Sound off on our Russia launches drive to upgrade its strategic nuclear weapons
Special to World Tribune.com
MIDDLE EAST NEWSLINE
Saturday, April 8, 2000
TEL AVIV -- Russia has changed its benign policy and is directing
scarce funding toward improving its strategic nuclear weapons arsenal, a
leading defense expert says.
Alexei Arbatov, deputy chairman of the Russian parliament's Defense
Committee, said that after several years of neglect the Kremlin is focusing
its energy on rebuilding and improving its strategic nuclear arsenal. He
said this includes billions of dollars into research for new weaponry.
Arbatov said the trigger for the new Russian policy was the U.S.-led
NATO offensive against Yugoslavia in 1999. He said Moscow now regards NATO
as an opponent if not an enemy.
"Now, everything has changed," Arbatov told a Tel Aviv University
conference. "After the war in the Balkans, there was no more talk of
detargetting [the United States]. The Duma [Russian parliament] and the
executive branch drafted a law for long-term allocations for the strategic
forces."
The result, he said, has been a 26 billion ruble increase for such
programs as anti-missile and anti-aircraft defense. He said the goal is to
increase nuclear deterrence and enhance conventional defense against NATO.
But Arbatov acknowledged that Moscow cannot afford to confront both NATO
and fight the current war in Chechnya. He said NATO has a five-fold
superiority in conventional forces and weapons.
Russia now spends 2.8 percent of its gross national product on defense.
To meet Russia's military needs, Arbatov said, Moscow would have to increase
the defense budget to at least 3.5 percent of the GDP.
"The would mean instituting price and wage controls and we would stop
being a market economy," he said.
In Washington, U.S. deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott
acknowledged concern over Russia's new arms policy. "Mr. Putin has also said
he wants to re-establish Russian strength," Talbott told the Senate
Appropriations Committee. "How will he define strength? Will it be in
anachronistic terms of brute strength and the capacity to intimidate
neighbors? Or will, it be in modern terms, relevant to the demands and
opportunities of an era of globalization? Those are questions that virtually
all of Russia's neighbors are asking themselves today."
Friday, April 7, 2000
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