... Treaty does not differentiate between nuclear-tipped and conventional missiles. When it was drafted and signed, medium- and short-range missiles were primarily a threat due to their ability to carry nuclear warheads. Even with a range of several thousand kilometres they would ensure guaranteed destruction of their targets with warheads yielding hundreds of kilotons. Today, such missiles are of interest to current and potential owners as conventional munitions too (in fact, their conventional role ...
... lead to several outcomes that appear rather similar from the Russian and US perspectives. True, such a scenario may serve to reinforce perceptions on both sides that the other is an unreliable partner. Yet at the same time, the absence of mutual accusations over alleged INF violations – since the treaty would no longer exist – may lead to a healthier bilateral environment, at least over arms control issues. However, for this to happen Washington must first thoroughly address several concerns ...
In Paris, 100 years after the guns across Europe fell silent, leaders can begin taking important steps to ensure a new and devastating war will not happen today
This weekend marks the 100th anniversary of the end of the First World War, one of the world’s most horrific conflicts. One of the best accounts of how this tragedy began, by the historian Christopher Clark, details how a group of well-meaning European leaders—“The Sleepwalkers”—led their nations into a war with 40 million military and...
ELN Group Statement
Ahead of the meeting of President Putin and President Trump in Paris on November 11th 2018, 79 European political, diplomatic and military leadership figures are appealing to both Russia and the US not to take unilateral action that would jeopardise the future of the INF without further efforts, such a move would likely trigger an arms race and damage the global nuclear non-proliferation regime.
The full statement is reproduced below.
A European response to US withdrawal from...
After Ditching the INF Treaty, the U.S. Risks Further Isolation
Seventeen years ago, in late 2001, the George W. Bush Administration announced the unilateral withdrawal of the United States from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM) that Moscow and Washington, which was signed in 1972 and had served as a foundation of global strategic stability for 30 years. I remember well the tremendous efforts the Russian leadership poured into trying to keep the American side from taking such a step. President...
Perhaps the term “arms control” itself should be revised
Could the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty have been saved? No doubt. American and Russian experts have long discussed allegations of treaty violations in great detail, and there is no shortage of proposals on resolving compliance concerns and giving the treaty a new lease on life. Washington and Moscow are not likely to face any unprecedented security threats that would require the immediate deployment of intermediate-range...
Reaffirming that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought, the United States and Russia could agree to specific steps at Helsinki to reduce nuclear risks
Presidents Trump and Putin will finally meet next week in Helsinki for a bilateral summit. Throughout the Cold War, summits between US and Soviet leaders were overwhelmingly welcomed in both countries and the world as an opportunity to reduce tensions. After the Cold War, these meetings became routine. Today, the scheduling of the...
The old arms control got into its ‘perfect storm’ and though the preservation of the Cold War heritage is indispensable, preservation per se is clearly not sufficient to provide for strategic stability in a completely new global environment
In the aftermath of the 2016 presidential election, the enmity between the U.S. and Russia has reached new highs. However, the intense heat generated by the current Trump–Russia scandal as well as U.S.–Russia tensions over Ukraine and other hot spots risks blinding...
How to achieve mutual U.S. – Russia reductions without reducing the margin of superiority over China and others?
Ilya Kramnik
has shown
that the equations of U.S. and Russian nuclear planning and interests not only do not converge on a potential for new reductions agreements, but rather diverge. The pressures are centrifugal not centripetal; they point to new competitive developments and deployments.
This result, while not in itself catastrophic, is distressing. It entails piecemeal mutual escalation...
... likely to get worse. Terrorist attacks have struck Moscow, Beslan, Ankara, Istanbul, Paris, Nice, Munich, Brussels, London, Boston, New York, Washington, and other cities — and those responsible for carrying them out are determined to strike again. Thousands of people have been killed in Ukraine since 2013, and more are dying in renewed fighting today. Innocent refugees are fleeing the devastating wars in the Middle East and North Africa. And Western-Russian relations are dangerously tense, increasing ...
