes 

weapons of mass effect (WME) as well as weapons 

of mass destruction (WMD) in this calculus. Russia 

will collaborate in regional efforts to reduce terrorist threats and retain Russian influence. It has good 

reason to see nuclear proliferation as dangerous to 

Russia’s own strategic situation and to the current 

international system and will cooperate in endeavors 

to reduce such risks so long as they do not result in 

the use of force, which would further destabilize the 

global system and regional security structures. Mega-terrorism poses a particularly major risk in the relationship between Pakistan and India. Such an event 

could set off a conflict that would be difficult for the 

international community to moderate and could drive 

external intervention and a concomitant risk of nuclear escalation. 

Iran represents a particularly difficult problem because of its involvement in supporting anti-Israeli terrorism, Israeli fears of Iranian acquisition of nuclear 

weapons, and the deployment of U.S. and coalition 

forces in both Iraq and Afghanistan, which could 

transform any limited strikes against Iranian nuclear 

facilities into a larger regional conflict on Russia’s 

periphery, thus impacting the Caucasus and Central 

Asia and giving new momentum to Islamic extremism globally. At present, as we watch the unfolding of 

the “Arab Revolutions” across North Africa and the 

Middle East, this particular problem has to be reassessed. Commenting on the United Nations (UN) Security Council resolution for the imposition of a no-fly 

zone against Libya, some Russian commentators have 

wondered whether Muammar Gaddafi’s decision to 

give up Libya’s chemical and nuclear weapons pro-
50

grams in December 2003 was not short-sighted, pointing to the fact that North Korea has openly tested 

nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles and engaged 

in repeated provocations against South Korea without 

facing any use of force against it. Mikhail Lukanin, the 

defense correspondent for Trud, stated flatly: “They 

would not have touched Gaddafi if he had built an 

atomic bomb.” Lukanin listed other states which 

might be tempted to acquire nuclear weapons in the 

aftermath of the Arab Revolution and included Saudi 

Arabia because of the changes in the balance of power 

in the Middle East and the enhanced position of Iran.78

In April 2011 in the midst of the initial response to 

NATO intervention in Libya, the Russian press published an extended examination of the possible course 

and outcome of an Israeli-Iranian War. Drawing heavily upon the 2009 study by the Center for Strategic and 

International Studies in Washington, DC, regarding 

an Israeli preemptive strike at Iran’s nuclear program, 

the author invited Russian specialists to comment on 

the course and outcome of such a possible conflict. 

The estimated losses by both sides from missile attacks using nuclear and chemical weapons stood at 20 

million Iranian casualties and 800,000 Israeli casualties. The Russian experts did not exclude the possibility of a more protracted conflict, in which both sides 

employed indirect means and surrogate forces, which 

they viewed as a possibility if Iran did create its own 

nuclear forces. They noted the paradox of self-deterrence, when both sides have nuclear arsenals. “The 

creation of nuclear weapons by Iran could actually be 

a positive development. When both countries possess 

them, this creates a powerful deterrence factor and 

most likely the leaders of both Israel and Iran could be 

deterred from a direct military conflict.”79
51

 The implications of increased nuclear proliferation 

for Russian national security will be a topic of intense 

debate among the Russian national security elite. It is 

very likely to color the Russian approach to negotiations on reductions in, and confidence-building measures pertaining to, nonstrategic nuclear weapons. The 

last few months have not lent much hope of bilateral 

or multilateral progress on arms control in the areas 

of missile defense, nonstrategic nuclear weapons, or 

conventional forces in Europe. The very complexity 

and interconnections of these issues makes progress 

very unlikely. 

CURRENT U.S.-RUSSIAN DISCUSSIONS ON 

NONSTRATEGIC NUCLEAR WEAPONS AND 

MISSILE DEFENSES AS SEEN FROM MOSCOW

With the ratification of START III by the U.S. Congress and the Russian parliament, nonstrategic nuclear weapons became a topic of intense discussions between Washington and Moscow. Rose Gottemoeller, 

Assistant Secretary of State for Verification, Compliance, and Implementation, stated in January 2011 that 

the topic was now on the agenda of U.S.-Russian relations and pointed to studies by nongovernmental 

groups in the United States and Russia that addressed 

the topic.80

Governmental groups, notably NATO member 

governments, have come forward with their own proposals regarding U.S. and Russian nonstrategic nuclear weapons in Europe. In early February 2011, Lithuanian Defense Minister Rasa Jukneviciene announced 

that Russia had deployed tactical nuclear weapons in 

Kaliningrad Oblast’ and called upon “the world powers” to begin negotiations to ensure their removal. 
52

Jukneviciene said that Lithuanian national interests 

demanded the removal of such weapons since they 

posed a threat to “our very existence.”81 Recently, 

the Four-Plus-Six Group put forward a proposal by 

NATO members to increase transparency in U.S. and 

Russia nonstrategic nuclear weapons, which was submitted in a “so-called ‘nonpaper’“ by Germany, the 

Netherlands, Norway, and Poland, and endorsed by 

Belgium, the Czech Republic, Iceland, Luxembourg, 

and Slovenia, and which highlights this difference 

among NATO members. The proposal outlines a series of transparency and confidence-building measures, which include: 

1) Use the NATO-Russia Council (NRC) as the primary 

framework for transparency and confidence-building 

efforts concerning tactical nuclear weapons in Europe; 

2) Exchange information about U.S. and Russian tactical nuclear weapons, including numbers, locations, 

operational status, and command arrangements, as 

well as level of warhead storage security; 3) Agree on a 

standard reporting formula for tactical nuclear weapons inventories; 4) Consider voluntary notifications of 

movement of tactical nuclear weapons; 5) Exchange 

visits by military officials [presumably to storage locations]; 6) Exchange conditions and requirements for 

gradual reductions of tactical nuclear weapons in Europe, including clarifying the number of weapons that 

have been eliminated and/or stored as a result of the 

1991-1992 Presidential Nuclear Initiatives (PNIs); and, 

7) Hold a NRC seminar on tactical nuclear weapons in 

the first quarter of 2012 in Poland.82

It is noteworthy that this proposal did not include 

among its sponsors or supporters either of the two 

other NATO members with nuclear weapons, Britain, 

and France, or the three Baltic States.
53

A deal over a joint missile defense system might 

have provided a basis for such a choice but a joint 

NATO-Russia system is not in the cards. In a recent 

interview in Moscow, Assistant Secretary of Defense 

Alexander Vershbow spoke of a solution for the problem of missile defense involving two separate but parallel missile defense systems, which would coordinate 

their work, rather than a common system.83 He also 

held out the possibility of creating two structures for 

missile defense cooperation. One would be a center 

for the integration of ground-based and space-based 

radar and sensor data from NATO and Russian sources, and the second center would be involved in planning and coordinating missile defense. 

However, there was little enthusiasm in Moscow 

for such ideas after the announcement that the United 

States planned to extend its European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) to the Black Sea littoral by including Turkey and Rumania in the system. Russian 

press coverage of Turkey’s membership came as an 

unpleasant surprise to Moscow because the EPAA radar component would reduce the possibility of cooperation in the sharing of radar and sensor data, given 

the close cooperation that would be expected between 

the U.S. radar in Turkey and that deployed in Israel.84

The decision to deploy missile defense interceptors 

in Rumania did not create as much concern because 

their characteristics did not make them capable of 

intercepting warheads.85 Vladimir Kozin, a frequent 

commentator on missile defense and nonstrategic nuclear missiles, called attention to the development of 

sea-based Aegis systems for deployment in the Adriatic, Aegean, and Black Seas as a developing threat to 

Russia’s strategic nuclear forces. He called for the removal of U.S. tactical nuclear forces from Europe and 
54

linked to that the goal of limiting the deployment of 

sea-based missile defense systems to strictly defined 

regions of the world’s oceans.86

CONCLUSIONS

Russia is not in a position to enter into meaningful 

arms control negotiations at this time. The successors 

to the leadership tandem in Moscow will wait and see 

how the situation develops in Washington, meanwhile 

pursuing completion of Russia’s 2020 armament plan, 

which is supposed to modernize strategic and tactical 

nuclear forces and create the foundation for a modern conventional military, which embraces command, 

control, communications, computers, and intelligence 

surveillance and reconnaissance (C4ISR). Given the 

past failure of Russian armament programs, there is 

no guarantee that Russia will be in a stronger position 

in 2020, but there are no political incentives to seek 

a general deal with Washington or to embrace multilateral negotiations where Russia might find itself 

isolated. Russia can continue to avoid the dilemma of 

choosing between Washington and Beijing, time does 

appear to be the friend of a power like Russia, which 

most of all needs stability for itself and Eurasia.

ENDNOTES - CHAPTER 1

1. Jacob W. Kipp, “Presidential Elections and the Future of 

U.S.-Russian Relations,” in Stephen J. Blank, ed., Prospects for 

U.S.-Russian Security Cooperation, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies 

Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2009, pp. 45-97.

2. Peter Baker, “Obama Offered Deal to Russia in Secret Letter,” The New York Times, March 2, 2009.

3. “The Global Zero movement,” available from www.

globalzero.org/en/about-campaign.
55

4. Vladimir Dobrovol’skii, “Global Zero prizyvaet Medvedeva i Obamu k unichtozheniiu iadernogo oruzhiia,” RIA Novisti, 

March 24, 2009. 

5. Michael D. Shear and Scott Wilson, “Obama, Medvedev 

Pledge Cooperation,” The Washington Post, April 2, 2009.

6. The Treaty between the United States of America and the 

Russian Federation on Measures for the Further Reduction and 

Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms, “Remarks by President 

Barack Obama,” Hradcany Square, Prague, Czech Republic, 

Washington, DC: The White House, April 5, 2009, available from 

www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-By-President-BarackObama-In-Prague-As-Delivered/.

7. “The Global Zero movement.” 

8. Dmitry Petrov, “Nuclear Zero aye nay abstained,” Rossiia, 

June 6-14, 2009.

9. Ibid.

10. Ibid.

11. Ibid.

12. “Opening Day Statement from Global Zero Leaders,” 

Global Zero movement, February 2-4, 2010, available from www.

globalzero.org/en/opening-day-statement-global-zero-leaders.

13. Ibid.

14. “The New START Treaty and Protocol,” Washington, DC: 

The White House, April 8, 2010, available from www.whitehouse.

gov/blog/2010/04/08/new-start-treaty-and-protocol.

15. Oleg Nikiforov, “Bumazhnyi tigr ili real’naia ugroza,” Nezavisimoe voennoe obozrenie, February 5, 2010.

16. On the status of the “New Look” in Russian defense policy 

as it relates to the modernization of conventional forces follow-
56

ing the August 2008 Russo-Georgian War, see Roger McDermott, 

Russia’s Military Transformation: Implications for NATO, Washington, DC: Jamestown Foundation, 2011; and Timothy Thomas, Recasting the Red Star: Russia Forges Tradition and Technology through 

Toughness, Ft. Leavenworth, KS: Foreign Military Studies Office, 

2011.

17. Olga Bozheva, “Antivoennaia doktrina,” Moskovskii komsomolets, February 8, 2010. 

18. Aleksandr Khramchikhin, “Esli zavtra voina . . .Vtoraia 

koreiskaia,” Nezavisimoe voennoe obozrenie, February 4, 2010. 

19. Andrei Terekhov, “Mudretsy NATO napomnili Moskve o 

Kitaiskom vyzove,” Nezavisimoe gazeta, February 12, 2010. 

20. Vladimir Kuzar’, “SSha - KNR: Vyzov na duel’?” Krasnaia 

zvezda, February 10, 2010. 

21. “Dmitry Medvedev and Barack Obama will meet in 

Prague to sign a new strategic arms reduction treaty,” The President of Russia, March 26, 2010, available from eng.kremlin.ru.

22. “Key Facts about the New START Treaty,” The White 

House, March 26, 2010.

23. Nikolai Surkov, “Moscow and Washington Close to 

Agreement,” Nezavisimaia gazeta, March 24, 2010.

24. “Rossiia i SShA pokazali primer drugim,” Nezavisimaia 

gazeta, March 29, 2010.

25. Denis Tel’manov and Anastasiia Novikova, “V novom dogovore ob SNV ‘podedila druzhba’,” Gazeta, March 29, 2010.

26. Nikolai Snezhkov, “Vnimanie, na START,” Vremia novostei, March 31, 2010.

27. Fedor Lukianov, “Poslednyi dogovor,” Vremia novostei, 

March 29, 2010.

28. Melor Sturua, “Kak Medveev i Obama spasli dogovor po 

SNV,” Izvestiia, March 30, 2010.
57

29. Polina Khimshiashvili and Natal’ia Kostenko, “Sokratiat 

minimal’no,” Vedomosti, March 29, 2010 .

30. Sergei Lavrov, “The New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in the Global Security Matrix: The Political Dimension,” International Affairs, No. 4, 2010, p. 16. 

31. Ibid., p. 2.

32. Ibid., p. 4.

33. Ibid., pp. 10-11.

34. Ibid., p. 11.

35. Ibid.

36. Ibid., p. 18.

37. Sergei Karaganov “Global Zero and Common Sense,” 

Russia in Global Affairs, No. 2, 2010, p. 26. 

38. Ibid., p. 27.

39. Ibid., p. 28.

40. Ibid.

41. Ibid., p. 29.

42. Ibid., p. 30.

43. Ibid., p. 34.

44. “START Promotes Russian-American Cooperation and 

Rapprochement: Nuclear Free World Is a Dangerous Concept that 

Ought to be Abandoned,” Rossiiskaia gazeta, April 23, 2011.

45. Ibid. 

46. Ibid.
58

47. Ibid.

48. Ibid.

49. V. L., “Bomba spravliaet iubilei,” Nezavisimoe voennoe obozrenie, November 26, 2010.

50. Ibid.

51. “Iz Rossiiskoi akademii nauk: Asimmetrichno i 

nerazopitel’no,” Krasnaia Zvezda, June 28, 2011. On Kokoshin’s 

view on strategic stability, see A. Kokoshin, Obespechenie strategicheskoi stabil’nosti v proshlom, i nastoiashchem: Teoritecheskie i 

prikladnye voprosy, Moscow, Russia: Krasand, 2009.

52. Nataliia Ermolik, “BRIKS Nabiraet oboroty,” Krasnaia 

zvezda, April 14, 2011, p. 1. Brazil, Russia, India, China (BRIC) officially became BRICS in 2011 when South Africa joined the BRIC 

summit meeting in Sanya. While seen as an ad hoc group lacking common interests, these powers do share common views on 

United Nations (UN) Security Council reform and on the air intervention in Libya.

53. “Russia set to finish development of new air defense system,” RIA Novosti, September 16, 2009, available from en.rian.ru/

mlitary_news/20090916/156150066.html. 

54. Aleksandr Emel’ianenkov, “Za ‘Sinevoi’ pustili ‘Lainer’,” 

Rossiiskaia gazeta, May 25, 2011.

55. Aleksandr Khramchikhin, “Perspektivnaia MBR — zhidkostnaia ili tverdotoplivaia,” Nezavisimoe voennoe obozrenie, June 

17, 2011.

56. Vladimir Popovkin, “Perspektivy perevooruzheniia 

vooruzhennykh sil Rossiiskooi Federatsii,” Rossiiskoe voennoe 

obozrenie, March 2011, pp. 15-20; and Viktor Litovkin, “Raketnaia nanaiskaia bor’ba,” Nezavisimoe voennoe obozrenie, February 4, 

2011, p. 1.
59

57. A. G. Arbatov, “Iadernaia perezahruzka i mezhdunarodnaia besposnost’,” Pol\\OLIS, Politicheskie issledovaniia, No. 3, 

2011, pp. 39-40.

58. U. S. Senate, 111th Cong., 2nd Sess., Treaty with Russia on 

Reductions and Further Limitations of Strategic Offensive Arms (The 

New START Treaty) Report submitted by Mr. Kerry from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, October 1, 2010, pp. 51-53. 

59. Jacob Kipp, “ The Russia-Georgia Conflict as Analyzed 

by the Center of Analysis of Strategies and Technologies in Moscow,” Eurasia Daily Monitor, Vol. 7, Issues: 15 and 16, available 

from www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Bsword

s%5D=8fd5893941d69d0be3f378576261ae3e&tx_ttnews%5Bany_of_

the_words%5D=Tanks%20of%20the%20august&tx_ttnews%5Btt_

news%5D=35947&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=

88e09810c5; and www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttne

ws[swords]=8fd5893941d69d0be3f378576261ae3e&tx_ttnews[any_

of_the_words]=Tanks%20of%20the%20august&tx_ttnews[tt_

news]=35951&tx_ttnews[backPid]=7&cHash=3ef1cf451f. 

60. McDermott.

61. Aleksei Bogaturov, “Russia and the USA: Equilibrium of 

Distrust,” Mezhdunarodnye protsessy, Vol. VII, No. 3, 2009, p. 124.

62. “Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation,” Military 

News Bulletin, May 1, 2000.

63. “Russia not to participate in no-fly zone operations in 

Libya—Medvedev,” RIA Novosti, March 21, 2011, available from 

en.rian.ru/world/20110321/163131709.html. 

64. A. Kondrat’ev, “Nekotorye osobenosti realizatsii kontseptsii ‘setetsentricheskaia voina’ v vooruzhennykh silakh KNR,” 

Zarubezhnoe voennoe obozrenie, March 2010, pp. 11-17.

65. Alexander Khramchikhin, “Inadequate East,” Nezavisimoe 

voennoe obozrenie, July 23-29, 2010, p. 1.

66. Alesksei Nikol’skii, “Otsenku dast ‘Vostok’,” Vedomosti, 

March 9, 2010.
60

67. Dmitri Litovkin, “Ucheniia popali v seti,” Izvestiia, September 28, 2009.

68. A. Kondrat’ev, “Nekotorye osobennosti realizatsii kontseptsii ‘setetsentricheskaia voina’ v vooruzhennykh silakh KNR,” 

Zarubezhnoe voennoe obozrenie, No. 3, March 2010, pp. 11-17.

69. “Ucheniia,” Zarubezhnoe voennoe obozrenie , No. 8, July 31, 

2009; and Aleksandr Khramchikhin, “Starye osnovy novoi doktriny,” Voyenno-Promyshlennyy Kuryer, No. 6, February 17, 2010, 

p. 5. 

70. Aleksandr Khramchikhin, “Milliony soldat plius sovremennoe vooruzhenie,” Nezavisimoe voennoe obozrenie, October 9, 

2009.

71. “Novosti,” VPK-Voennopromyshlennyi kur’er, March 3, 

2010.

72. “Russia Strengthens the Border with China,” Argumenty 

nedeli, March 4-10, 2010.

73. Prezident Rossii, Voennaia doktrina Rossiiskoi Federatsii, 

February 5, 2010.

74. Vladimir Mokhov, “Osnovy natsional’noi bezopastosti,” 

Krasnaia zvezda, February 6, 2010. 

75. V. I. Slipchenko, Voina budushchego, Moscow, Russia: 

Izdetl’skii Tsentr nauchnykh i uchebnykh programm, 1999; and V. 

I. Slipchenko, Beskontaktnye voiny, Moscow, Russia: “Gran-Press,” 

2001. On the debate between Slipchenko and Makhmut Gareev 

over the prospects of “no-contact war” vs. mass mobilization advanced conventional war with ground forces, see Makhmut Gareev and Vladimir Slipchenko, Future War, Ft. Leavenworth, KS: 

Foreign Military Studies Office, 2007. 

76. Aleksandr Khramchikhin. “Illiuziia iadernogo sderzhivaniia,” VPK Voenno-promyshlennyi kur’er, March 24, 2010.

77. A. A. Kokoshin, Iadernye konflikty v XXI veke: Tipy, formy, 

vozmozhnye uchastniki, Moscow, Russia: Media-Press, 2003, pp. 

67-76.
61

78. Mikhail Lukanin, “Arabskii krizis mozhet pereasti v atomnyi,” Trud, March 29, 2011, p. 1; and Viacheslav Tetekin, “Liviiskii urok,” Pravda, April 1, 2011, p. 7.

79. Sergei Turchenko, “Voiny: XXI veka: Izrail’ protiv Irana, 

Svobodnaia pressa, April 17, 2011.

80. “US wants to step up dialogue with Russia on non-strategic weapons,” Russia Today, January 20, 2011, available from 

rt.com/politics/russia-usa-arms-control/. 

81. Litva prizvala mirovye derzhavy nachat’ peregovory organixheniiu takicheskogo iadernogo oruzhiia dislotsipovannogo 

v Kalingradskoi oblasti,” Defens E’skress: Ezhennedelnaia lenta 

novostei, February 8, 2011, available from dlib.eastview.com.www2.

lib.ku.edu:2048/browse/doc/24215096. 

82. Hans M. Kristensen, “10 NATO Countries Want More 

Transparency for Non-Strategic Nuclear Weapons,” Washington, 

DC: Federation of American Scientists, April 24, 2011, available 

from www.fas.org/blog/ssp/2011/04/natoproposal.php. 

83. Aleksandr Artem’ev, “Nasha ideia - dve otdel’nye sistemy 

PRO,” Kommersant, September 12, 2011.

84. Aleksandr Semenov, “Amerikanskuiu PRO razmestiat v 

Turtsii,” Komsomol’skaia pravda, September 3, 2011.

85. “Dar’ia Tsiliurik, SShA sovratili Rumyniiu na evropeiskuiu PRO,” Nezavisimaia gazeta, September 14, 2011.

86. Vladimir Kozin, “Ugroza s moria,” Krasnaia zvezda, September 2, 2011.

63

CHAPTER 2

THE RUSSIAN ARMS CONTROL AGENDA 

AFTER NEW START

Steven Pifer

INTRODUCTION

With the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty 

(New START) having entered into force in February 

2011, the question arose as to what would come next 

on the U.S.-Russian arms control agenda. As early as 

April 2010, President Barack Obama called for further 

negotiations to reduce U.S. and Russian nuclear forces 

below New START levels and to address nondeployed 

strategic warheads and nonstrategic nuclear weapons. 

President Dmitri Medvedev has agreed in principle to 

a step-by-step process of further nuclear reductions, 

but Moscow has shown little enthusiasm for a new 

round of negotiations.

This chapter examines what Russian officials were 

saying about next steps on the arms control agenda 

and possible missile defense cooperation, as of autumn 

2011. It also looks at Russian concerns about conventional force disadvantages, how those concerns might 

affect the Russian approach to arms control, and possible incentives that Moscow may have in the medium 

term to explore further nuclear arms cuts.

Russian officials in 2011 said that a number of issues should be addressed in conjunction with, if not 

before, further nuclear arms reductions. These issues 

included missile defense, long-range conventional 

strike weapons, the fate of the Conventional Forces in 

Europe (CFE) Treaty, and weapons in outer space. The 
64

bundling of these questions may reflect uncertainty in 

Moscow as to where to go next on arms control. Russian officials also said they wanted to see how New 

START was implemented, and both countries faced 

presidential elections in 2012.

 Moscow has said little about further cuts of strategic nuclear forces and virtually nothing about nonstrategic nuclear weapons—sometimes referred to as 

sub-strategic or tactical nuclear weapons—other than 

to call for the removal of U.S. nonstrategic weapons 

from Europe to national territory, which the Russians 

said should be a precondition for any negotiation on 

such weapons. The Russian military attaches importance to its nonstrategic arsenal, including tactical 

nuclear weapons, as offsetting perceived conventional 

force disadvantages vis-à-vis the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and China. Some analysts 

suggested the Russians would not be prepared for a 

serious discussion of reducing nonstrategic nuclear 

weapons until they had a prospect of modernizing 

their conventional forces; it is unclear how long that 

will take.

At the end of 2011, the issue on the arms control 

agenda receiving the most attention was missile defense and whether the United States, NATO, and 

Russia could agree on the terms for a cooperative missile defense system for Europe. Moscow focused on 

the bilateral dialogue with Washington on this issue. 

The sides reportedly found some common ground 

on practical cooperation, such as transparency and a 

data fusion center. Washington believed that such cooperation would yield significant transparency about 

U.S. missile defense plans and capabilities and would 

assure Russia that those plans did not pose a serious threat to Russian strategic ballistic missile forces. 
65

Moscow, however, sought a legal “guarantee” that 

U.S. systems would not be directed against Russian 

strategic forces and “criteria” regarding U.S. missile 

defenses that went beyond what the administration 

was prepared to offer—or what the Senate would be 

prepared to support.

If the missile defense cooperation question is resolved, it would improve prospects for new bilateral 

nuclear arms negotiations. Moscow has incentives to 

engage at some point in such negotiations. The Russians may have trouble maintaining the level of 1,550 

deployed strategic warheads allowed under New 

START; the U.S. military will not. The treaty, moreover, will leave the United States with a sizable advantage in strategic “upload” capability. A new arms 

control agreement would offer Moscow the best vehicle to address these issues as well as to secure the 

withdrawal of U.S. nonstrategic nuclear weapons 

from Europe and their future limitation to U.S. territory. 

Conventional forces in Europe posed an equally 

difficult question in 2011. Efforts during 2010 to revive the CFE Treaty stumbled over the question of 

host nation consent to stationing of foreign forces, 

which brought to the fore the status of South Ossetia 

and Abkhazia. Given such differences and the need 

to find consensus among 30 CFE Treaty parties, salvaging CFE appears a nearly hopeless task. While the 

Russians said they wanted a treaty regime to cover 

and limit conventional armed forces in Europe, they 

offered no workable ideas to break the impasse.
66

NEW START AND U.S.-RUSSIAN NUCLEAR 

FORCE LEVELS

New START has proved a key element of Washington’s Reset policy with Moscow. The Russians appreciated the fact that the Obama administration supplanted its predecessor’s approach to strategic arms 

control with a more traditional approach, one that provided for legally-binding limits on strategic delivery 

vehicles as well as strategic warheads. (The Russians 

had rejected the approach suggested by the George 

Bush administration in 2008, which would have limited only deployed strategic warheads.) Signed in April 

2010, New START entered into force on February 5, 

2011, following a ratification debate in the U.S. Senate 

that proved more difficult than anticipated. By contrast, the Russian Duma ratified New START in January 2011, not surprisingly with relative ease. 

New START contains three limits. When the treaty’s reductions are fully implemented by February 5, 

2018, each side will be limited to no more than 1,550 

deployed strategic warheads; 700 deployed strategic 

delivery vehicles, i.e., intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles 

(SLBMs) and nuclear-capable bombers; and 800 deployed and nondeployed launchers for ICBMs and 

SLBMs plus nuclear-capable bombers. The sides exchanged data in February 2011 and exchanged their 

first data update the following September. (See Figure 

2-1.)
67

Figure 2-1. U.S. and Russian Strategic Forces, 

September 2011.1

The lower Russian numbers reflect the fact that 

in recent years many Russian strategic missiles have 

reached or exceeded their service warranty life and 

been retired, and the relatively modest pace at which 

Moscow has procured new ICBMs and SLBMs. 

Nongovernmental analysts in the United States 

project that the Russian military will have a hard 

time maintaining 1,550 deployed strategic warheads 

and could fall to around 1,260-1,350.2

 Russian analyst 

Alexei Arbatov projects that Russian deployed strategic warhead numbers could fall even lower, perhaps 

to 1,000-1,100, leaving Moscow facing a decision on 

whether or not to build back up to 1,550.3

 In the spring 

of 2011, the Russian government reportedly decided 

to proceed with designing a new liquid-fueled heavy 

ICBM, which could offer the Russian military a costeffective way to deploy a large number of warheads to 

reach the 1,550 level.

By contrast, the U.S. military will be able to sustain 

a force of 1,550 deployed strategic warheads on 700 

deployed strategic delivery vehicles for the duration 

Treaty Limit U.S. Russia

Deployed Strategic 

Warheads 1,550 1,790 1,566

Deployed Strategic Delivery 

Vehicles 700 822 516

Deployed and 

Non-Deployed ICBM/SLBM 

Launchers plus Bombers

800 1,043 871
68

of New START. The Pentagon announced its planned 

force structure in 2010: 1,550 deployed strategic warheads on 240 deployed Trident D-5 SLBMs, 400 deployed Minuteman ICBMs, 40 deployed nuclear-capable bombers, and 20 additional deployed ICBMs or 

bombers.4

When signing New START in 2010, Obama called 

for another round of arms reduction negotiations, 

this one to include nonstrategic nuclear weapons and 

nondeployed strategic warheads. The United States 

reportedly has 500 nonstrategic nuclear warheads in 

its inventory, assuming that the 260 W80 warheads 

for sea-launched cruise missiles have now been retired and are in the queue for dismantlement. The U.S. 

nonstrategic nuclear inventory includes some 200 B61 

bombs deployed in Europe.5

 The Russian nonstrategic nuclear arsenal in 2011 was believed to consist of 

3,700-5,400 nuclear warheads of various types, including those for use on cruise missiles, tactical aircraft, 

and air defense systems. Many of these warheads 

were old and believed ready for retirement soon; 

the “nominal load” of Russian nonstrategic delivery 

systems was estimated to be 2,080 nonstrategic warheads.6

 (See Figure 2-2.)

 

Figure 2-2. U.S. and Russian Non-Strategic Nuclear 

Weapons.8

U.S. Russia

Air-Delivered 500 800

Anti-Ballistic Missile/Air Defense 0 700

Ground-Based 0 ?

Naval 0 600

Total 500 ~2,1007
69

WHAT THE RUSSIANS SAY

Medvedev and Obama committed to a step-bystep process of reducing nuclear arms in their April 

1, 2009, joint statement at their initial meeting in London, England. The New START preamble notes the 

sides “seeking to preserve continuity in, and provide 

new impetus to, the step-by-step process of reducing 

and limiting nuclear arms.” Medvedev, like Obama, 

has endorsed the goal of a world free of nuclear arms.

That said, Moscow has shown little enthusiasm for 

an early round of new nuclear arms reduction negotiations. Speaking at the United Nations (UN) Conference on Disarmament on March 1, 2011, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated:

We insist that there is a clear need to take into account 

the factors that negatively affect strategic stability, 

such as plans to place weapons in outer space, to develop non-nuclear armed strategic offensive weapons, 

as well as unilateral deployment of a global BMD [ballistic missile defense] system. Nor could we ignore the 

considerable imbalances in conventional arms, especially against the background of dangerous conflicts 

persisting in many regions of the world.9

This reiterated a standard Russian line: issues 

which must be addressed in conjunction with, if not 

prior to, further nuclear arms reductions include missile defense, long-range conventional strike weapons, 

the fate of the CFE Treaty, and weapons in outer space. 

The mass of linkages that the Russians have insisted 

on—and adding that they appear reluctant to agree to 

cooperate on missile defense and have shown little creativity on the question of limiting conventional forces 
70

in Europe—makes for a daunting knot of issues. This 

may well reflect broader uncertainty or indecision in 

Moscow on where to go next on arms control with the 

United States.

As of the autumn of 2011, the Russian government 

had not articulated its thinking on what further reductions of strategic nuclear forces might entail and 

had said little about nonstrategic nuclear weapons. In 

his Conference on Disarmament speech, Lavrov indicated that withdrawal of nonstrategic nuclear weapons to the national territory of the state owning the 

weapons—U.S. nonstrategic B61 bombs deployed in 

Europe are the only weapons in this category—should 

be the first step in addressing nonstrategic nuclear 

arms. Lavrov and other Russians suggested that such 

withdrawal would be a precondition for negotiations 

on nonstrategic weapons.10 Transparency regarding 

nonstrategic nuclear weapons might be a first step, 

but Moscow has not addressed this publicly.11

Unofficial Russian experts have offered ideas for 

addressing nonstrategic nuclear weapons, but they 

tend to shy away from proposing to limit the weapons 

directly. They instead suggested that the warheads 

could be “demated” (separated) from their delivery systems—most, if not all, Russian nonstrategic 

warheads already are demated from their delivery 

systems—and stored in “central” storage facilities located away from bases where the delivery systems are 

deployed. The storage facilities could be monitored to 

ensure that the warheads were not moved out and/

or to confirm the number of warheads they contain, 

but not as pertaining to a direct numerical limit on 

the warheads. Inspections might also be conducted at 

former storage sites to confirm the absence of nuclear 

weapons.12
71

Russian officials also said that, before pursuing further nuclear cuts, Moscow wanted to observe how the 

New START Treaty was implemented.13 Moreover, at 

that time, both countries faced presidential elections. 

With the September 24, 2011, announcement that 

Vladimir Putin would run in the March 2012 election 

for the presidency (with Medvedev to become prime 

minister), it was a virtual certainty that Putin would 

assume the office in May, and indeed he did. As Putin 

has undoubtedly been involved in all major foreign 

as well as domestic policy decisions during his tenure 

as prime minister, his return to the presidency should 

not mean a major shift in Russian arms control policy. 

He has, however, a more skeptical view of the United 

States than does Medvedev. The Russian bureaucracy, 

moreover, is unlikely to show much daring or creativity.

Moscow is also watching the 2012 U.S. presidential election. Consequently, the Russian government 

may wait until it sees the outcome of the election in 

November 2012 before deciding how to proceed on 

further nuclear arms cuts.14 The Russians also believe 

that the Obama administration will be cautious about 

arms control steps, fearing that such steps could become politicized as the U.S. election campaign heats 

up.15

CONVENTIONAL WEAKNESS AND NUCLEAR 

DEPENDENCE

Russian conventional force capabilities have declined dramatically since the collapse of the Soviet 

Union. Large numbers of tanks, armored personnel 

carriers, artillery, tactical aircraft, and helicopters 

were located on the territories of non-Russian repub-
72

lics, and most of that equipment ended up as part of 

the militaries of those states. In addition, the Russian 

military budget suffered greatly during the economic 

downturn of the 1990s. This led to striking changes. 

For example, while NATO long worried about the Soviet numerical advantage in main battle tanks, in 2009 

NATO had a more than 2:1 advantage over Russia in 

tanks in the CFE Treaty area of application.16 NATO 

likewise leads in other key categories of conventional 

military equipment where it long lagged behind the 

Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact (this, in part, reflects 

the fact that most former members of the Warsaw Pact 

have since joined NATO).

Moscow has announced a major conventional rearmament plan, with the goal that 70 percent of the military’s weapons and equipment should be modernized 

by 2020. It remains unclear how much real capability 

this will add. The plan called for some $700 billion in 

new arms procurement over the decade to 2020 but 

faces major challenges. Corruption in the defense sector has traditionally siphoned sizable funds away from 

their stated purposes. It is not clear that the Russian 

defense industry will be able to meet the demands for 

modern military equipment, particularly in the hightech sector.17 In June 2011, Russia concluded a contract 

with France for the purchase of two Mistral class helicopter assault ships (and the option to build two more 

in Russia). In July 2011 Medvedev expressed concern 

about the quality and cost of Russian-produced military equipment, suggesting to Defense Minister Anatoliy Serdyukov that he consider purchasing other 

equipment from foreign sources.18

Russian analysts also worried that Russia would 

be unable to compete with other militaries in hightech areas. Take tactical air power, for example: Russia 
73

has only begun flight-testing a 5th generation fighter, 

while the U.S. military has already completed its purchase of the F-22 and will shortly begin receiving the 

F-35. Moreover, Russia has nothing to compare to the 

unmanned drone aircraft that already provide the U.S. 

air force with major reconnaissance, surveillance, and 

strike assets.

Russian analysts expressed particular concern 

about U.S. long-range, precision-guided conventional 

strike weapons, such as conventionally-armed seaand air-launched cruise missiles, for which the Russian military had no real counterpart. Some suggested 

that the United States could use long-range, precisionguided conventional weapons to strike targets that 

previously would have required nuclear weapons, 

such as silo-based ICBMs. Arbatov wrote that the 

United States might deploy as many as 3,000-5,000 

long-range, conventionally-armed cruise missiles, 

though he noted that preparations for a major conventional counterforce campaign would take time and 

would be visible.19 A senior Russian foreign ministry 

official downplayed this concern, noting that Russia 

would respond—and the United States should understand that Russia would respond—with strategic 

nuclear weapons to a large-scale U.S. effort to degrade 

Russian strategic nuclear forces with conventional 

strike systems.20 (It is also unclear whether there is a 

solid basis for Arbatov’s concern; senior U.S. Air Force 

officers discount the ability of conventionally-armed 

cruise missile warheads to disable hardened ICBM silos.21) 

In any event, the Russian military in 2011 lacked 

a clear picture of when it might have large numbers 

of conventional strike weapons of its own. Above and 

beyond the question of equipment, the Russian mili-
74

tary faces a shrinking and less well-trained manpower 

base. Due to demographic trends, the number of Russian males eligible for the draft in 2017 will be about 

half the number in 2006, and it is already difficult to 

find a sufficient number of healthy draftees.22 The conscription period has been slashed over the past decade 

from 2 years to 1, and the military leadership continues to be aloof to the notion of an all- or mostly allprofessional force.

Medvedev and Serdyukov launched the latest in 

Russia’s post-Soviet military reforms in the autumn of 

2008. The reform path—which has included downsizing the military, particularly the officer corps; reorganizing the army into a brigade-based system; and 

raising the alert status of all units—has made some 

progress, but it has not been steady. After announcing 

that the officer corps would be downsized by 205,000, 

which would bring the number of officers down to 

150,000, in early 2011, the defense ministry raised the 

new total of outgoing officers to 220,000. It is unclear 

how much progress the army has made in adopting 

the brigade system.23

Weaknesses in Russian conventional forces—and 

the uncertain prospects for military modernization 

and reform over the coming decade—mean that nuclear weapons will likely remain central to Russian 

military strategy for the foreseeable future. A number of Russian analysts have expressed concern about 

conventional force imbalances and their potential impact on strategic nuclear stability. For example, Andrei Kokoshin noted the increase in U.S. conventional 

capabilities and wrote that “nuclear weapons act as a 

sort of equalizer . . . and we still do not see any credible signs that the West is ready to eliminate the imbalance in general-purpose forces and conventional 

weapons.”24
75

For its part, the new Russian military doctrine issued in early 2010 stated that:

The Russian Federation reserves the right to utilize 

nuclear weapons in response to the utilization of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction 

against it and (or) its allies, and also in the event of aggression against the Russian Federation involving the 

use of conventional weapons when the very existence 

of the state is under threat.25

The doctrine appeared to narrow somewhat the 

circumstances in which nuclear weapons might be 

used compared to its 2000 predecessor, but it offered 

few specifics about the roles of strategic or nonstrategic nuclear weapons. Indeed, it did not draw a distinction between strategic and nonstrategic nuclear arms.

Conventional disadvantages appear to explain 

much of the Russian attachment to nonstrategic nuclear weapons. Although the Russian government 

appears reluctant to speak publicly of a Chinese military threat or challenge, the Russian military may see 

little alternative to nuclear weapons for dealing with a 

large Chinese army equipped with increasingly modern conventional arms. That said, the logic for maintaining so many nonstrategic nuclear warheads is not 

clear; how many such nuclear weapons would the 

Russian military employ against an invading Chinese 

force before the conflict escalated to strategic nuclear 

strikes against the homeland? The number is certainly 

well below the thousands of weapons currently in the 

Russian nonstrategic nuclear arsenal.
76

MISSILE DEFENSE

On the 2011 arms control agenda, Moscow (as well 

as Washington) attached the greatest priority to the 

issue of missile defense and the possibility of missile 

defense cooperation. Russian concerns focused on the 

“phased adaptive approach” based on the Standard 

SM-3 missile interceptor; the Russians expressed little 

concern about the 30 ground-based interceptors deployed at Fort Greely, Alaska and Vandenberg Air 

Force Base, California.

Under the phased adaptive approach, SM-3 Bloc 

IA missiles were deployed on board ships in the 

Mediterranean Sea in Phase 1 (the Aegis-class cruiser 

Monterrey made the first Mediterranean deployment 

in the spring of 2011). Bloc IB missiles with upgraded 

seekers will be deployed ashore in Romania in 2015 in 

Phase 2; Bloc IIA missiles with higher velocities will 

be deployed in Poland in 2018 in Phase 3; and Bloc IIB 

missiles with still higher velocities will be deployed in 

2020 in Phase 4. Although some Russian analysts expressed concern about Phase 3; most focused on Phase 

4, when the SM-3 Bloc IIB missile is to be given some 

capability to intercept ICBMs.

U.S. officials do not believe the planned missile defense system poses a serious threat to Russian strategic 

ballistic missile forces. Bloc IIB would constitute only 

a portion of the total planned buy of 450-550 SM-3 interceptors, and its deployment in Poland and Romania would mean that it would not be well-positioned 

to intercept Russian ICBMs headed across the Arctic.26

U.S. defense department officials have reportedly 

made this point, with accompanying technical presentations, to their Russian counterparts.
77

In 2011, Russian officials professed not to be persuaded. Some voiced concern about scenarios that appeared highly unlikely, e.g., the deployment of most 

or all SM-3 equipped warships into the Arctic Ocean 

to defend the United States against Russian ICBMs. 

Much Russian concern may be related to what comes 

after 2020 should U.S. missile defense continue to 

progress. Finally, some Russian concern was politically-motivated: Moscow is not happy about the prospect of any U.S. military hardware deployed in Poland 

and Romania.

In discussions with their U.S. counterparts, Russian officials sought a legally-binding guarantee that 

U.S. and Russian missile defense systems would not 

be directed against the other side’s strategic forces. 

They have also sought agreement on criteria regarding parameters such as the number, velocity, and location of missile defense interceptors (the criteria are 

sometimes described as being reminiscent of those in 

the 1997 ABM Treaty demarcation agreement that was 

intended to distinguish theater missile defense interceptors from ABM interceptors).

The U.S. Government stressed its readiness to be 

transparent about U.S. missile defense plans and capabilities; the head of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency 

offered to allow the Russians to monitor SM-3 tests so 

that they could be assured that the interceptors lacked 

the range and velocity to engage ICBMs. Washington 

was also prepared to offer political assurances at the 

highest level that its planned system was not directed 

against Russian missiles. U.S. policy is to defend the 

United States against limited ballistic missile attacks, 

such as might be mounted in the future by North Korea or Iran, not a Russian missile attack. Washington 

balked, however, at a legally-binding guarantee and at 
78

criteria that appear to resemble limits; neither would 

be ratifiable by the Senate.

U.S. and Russian officials had hoped to have a joint 

statement of principles for missile defense cooperation 

for release by the presidents at their May 2011 meeting in Deauville, France, but the sides failed to reach 

final agreement on the language. Missile defense was 

discussed further at the June NATO-Russia defense 

ministers’ meeting and during Lavrov’s mid-July visit 

to Washington. No significant progress was reported 

from these meetings, but U.S., NATO, and Russian officials seemed to take care to leave the door open. For 

example, in a November 23 statement that appeared 

aimed largely at the Russian domestic audience, Medvedev sharply criticized U.S. missile defense plans 

and threatened Russian countermeasures; he made 

clear, however, that Russia remained open to discussions with the United States and NATO. Despite the 

appearance of an impasse at the end of the year, U.S. 

officials continued to pursue the dialogue with their 

Russian counterparts.

While Washington and Moscow disagree on a 

legally-binding guarantee (as opposed to political assurances) and criteria, the sides’ positions reportedly 

converged on what practical missile defense cooperation might include: a U.S.-Russia defense technical cooperation agreement that would enable exchange of 

sensitive information; NATO-Russia theater missile 

defense exercises; a joint NATO-Russia data fusion 

center as a venue to exchange early warning data from 

the sides’ radars and other sensors; and a NATO-Russia planning and operations center to develop ideas 

for further cooperation. U.S. and Russian officials also 

discussed, though made less progress on, the idea of a 

joint analysis of the impact of missile defense on strategic deterrence.27
79

U.S. officials argued that Russia should set aside 

its demands for legally-binding guarantees and criteria and engage in practical cooperation, which would 

give Moscow significant insights into the U.S. missile 

defense system. If that did not allay Russian concerns, 

Moscow would always be free later to withdraw from 

a cooperative plan. Public Russian pronouncements in 

2011 suggested that Moscow was not then prepared to 

accept that approach.

It is not clear what the Russians want on missile 

defense or why they are so reluctant about missile defense cooperation; some may fear that agreement to 

cooperation with the United States and NATO would 

“bless” the planned U.S. missile defense deployments 

in Europe. However, the Russian government presumably understands that, with NATO having adopted the territorial defense mission at its 2010 Lisbon, 

Portugal, summit, it would be difficult for Moscow 

to sow division among allies on this issue; missile 

defense will not prove to be a controversial issue like 

medium-range missiles were in the 1980s. It may be 

that Moscow has not made up its mind about how to 

handle missile defense.

This creates another problem. The Russians repeatedly said that they should be in on the ground floor 

of any effort to define a cooperative missile defense 

arrangement for Europe, but U.S. and NATO plans 

moved forward regardless. For example, in September 

2011, it was announced that the United States would 

base four Aegis-class warships in Rota, Spain, and 

that an AN/TPY-2 radar would be deployed in Turkey, as the United States and NATO proceeded with 

implementation of the phased adaptive approach. The 

longer the Russians wait to agree to missile defense 

cooperation, the less influence they may have on the 

architecture that emerges. 
80

FURTHER NUCLEAR WEAPONS REDUCTIONS

As noted earlier, Russian officials have stipulated 

a number of issues that they say should be addressed 

in conjunction with, or prior to, further negotiations 

on reducing nuclear arms. Nevertheless, there are several factors that might motivate Moscow to consider 

further negotiations, even if they did not achieve full 

satisfaction on their other issues.

First, Russian strategic nuclear forces have declined to a number very close to the New START limit 

of 1,550 deployed strategic warheads and have fallen 

well below the limit of 700 deployed strategic delivery 

vehicles. Most analysts expect Russian strategic force 

levels to decline further, as older systems are retired 

faster than new systems can be deployed. Should the 

number drop to 1,000, as Arbatov wrote is possible, 

there would be a significant gap between Russian and 

U.S. numbers. The U.S. military can—and intends 

to—sustain a force of 1,550 deployed strategic warheads and 700 deployed strategic delivery vehicles. 

(See Figure 2-3.)

Figure 2-3. Notional U.S. and Russian Strategic 

Offensive Forces Under New START.

U.S.28 Russia29

Deployed ICBMs 420 192

Warheads on deployed ICBMs 420 542

Deployed SLBMs 240 128

Warheads on deployed SLBMs 1,090 640

Deployed heavy bombers 40 76

Warheads attributed to deployed heavy bombers 40 76

Total deployed ICBMs, SLBMs, heavy bombers 700 396

Total warheads attributed 1,550 1,258
81

One way to close this gap without a major Russian buildup would be a new agreement that reduced 

the limit on deployed strategic warheads, perhaps 

to 1,000. It would appear that Russia could sustain 

a force of that level with its current SLBM, Topol-M, 

and Yars ICBM plans. It might not have to develop 

and deploy a new heavy ICBM, which would be costly 

and potentially destabilizing, in that it would result 

in many Russian warheads on a relatively small number of fixed aim points and raise concern in the United 

States about silo-based Minuteman survivability. 

A second reason that the Russians might engage in 

further negotiations is to secure limits on nondeployed 

strategic warheads or otherwise reduce U.S. “upload” 

potential (the ability to put additional warheads on 

existing ICBMs and SLBMs). The United States will 

implement much of its New START reductions by 

“downloading” missiles, that is, by removing one or 

more warheads but keeping the missile deployed. The 

Department of Defense (DoD) stated in 2010 that, under New START, all Minuteman III ICBMs—each of 

which can carry three warheads—will be downloaded 

to carry a single warhead. Trident D-5 SLBMs—each 

of which can carry eight warheads—will also be significantly downloaded, so that they will carry an average of four-five warheads.

At least initially, downloaded U.S. warheads will 

go into storage (there is already a long queue of nuclear warheads awaiting dismantlement). It would not 

be difficult to upload, or return, them to ICBMs and 

SLBMs, were the New START Treaty to break down. 

It appears that the United States will have the capacity to upload warheads and increase the number of its 

deployed strategic warheads on ICBMs and SLBMs to 

2,650-2,850.
82

The Russians do not have a comparable ability. 

Russia is expected to implement its New START reductions by eliminating missiles, with the residual 

missiles carrying full or close to full warhead sets. 

Thus, even if Russia has additional ballistic missile 

warheads, it will have no spaces on ballistic missiles 

on which to put them. A new negotiation could produce direct limits on nondeployed strategic warheads, 

reducing the American advantage in upload potential.

Some Russian experts have suggested that Moscow 

could deal with the upload problem by reducing the 

limit on deployed strategic delivery vehicles to below 

the New START level of 700. That would reduce the 

number of spaces into which extra warheads might be 

uploaded but, as long as the United States has some 

downloaded missiles, it would retain some upload 

capability. 

A third reason why Russia might be interested in 

further negotiations is to secure the permanent removal of U.S. nonstrategic nuclear weapons from Europe, 

something that Moscow has long sought. Washington 

is unlikely to accept this as a precondition for negotiations on nonstrategic nuclear arms, but U.S. officials 

privately indicated that it could be an outcome of a negotiation, depending on the other terms of the agreement.30

U.S. nonstrategic nuclear weapons in Europe 

probably represent a relatively small bargaining chip. 

Moscow analysts undoubtedly noted that a number of 

NATO member states have expressed interest in a reduction in or complete withdrawal of those weapons. 

This was not a unanimous Alliance view; other allies 

believe that a U.S. nuclear presence should remain. 

But those states favoring removal of U.S. weapons 

included Germany, the Netherlands, and Belgium, 
83

on whose territory U.S. nuclear weapons reportedly 

are stored, and whose decisions on modernizing—or 

not modernizing—dual-capable aircraft might make 

those weapons’ continued presence on their territory 

superfluous. 

Taken together, these factors would appear to give 

the Russians reasons to seek a round of negotiations 

on further reductions, although Moscow was not prepared for negotiations in 2011 and may choose to wait 

until after the outcome of the 2012 U.S. presidential 

election is known. As 2011 drew to a close, U.S. officials appeared to accept that comprehensive negotiations might have to wait until 2013, but they thought 

there was a possibility that bilateral consultations on 

nuclear arms reductions might get underway before 

then.

If/when Russia agrees to a further negotiation, it 

will be a more difficult and drawn-out process than 

the negotiation that produced New START in less 

than 1 year. The sides will negotiate more carefully 

as numbers go down. Bringing nondeployed strategic 

warheads and nonstrategic nuclear weapons into the 

negotiations, assuming that the Russians agree, will 

introduce challenging new questions, such as how to 

limit and monitor limits on warheads in storage areas. 

It will not be an 11-month negotiation, as was the process that produced New START.

Finally, Moscow likely will not be prepared for truly radical cuts in a next round of negotiations. There 

is some level of deployed strategic warheads—and/

or total nuclear warheads—below which the Russians 

will not reduce without addressing third-country forces, at least those of Britain, France, and China. (Washington likely has a level of its own; given the range of 

other U.S. military capabilities, that level probably is 
84

lower than the Russian level.) Some Russian analysts 

have previously suggested that Russia would not be 

prepared to reduce to below 1,000 deployed strategic 

warheads without bringing in third countries and perhaps applying limits on missile defense. 

CONVENTIONAL WEAPONS AND FORCES

The Russians have not yet proposed a way to address their concerns about long-range conventional 

strike weapons. Should conventional warheads be 

placed on ICBMs or SLBMs, they would be captured 

under the New START limit on deployed strategic 

warheads. In essence, the United States would have 

to give up one nuclear warhead for each conventional 

warhead it deployed on a strategic ballistic missile. 

In any case, U.S. officials have stated that they do not 

intend to place conventional warheads on ICBMs or 

SLBMs. The Pentagon, however, is developing a hypersonic glide vehicle, which could rapidly strike targets at intercontinental distances. U.S. officials have 

argued that such a vehicle would not be captured by 

the definitions and limits of New START. However, 

should the United States proceed with development 

of that vehicle, the Russians will undoubtedly raise 

it as an issue in New START’s Bilateral Consultative 

Commission.

Moscow has expressed concern about other types 

of conventional strike weapons, such as long-range 

cruise missiles. It is difficult to see the United States 

accepting constraints on such weapons, which are key 

to U.S. conventional power projection. U.S. military 

officials do not see conventionally-armed cruise missiles as posing a threat to Russian strategic targets; 

they do not believe the warheads are large enough to 
85

disable ICBM silos. A military-to-military dialogue 

might explore whether the threat is real or not, but it 

is not clear whether that could by itself assuage Russian concerns.

The other conventional issue is the fate of the CFE 

Treaty. Signed in 1991, the Treaty originally constrained NATO and Warsaw Pact holdings of key 

equipment, such as tanks, armored personnel carriers, 

artillery, attack helicopters, and tactical aircraft. The 

treaty was “adapted” in 1999 to reflect the end of the 

Warsaw Pact and apply national limits vice limits on 

NATO and Warsaw Pact holdings. Due to Russia’s 

failure to live up to political commitments regarding 

its forces in Georgia and Moldova, NATO countries 

have not ratified the Adapted CFE Treaty (Moscow 

disputed this linkage). In 2007, Russia announced that 

it was suspending its observance of the original treaty, 

though it does not appear to have exceeded its overall 

CFE equipment entitlements.

Attempts have been made to revive the CFE regime. During the second George W. Bush term, U.S. 

officials proposed a “parallel actions” approach, under which NATO would move to ratify the Adapted 

CFE Treaty and take other steps, such as preparing to 

bring the Baltic States into the treaty, in parallel with 

Russia implementing its 1999 commitments. In 2010, 

U.S. officials attempted to define principles for reviving conventional arms control but could not find a formula with Russia that would work. One particularly 

difficult question proved to be host nation consent, 

i.e., a nation’s right to determine the presence of foreign forces on its soil. U.S. and Russian officials failed 

to find a formulation to sidestep the issues of South 

Ossetia and Abkhazia, where Russian forces are stationed with the consent of local authorities but without Georgian consent.
86

Were the sides able to resolve the host nation consent question, the Russians would like to reduce the 

limits on equipment for NATO member states. As 

most, if not all, NATO members are below—in some 

cases, significantly below—their CFE entitlements, 

this might not pose a major problem. More difficult 

would be the flank question. Moscow strongly opposes flank limits that constrain where Russia deploys 

CFE-limited equipment on Russian territory. While 

the U.S. military attaches no importance to the flank 

limits, those restrictions matter to countries such as 

Georgia, Turkey, Norway, and the Baltic states. It is 

difficult to see a compromise on this question.

By 2011, U.S. officials had concluded that the CFE 

Treaty regime likely could not be saved. Moscow had 

not offered steps that might preserve the treaty and 

its limits or open the way for a mutually acceptable 

successor regime. On November 22, 2011, the Department of State announced that the United States would 

“cease carrying out certain obligations” to Russia related to data provision and acceptance of inspections. 

All other NATO states shortly thereafter followed suit. 

The Russians did not seem unduly alarmed; they may 

assume, perhaps correctly, that fiscal difficulties will 

mean reductions in the conventional forces of most 

NATO countries in any case.

While suspending its observance of the CFE 

Treaty’s transparency and observation provisions, 

the Russians have continued to observe the requirements of the Vienna Document on Confidence- and 

Security-Building Measures (CSBMs) and the Open 

Skies Treaty. One possible way forward would be 

to set aside equipment limits for the time being and 

focus on expanding the Vienna Document CSBMs to 

include some of the transparency and observation 
87

provisions of the CFE Treaty. The negotiation would 

still have to deal with host nation consent, but it might 

be simpler in the context of CSBMs rather than limits. 

It is not clear how Moscow would respond to such an 

approach.

CONCLUSION

There is a full arms control agenda between the 

United States (and NATO), on the one hand, and Russia, on the other. Whether progress is possible depends 

in large part on decisions that Moscow may not yet 

have taken. The impending U.S. presidential election, 

moreover, complicates prospects for arms control negotiations in 2012. In the near term, prospects appear 

limited to the (apparently declining) possibility of an 

agreement on a cooperative missile defense system 

for Europe, transparency measures regarding nonstrategic nuclear weapons, and consultations on arms 

control issues. While Moscow may have incentives in 

the medium term to negotiate on further nuclear arms 

reductions, more formal negotiations and more meaningful proposals will have to wait until 2013.

ENDNOTES - CHAPTER 2

1. U.S. Department of State, Fact Sheet, “New START Treaty 

Aggregate Numbers of Strategic Offensive Arms,” October 25, 

2011, available from www.state.gov/documents/organization/176308.

pdf. This table uses New START counting rules, which count the 

actual number of warheads on deployed intercontinental ballistic 

missiles (ICBMs) and sea-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) plus 

one warhead for each deployed nuclear-capable bomber (even 

though bombers can carry more than one weapon).

2. Pavel Podvig projects a Russian strategic force of 396 deployed strategic delivery vehicles and 1,258 deployed strategic 
88

warheads. See Pavel Podvig, “New START Treaty in Numbers,” 

Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces, available from russianforces.org/

blog/2010/03/new_start_treaty_in_numbers.shtml. Hans Kristensen 

projects slightly higher levels: 403 deployed strategic delivery vehicles and 1,349 deployed strategic warheads; private exchange 

with the author, July 2010. Some Pentagon officials question 

whether Russia will go so low, noting that Russian negotiators 

in New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) held out 

for a limit of 1,550 deployed strategic warheads rather than the 

U.S. proposal of 1,500, though Russian resistance to 1,500 could 

have been due to Moscow’s reluctance to accept the opening U.S. 

proposal.

3. Alexei Arbatov, “Gambit or Endgame? The New State 

of Arms Control,” Moscow, Russia: Carnegie Moscow Center, 

March 2011, p. 14.

4. The Pentagon has yet to say whether its force will include 

400 ICBMs and 60 bombers or 420 ICBMs and 40 bombers. Since 

the Air Force plans to deploy only single-warhead ICBMs and 

New START counts each bomber as one warhead, the decision 

will not affect the deployed strategic warhead count.

5. Exchange with Hans Kristensen, June 2011.

6. Hans M. Kristensen and Robert Norris, “Russian Nuclear 

Forces, 2011,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Vol. 67, No. 3, May 

2011, pp. 71-73.

7. This is the “nominal load” of warheads that could be carried by Russian nonstrategic delivery systems; the total Russian 

nonstrategic nuclear inventory is believed to be in the range of 

3,700-5,400 warheads.

8. “Russian Nuclear Forces, 2011.” Note that it is unclear 

whether or not there is a nuclear warhead for the Russian Iskandr 

ground-based surface-to-surface missile.

9. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, Information and Press Department, “Statement by H.E. Mr. Sergey 

Lavrov, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, 

at the Plenary meeting of the Conference on Disarmament, Geneva, Switzerland, March 1, 2011,” available from www.ln.mid.ru/
89

bdomp/brp_4.nsf/e78a48070f128a7b43256999005bcbb3/2de66a92e764

dbb8c3257846004dfd44!OpenDocument.

10. Some Russian statements go further, suggesting that the 

withdrawal of U.S. nuclear weapons from Europe must be accompanied by elimination of any nuclear infrastructure on the territory of European members of the North Atlantic Treaty Oganization (NATO) and an end to NATO nuclear exercises.

11. Conversation with senior Russian foreign ministry official, May 2011.

12. See, for example, “Gambit or Endgame,” pp. 31-33; and 

Anatoliy S. Diakov, “Verified Reductions in Non-Strategic Nuclear 

Weapons,” Moscow, Russia: Center for Arms Control, Energy and 

Environmental Studies, Moscow Institute for Physics and Technology, February 18, 2011, available from www.armscontrol.ru/. 

13. See, for example, “Russia Says Too Early to Talk about Tactical Nuclear Weapons with United States,” RIA Novosti, January 29, 

2011, available from en.rian.ru/mlitary_news/20110129/162362622.

html.

14. Conversation with senior Russian foreign ministry official, May 2011.

15. Conversation with senior Russian diplomat, August 2011.

16. In 2007, Russia’s last data declaration before it suspended 

its observance of the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty reported 5,063 main battle tanks. NATO’s January 2009 data 

declaration reported 12,486. See Dorn Crawford, “Conventional 

Armed Forces in Europe (CFE): A Review and Update of Key 

Treaty Elements,” U.S. Department of State, March 2009.

17. See Roger N. McDermott, “Russia’s Conventional Military 

Weakness and Substrategic Nuclear Policy,” Fort Leavenworth, 

KS: The Foreign Military Studies Office, pp. 19-22, for a more detailed discussion of the Russian military’s 10-year procurement 

plan and the challenges that it faces.
90

18. Anatoly Medetsky, “Medvedev Threatens to Start Importing Arms,” Moscow Times, July 13, 2011, available from www.

themoscowtimes.com/news/article/medvedev-threatens-to-startimporting-arms/440428.html.

19. “Gambit or Endgame?,” pp. 19-23.

20. Conversation with senior Russian foreign ministry official, May 2011.

21. Conversation with U.S. Strategic Command officers, August 2010.

22. Keir Giles, “Where Have All the Soldiers Gone? Russia’s 

Military Plans versus Demographic Reality,” Shrivenham, UK: 

Conflict Studies Research Centre, Defence Academy of the United 

Kingdom, October 2006, p. 2.

23. See “Russia’s Conventional Military Weakness and Substrategic Nuclear Policy,” pp. 14-17, for a discussion of the ups 

and downs of the Russian military’s latest reform effort.

24. Andrei Kokoshin, “Ensuring Strategic Stability in the Past 

and Present: Theoretical and Applied Questions,” Cambridge, 

MA: Harvard Kennedy School, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, 2011, p. 57.

25. “The Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation,” approved by Russian Presidential Edict on February 5, 2010.

26. It is expected that the SM-3 Bloc IIB will be liquid-fueled in 

order to achieve the desired velocity to engage ICBMs; that may 

mean that Bloc IIB interceptors are deployed only onshore, as the 

U.S. navy traditionally prefers solid-fueled missiles for fire safety 

reasons.

27. Conversations with U.S. Government officials, July 2011.

28. This column assumes that the United States chooses to 

keep 420 deployed Minuteman III ICBMs, which will require that 

deployed U.S. nuclear-capable bombers be reduced to 40. If the 
91

Department of Defense (DoD) were to choose to keep more than 

40 bombers (it has said it may keep up to 60), it would have to 

reduce one deployed Minuteman III for each bomber over 40.

29. This column is based on calculations by Pavel Podvig, 

“New START Treaty in Numbers,” Russian Strategic Nuclear 

Forces, available from russianforces.org/blog/2010/03/new_start_

treaty_in_numbers.shtml. A different calculation provided to the 

author by Hans M. Kristensen in July 2010 projected a total of 

403 Russian deployed ICBMs, SLBMs, and heavy bombers attributed with 1,349 warheads under New START. Some DoD officials question whether the Russians would reduce their deployed 

strategic weapons so low, noting that the Russians originally proposed a strategic warhead limit of 1,675 and did not accept the 

U.S.-proposed limit of 1,500, agreeing in the end to a limit of 1,550. 

The Russian government has not publicly described its intended 

strategic force structure under New START, and the U.S. Government has not produced an unclassified estimate of that structure. 

30. U.S. views on this will likely be affected by the views of 

NATO allies. Some allies feel strongly that a U.S. nuclear presence 

should remain in Europe; whether or not they would be comfortable with the removal of those weapons would depend in part 

on the nature of the reductions taken on the Russian side and on 

other steps that NATO might take to assure them of the Alliance’s 

commitment to their security.

93

CHAPTER 3

RUSSIAN VIEWS ON NUCLEAR WEAPONS

AND GLOBAL ZERO:

IMPLICATIONS AND CONSEQUENCES

Peter R. Huessy

Russia sees “Global Zero”—the effort to move the 

world’s nuclear powers to eliminate all their nuclear 

weapons—as a means for the United States to enhance 

the effectiveness of its own conventional capability. 

Ironically, U.S. analysts have echoed this, claiming 

that Global Zero, which they support, “would make it 

easier for the U.S. to defend allies and interests overseas.”1

In addition, while advocates of U.S. movement 

toward zero nuclear weapons often speak of the immorality of the United States maintaining thousands 

of nuclear weapons both deployed and stockpiled, the 

Russians do not see moral delinquency or hypocrisy 

in their own maintenance of 5,000 or more tactical or 

strategic nuclear weapons. 

Given this difference in views, it is highly uncertain whether the U.S. pursuit of more nuclear arms 

control beyond the New Strategic Arms Reduction 

Treaty (New START) will strengthen U.S. efforts to 

“isolate Iran” with Russian help. Russia feels no pressure to reduce its nuclear weaponry and is in no rush 

to see U.S. conventional superiority dominate geostrategic relations. 

RUSSIAN VIEWS ON NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY

Russian views on specific nuclear weapons technology also parallel their views on the deployment of 
94

such weapons. Major U.S. efforts have been made for 

the past 30 years to make the strategic balance more 

stable as both the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) (and now Russia) have 

pursued major reductions in nuclear weapons. One of 

the central tenets of the second Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START II) was the elimination of multiple 

warhead land-based missiles. 

As nuclear weapons platforms, (bombers, submarines, and land-based silo-deployed missiles) are reduced in number, the worry was that too few numbers 

would encourage an attack during a crisis, because an 

adversary could see the possibility of eliminating our 

ability to retaliate after suffering an initial attack. So 

there were efforts to reduce warheads while keeping 

the number of “platforms” as high as possible. 

Russian strategic thought has long seen U.S. deployments as threatening, especially missile defenses, 

but Russian development of new nuclear weapons 

is universally described by Moscow as “intended to 

trump” other similar missiles of other nuclear powers.2

 Russia apparently sees little “destabilizing” in the 

deployment of missiles capable of carrying a heavily 

multiple independent reentry vehicled (MIRVed) contingent of warheads. Such weapons are a significant 

portion of its inventory and will probably increase as 

Russia seeks to maintain the deployment of 1,550 warheads allowed by new START but with fewer overall 

platforms.

RUSSIAN VIEWS OF THE UTILITY OF NUCLEAR 

WEAPONS

There is also the factor that the Russians see nuclear weapons as actually “increasing” in utility as their 
95

own conventional capability declines, as opposed to 

a near universal assumption among Global Zero advocates that nuclear weapons have very little actual 

utility in today’s geostrategic environment. Russia 

sees nuclear weapons as a key capability to offset its 

conventional inferiority in the European theater and 

in their near abroad. It sees nuclear weapons as a leveler in its relations with China, as its military analysts 

have repeatedly raised concerns over hegemonic Chinese ambitions in East Asia.

Moscow also sees nuclear weapons as a means of 

practicing peacetime coercion. They have reputedly 

threatened the use of nuclear weapons against eastern 

European and Baltic states to counter cooperative missile defense efforts with the United States. According 

to some Russian commentary, nuclear weapons are 

needed to reverse the prospects of a major conventional defeat. As one top U.S. analyst told me, in Russia’s view, “Nukes on big rockets with lots of room for 

error makes lots of sense.” He concluded our conversation by noting that nuclear weapons allow the Russians to “reign in hell rather than serve in Heaven.”3

DOES CONVENTIONAL WISDOM REFLECT 

ACTUAL RUSSIAN NUCLEAR POLICY?

Alexei Arbatov, in his March 2011 Carnegie Paper 

on Russian nuclear weapons policy, concluded that 

Russia maintains a conservative, not reckless, nuclear 

policy, and will not even be able to deploy up to New 

START ceilings While interested in even further reductions in nuclear weapons, Russia would find that 

such cuts would be impossible because of U.S. deployments of ballistic missile defenses, development 

of new long-range prompt strike, and existing tacti-
96

cal nuclear weapons. Arbtov goes even further with 

the claim that Moscow has to rely on tactical nuclear 

weapons as a counterbalance not only to North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) conventional superiority4

 but also to U.S. strategic nuclear superiority and 

long-range precision-guided weapons. 

This “wisdom” has led such members of Congress 

as Barney Frank and Edward Markey to propose radical and unilateral reductions in U.S. nuclear forces, 

as well as elimination of the entire modernization 

and sustainment funding for the entire U.S. nuclear 

enterprise. Frank5

 has pushed further cuts in U.S. defense spending of $1 trillion, including nuclear forces, 

to a point where the United States would be left with 

160 Minuteman missiles (from the 450 deployed today), seven Trident submarines (from the currently 

deployed 12), and no strategic bombers. Moreover, 

Frank calls for no modernization funding, nor does 

Markey. In fact, Markey claims the United States is 

currently spending some $70 billion a year on nuclear 

weapons and “related” programs, thus justifying a cut 

of $20 billion annually as being only a small price to 

pay to further reduce U.S. spending. But this is utter 

nonsense, of course. 

According to the “Section 1251” report6 submitted 

to the U.S. Senate prior to the final debate on the ratification of the New START treaty, the administration 

pledged that a total of roughly $215 billion would be 

spent over a period of 10 years to “sustain and modernize” the U.S. strategic nuclear deterrents, including the launch platforms on which our warheads are 

deployed, the national laboratories where the sustainment work on the warheads is done, and the stockpile 

stewardship activities. 
97

Cutting $20 billion from these programs would 

essentially eliminate all U.S. nuclear sustainment and 

modernization. Such a draconian step is consistent 

with Markey’s call for a “nuclear freeze,” an echo of 

the Soviet-led nuclear freeze campaign of some 30 

years ago initiated in response to the election of President Ronald Reagan and the initiation of the U.S. strategic modernization effort outlined in the Scowcroft 

Commission report of March 1983.

CONCLUSIONS: TRUTHS AND 

CONSEQUENCES

We have emphasized in the arms control narrative 

that further agreements with Russia on nuclear weapons reductions can be used as leverage by Moscow to 

curtail a host of U.S. defense requirements and capabilities, including prompt global conventional strike, 

missile defenses, and U.S. and allied conventional capabilities.7

 That idea has now morphed into an effort 

within Congress to bring to a halt all further nuclear 

modernization, despite current major Russian nuclear 

modernization.

Ironically, even as Moscow threatens to use its 

significant advantage in tactical nuclear weapons for 

coercion and blackmail in such areas as the geopolitical game over the Caspian basin energy resources, the 

competition to control the flow of oil to China, and 

NATO missile defense deployments, pressure grows 

in the United States to restrain the very U.S. and allied 

military deployments that could guard against such 

Russian adventures. 

Even more worrisome, instead of seeking Russian 

restraint in its own nuclear weapons policy, especially 

its relatively cavalier attitude toward the use of nu-
98

clear weapons, we have tended to look the other way 

on Russian (and Chinese) contributions to nuclear 

proliferation elsewhere especially with regard to Iran, 

Syria, Venezuela, and North Korea, which they see 

keeping in check American power and influence as 

part of their zero-sum security policy perspective.

Understandably, because of the very large tactical 

nuclear weapons advantage of Russia, we have made 

it a central subject of future negotiations with Russia. Russia thus knows it can exact heavy concessions 

in exchange for its promise of movement on tactical 

nuclear weapons. Moreover, it can expect considerable restraint from the United States, as Washington 

promises itself that its own restraint will engender the 

proper response from Moscow.8

We have to remember that Russia begins with an 

attachment to nuclear weapons to guarantee its seat 

at the world power table. The more we grant Moscow 

leverage over an entire range of U.S. military deployments, the more we are cementing current Russian 

policy long into the future.9

SUMMARY

Many domestic analysts have called for major U.S. 

restraint in: (1) deployment of its conventional forces 

in Europe and the Far East; (2) deployment of prompt 

global conventional strike capabilities; (3) acceptance 

of major restrictions on the geographic location and 

number of deployed missile defense interceptors; (4) 

elimination of U.S. upload capability on its strategic 

nuclear force structure; and finally (5) overall serious 

restriction of U.S. space programs to avoid what is 

popularly termed “the weaponization of space.”
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U.S. restraint is needed, so the conventional wisdom goes, primarily to secure Russian cooperation on 

another “arms control deal,” but also to further a policy 

Reset with Moscow which will enable a more cooperative relationship to emerge that helps with key counterproliferation problems with Iran and North Korea.

 In fact, U.S. efforts have also enabled the Russians to 

gain important leverage over U.S. security policy without having to change significantly their own security 

behavior, especially their actions on nuclear weapons 

technology, their declaration of the utility of nuclear 

weapons, and their continued support for state sponsors of terror such as Syria and Iran. In addition, U.S. 

assumptions that Russia shares administration support for Global Zero are seriously wrong, as Russia is 

using the U.S. pursuit of that lofty goal as a means of 

securing U.S. restraint in U.S. nuclear modernization 

and deployment of U.S. and allied missile defenses.

ENDNOTES - CHAPTER 3

1. Bruce Blair wrote in Arms Control Today that the United 

States must limit its continental United States missile defense interceptors to significantly less than even the 100 allowed by the 

now defunct Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty or the number 

now maintained by Moscow, probably no more than 30-40.

2. On August 10, 2011, Putin announced plans for a new subfired ballistic missile with capability of firing 6-12 warheads per 

missile.

3. A specially upgraded Akula-class submarine has been 

caught trying to record the acoustic signature made by the Vanguard submarines that carry Trident nuclear missiles, with Britain 

recording the highest number of contacts with Russian submarines since 1987 according to the London Telegraph dated August 

28, 2010.
100

4. One wonders what part of the Russian Federation the North 

Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has war plans to invade.

5. The Barney Frank Sustainable Defense Task Force, July 

2010, or what I term the “Sing Kubaya” Option.

6. This report was submitted to Congress on May 13, 2010, 

pursuant to Section 1251 of the National Defense Authorization 

Act for Fiscal Year 2010 (Public Law 111-84) and thus is known as 

the “1251 Report.”

7. James Acton and Michael Gerson, “Beyond New Start,” 

Arms Control Today, September 2011: “Russia is increasingly concerned with U.S. conventional capability, long range prompt conventional strike, weaponization of space, our upload capability 

on our strategic forces and ballistic missile capability” and thus 

is “reluctant to engage in further arms control.” Russian Duma 

members have told me in private conversations they wish to curtail exactly those four areas of development. These concerns are 

then used by U.S. analysts as “proof” that such U.S. restraint will 

bring about the new agreements we seek.

8. Gerson and Acton say U.S. restraint on development has 

led to Russian cooperation on United Nations sanctions on Iran 

and “may help garner greater international support for nonproliferation initiatives. . . .”

9. Geopolitics and Crisis in the Caucasus: From Chyzmyz, January 

20, 2010:

Although military confrontation between Russia and the 

Western great powers in the Caucasus is unlikely, current power projection by both sides will create an unstable situation in the region, threatening peace and security 

in one of the mostly volatile regions of the contemporary 

world. Indeed, one point is certain: Russia will no longer 

tolerate any security arrangements between the Caucasian states and the outside powers as it sees such arrangements as an encroachment of its immediate security 

environment.
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ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

STEPHEN J. BLANK has served as the Strategic Studies Institute’s authority on the Soviet bloc and the postSoviet world since 1989. Prior to that he was Associate

Professor of Soviet Studies at the Center for Aerospace 

Doctrine, Research, and Education, Maxwell Air Force 

Base, Alabama, and taught at the University of Texas, 

San Antonio, and the University of California, Riverside. Dr. Blank is the editor of Imperial Decline: Russia’s 

Changing Position in Asia, coeditor of Soviet Military 

and the Future, and author of The Sorcerer as Apprentice: Stalin’s Commissariat of Nationalities, 1917-1924. He 

has also written many articles and conference papers 

on Russia, the Commonwealth of Independent States, 

and Eastern European security issues. Dr. Blank’s current research deals with proliferation and the revolution in military affairs, and energy and security in 

Eurasia. His two most recent books are Russo-Chinese 

Energy Relations: Politics in Command, London, UK: 

Global Markets Briefing, 2006; and Natural Allies? Regional Security in Asia and Prospects for Indo-American 

Strategic Cooperation, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2005. Dr. Blank holds 

a B.A. in history from the University of Pennsylvania, 

and an M.A. and Ph.D. in history from the University 

of Chicago.

PETER R. HUESSY is President of Geostrategic Analysis, and Senior Fellow in National Security at the 

American Foreign Policy Council, and Senior Defense 

Consultant to the Air Force Association. 
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JACOB W. KIPP currently is an Adjunct Professor at 

the University of Kansas and a weekly columnist on 

Eurasian Security of the Jamestown Foundations. He 

served for many years at the Foreign Military Studies 

Office (FMSO) at Ft. Leavenworth, KS.

STEVEN PIFER (Ambassador, Ret.) is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Center on the United States and 

Europe and Director of the Brookings Arms Control 

Initiative. He focuses on arms control, Russia, and 

Ukraine. He has offered commentary regarding Russia, Ukraine, and arms control issues on CNN, Fox 

News, National Public Radio, and Voice of America.
U.S. ARMY WAR COLLEGE

Major General Anthony A. Cucolo III

Commandant

*****

STRATEGIC STUDIES INSTITUTE

Director

Professor Douglas C. Lovelace, Jr.

Director of Research

Dr. Antulio J. Echevarria II

Editor

Dr. Stephen J. Blank

Director of Publications

Dr. James G. Pierce

Publications Assistant

Ms. Rita A. Rummel

*****

Composition

Mrs. Jennifer E. Nevil