Moscow Can Respond to US ABM Withdrawal
Moscow Interfax 1130 GMT 20 Oct 99
By Interfax observer Vitaliy Denisov
MOSCOW. Oct 20 (Interfax) - Moscow has already worked out plans to counter the consequences of the United States pulling out of the 1972 ABM Treaty, Russian military and diplomatic sources say. They believe that Washington is bound to pull out of the treaty or unilaterally revise its provisions.
This action will harm Russia's interests and increase U.S. superiority, says Col. Gen. Leonid Ivashov, head of the International Military Cooperation Board in the Defense Ministry.
"In purely military terms" Russia can take "retaliatory steps," Col. Gen. Vladimir Yakovlev, commander of Russia's strategic rocketry says. "Russia can take about 20 various steps without a significant increase of costs," in particular resumption of patrols by railroad trains carrying intercontinental ballistic missiles and the removal of restrictions imposed on single-warhead Topol systems by START-1, he said.
"If we remove these restrictions, the Topol's capacity to penetrate anti-ballistic defenses and the power of its warheads will be bolstered," Yakovlev said. He declined to list the other "asymmetric steps" Russia may take if the United States goes ahead and pulls out of the ABM Treaty. "The history of weaponry suggests that the shield is always weaker than the sword," Yakovlev said.
He quoted Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev as saying that the Topol-M can overcome all existing and expected anti- missile systems. "With the production process underway, 20 Topol-M intercontinental ballistic systems will be made next year. Output can be brought up to 30 missiles a year," Yakovlev said.
At the end of 1999 Russian rocketry will have 20 Topol-M missiles deployed.
In purely military terms a U.S. decision to opt out of the ABM Treaty will not significantly reduce the potential of Russian rocketry, some Russian authorities in defense believe. What Moscow planned to do 10 years ago as "an asymmetric response" to the U.S. star wars program can be effectively used today, they say.
The experts seriously doubt the assumptions made by Pentagon analysts that a U.S. nation-wide anti-missile treaty would be capable of intercepting 300 to 350 Russian strategic missiles or that in 2007 - 2010 Russia will not be able to afford maintaining more than 600 to 700 nuclear warheads.
They believe that the United States will need at least six years after the pull-out from the ABM Treaty to deploy a nation- wide system. What is more, some Russian analysts knowledgeable in offensive strategic systems say that the system will not be capable of averting a massive nuclear strike. "Contrary to the myth hammered into the minds of U.S. taxpayers by the Pentagon and the military industrial complex which is looming behind it, any expert in this field knows that a national anti-ballistic system cannot guarantee safety in case of a nuclear strike," they say.
The U.S. pull-out from the ABM Treaty would deal a blow to the entire system of restricting strategic arms, Russian defense specialists say. "If it waives the 1972 ABM Treaty, the United States will effectively undermine the process of restricting nuclear weapons. All the treaties, signed and under negotiation, such as START-1, START-2 and consultations on START-3, will be in jeopardy," Yakovlev believes.
As a result, "Russia and the United States will seem unpredictable to each other. We will pull out of all inspection events and will not allow anybody to see our weapons. Russia will not know what is going on in the United States. The Americans will be unaware of what is going on in Russia," he said.
"What is more, the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty will sustain a serious blow. The collapse of the Russian-U.S. negotiating process will make a strong impact on countries, which already do or intend to have nuclear weapons. The number of nuclear powers will increase," Yakovlev said. If the U.S. does withdraw from the ABM Treaty, the State Duma will not ratify START-2, Russian generals say.
They want the treaty to be strengthened as the core of the entire process of limiting strategic offensive weapons, Ivashov says.
The nuclear safety of both the United States and Russia would be enhanced by setting up centers, which would notify the other side of nuclear attacks, and missile launches, in particular by third countries. Russian President Boris Yeltsin and U.S. President Bill Clinton have called for setting up such centers, one in Colorado Springs and another in the Moscow region.
This proposal was resurrected following last fall's launch by North Korea of a ballistic missile whose flight was not controlled by Moscow or Washington, Yakovlev said.
All space-borne and land-based monitoring tools owned by Russia and the United States should be used to maintain comprehensive and impartial monitoring of all missile launches in the Asian-Pacific Region and in Europe, he thinks. Meanwhile, Russia is monitoring what is going on the Middle East and the south, in particular India and part of the Indian Ocean as well as the West, Yakovlev said.
The ABM Treaty signed by the USSR and the United States in 1972 bans the deployment of nation-wide anti-ballistic missile systems and allows smaller, land-based, systems to cover just one area in either country. In Russia, the successor to the USSR, this is the Moscow region while in the United States it is the area around an intercontinental ballistic missile base in Grand Forks, ND. Each system is allowed to deploy a maximum of 100 launching systems and a maximum of 100 anti-ballistic missiles.
THIS REPORT CONTAINS COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL. COPYING AND DISSEMINATION IS PROHIBITED WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE COPYRIGHT OWNERS.
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
