By Sergei Karaganov, political expert, Deputy Director, Institute of European Studies under the Russian Academy of Sciences

START-2 facilitates Russia-U.S. cooperation and rapprochement

Russia and the U.S. have signed a new strategic arms reduction treaty. This officially cuts their surplus of arms by one third, but in actual fact, each party will only decommission several dozen such armaments.

If the U.S. Senate and the Russian parliament ratify the agreement, the two countries will restore control over strategic nuclear armaments, making the situation more predictable.
In the course of the negotiations, Russia reached almost all the objectives it could possibly set. The only serious fault, for which we should blame politicians, not the negotiators, is that Russia failed to link the treaty – which the Obama administration was more anxious to reach than Russia – to the obligation to draw and sign a European security treaty, as Russia demands.
Russia did not succeed in reanimating the restrictions on the deployment of strategic missile defense systems. It was impossible anyway, not with the current setup in the U.S. Senate where any rigid constraint on the development of strategic missile defense would have killed all the chances for the ratification of any treaty.

Nor was it possible to secure a de facto ban on the development by the U.S. of high-precision non-nuclear systems capable of destroying strategic facilities. However, these factors will not threaten Russia if it modernizes its nuclear potential, its survivability, and capability to overcome missile defense, and if it makes no further moves to reduce it.
Yet the Treaty is good anyway. It normalizes political relations between the two countries, facilitating further their cooperation and rapprochement. And this is advantageous for Russia. Poor relations with the U.S.A., especially under the Obama administration, would harm almost all main fields of the Russian foreign policy.

The comeback to the center of the strategic armaments, has helped Russia to gaine political weight and highlighted the field in which it remains a superpower. It has also given a strong backing to the political positions of Barack Obama, cast as the most constructive and progressive U.S. president in the past decades, and, possibly for many years to come.

After the treaty had been signed, Washington hosted a nuclear non-proliferation summit, a landmark event for the U.S. administration, which has made the fight against nuclear non-proliferation its trademark policy. Almost all other countries are also keen to contain the threat of proliferation and terrorism. This concerns Russia in the first place as it has potential proliferators and terrorists among its neighbors.

The summit was a success. Russia undertook the commitment to stop the production of weapon-grade plutonium which it had piled up beyond measure. The participants pledged to step up coordination in fighting nuclear terrorism and proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Yet the few accords reached at the summit, though welcome, are not as significant as its political-psychological effect. It creates the impression that world leaders are ready to work together.

Iran, which I am sure is seeking to come in possession of nuclear weapons or the capability to produce them, is likely to encounter a much tougher resistance to its plans. Admittedly, Tehran can hardly be stopped, but the concerted international effort can limit its ambitions and opportunities, set a higher price for other proliferators, and inhibit possible chain reaction of nuclear proliferation in the region.

Yet the debates about the role of nuclear weapons in the modern and future world are only beginning. Regrettably, they are still based on the mentality and concepts inherited from the past. Meanwhile, the recent changes in the world have made it almost unrecognizable, so the adequacy of old concepts is to be challenged.

Just a reminder of these changes:
– An unprecedented shift in the correlation of economic forces in the world;
– Climate change and the new industrial revolution caused an increased competition for natural resources, water, food, and, hence, for territories. The competition will be gaining momentum while taking various forms;
– There began an apparently inevitable proliferation of nuclear weapons (which might be regulated by joint efforts at best). Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea have joined the club of nuclear weapon states;
– New challenges to international security have emerged, such as international terrorism, cyber crime, and piracy. The real impact of these threats is not clear yet;
– The old world governance institutions – the UN, WTO and IMF – have weakened, while the new ones have been lagging behind in their development;
– The role of nation states and regional blocs is reviving – to the detriment of the agencies and institutions of multilateral supranational governance. The remarkable European integration project seems to be unique at the present historical stage; it, too, is experiencing problems;
– The Euroatlantic space, including the former Soviet Union and the Old West remains split, although not as deeply or antagonistically as during the Cold War. In actual fact, the Cold War lingers;
– The growing security vacuums in a number of regions, including the Gulf and the Middle East, are exacerbating the situation;
– A lack of understanding of current events, a sort of intellectual political chaos, aggravates the situation in the military-political sphere. It has changed dramatically, compared with the period of 1945-1990 when the West formulated the modern military-strategic theory, along with its basic concepts of deterrence, expanded deterrence, strategic stability, etc. But the concepts of European universal – one and indivisible – security and of “a common European house,” which have been brought forward to replace them, refuse to take root.

For lack of new ones, old concepts have been offered in the military-strategic field, such as the calls reiterating the “nuclear zero” idea, i.e. the necessity to make the world completely free of nuclear weapons.

President Obama has made this idea his official objective. The recent Treaty and summit have been hailed as moves towards this goal.

I have serious questions regarding this bid. Strengthening the non-proliferation regimes or fighting nuclear terrorism by cutting armaments is one thing, but striving toward “the nuclear zero” is another. They may turn out to be opposite and mutually exclusive objectives.
I believe the “nuclear zero” concept is moral, but senseless.

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 consider: the anti-nuclear movement is harmful. Firstly, it may result in the reduction of nuclear armaments to a dangerous minimum; it opens the “Pandora’s box” of the negotiations over the reduction of non-strategic nuclear armaments. Secondly, it is a distraction from the search for new ways of setting peace and stability in the new world.

Now to the essence of the problem:
Obviously, nuclear weapons are immoral. An A-bomb is millions of times more immoral than a spear or sword, hundreds of thousand times than a rifle, thousands of times than a machine gun, and hundreds of times than salvo systems or cluster bombs.

But there is a significant difference. Unlike other kinds of armaments, nuclear weapons are an effective means of preventing large-scale wars and mass destruction of people – something the humanity has been doing throughout its history with surprising perseverance, destroying peoples, countries and cultures.

To reject nuclear weapons and strive towards their elimination is a moral thing. Yet one has to realize that this goal would be feasible and welcome only if man and humanity have changed. Apparently, the “nuclear zero” advocates believe that such a change is possible. I believe otherwise.

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The full original version was published in Rossiiskaya Gazeta on April 23, 2010