Authored by Daryl G. Kimball on July
15, 2019
Russian pursuit of the 9M729 intermediate-range missile, which is banned under the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, is unacceptable and merits a strong response. But NATO Secretary-General Stoltenberg’s formula, as expressed in a new op-ed published in the German-language Frankfurter Allgemeine, is inadequate.
In his July 14 essay, the
Secretary-General embraces the Trump administration’s decision to terminate the
treaty August 2 without a realistic plan to help resolve the long-running
compliance dispute. This move, combined with the possibility of new U.S.
ground-launched cruise missiles in Europe—is risky and unwise as it opens the
door to a new phase of destabilizing INF missile competition with Russia.
Furthermore, Stoltenberg fails to
mention that U.S. officials have refused thus far
to take up Russia’s offer to discuss “any mutually beneficial proposals that
take into account the interests and concerns of both parties.”
Options that address Russian concerns
about U.S. missile defense launchers in Romania and Poland—which are capable of
firing offensive missiles—and that encourage the verifiable elimination of
Russian noncompliant cruise missiles might have resolved the INF Treaty
dispute. Failure by both sides to take such diplomatic engagement more seriously
since the 9M729 (aka the SSC-8) missile was first tested five years ago has
bought us to this point.
The Secretary-General reiterates his
pledge that "NATO allies have no intention of developing and deploying
medium-range nuclear land-based missiles in Europe. We will not reflect the
behavior of Russia. Because we do not want a new arms race and we remain
committed to effective arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation.”
These words may sound reassuring, but
Stoltenberg fails to mention that NATO will soon entertain an American scheme to deploy
ground-launched cruise missiles and other intermediate-range missiles in Europe. The Trump administration is pressing Congress for
$100 million for a program to develop and test the missiles. The Department of
Defense plans to begin flight testing a ground-based variant of its Tomahawk
ground-launched cruise missile (GLCM) just a few weeks after it pulls out of the
INF Treaty August 2.
By seeking to deploy new,
intermediate-range missiles in Europe, the Trump administration wants to
counter Russia's 50-75 nuclear-capable, but very likely conventionally-armed,
9M729 ground-launched cruise missiles that have been deployed so far. Given
that the United States and NATO forces current can hold hundreds of key Russian
military targets at risk using their existing array of sea-, land-, and
air-based conventional strike weapons and missiles, new U.S. intermediate-range
missiles are militarily unnecessary.
Contrary to Stoltenberg’s assurances,
any agreement by NATO to deploy U.S. conventionally-armed, ground-launched
cruise missiles in Europe would indeed “reflect the behavior of Russia."
Russia would undoubtedly see any such
missile deployment, whether with conventional or nuclear warheads, as a direct
threat to its leadership and command-and-control centers — and NATO’s eastward
expansion allows these weapons to be placed on the Russian doorstep and where
they could hit key targets within minutes.
Russia would very likely respond in
kind with more intermediate-range missiles. If both sides begin to deploy
intermediate-range ballistic missiles and ground-launched cruise missiles,
Europe will be less secure and the risk of a military incident or
miscommunication leading to a full-scale war with Russia will increase.
Furthermore, Stoltenberg claims that
NATO remains committed to effective arms control, but he fails to endorse the
preservation of the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), which
will expire in 2021 if Presidents Trump and Putin do not agree to extend it as
allowed under Article XIV of the agreement. The treaty verifiably limits the
long-range nuclear weapons of the Russian Federation and the United States to
no more than 1,550 warheads and 700 delivery systems each.
Although Washington acknowledges
Moscow is abiding by the treaty, Trump has not decided to extend the agreement,
and his treaty-averse National Security
Advisor John Bolton says an extension is “unlikely." Without INF and without New START, there would
be no legally-binding limits on the world’s two largest nuclear arsenals for
the first time since 1972.
A new and more serious NATO
commitment to arms control is needed to protect Europe and the United States.
NATO could declare as a bloc that no alliance members will field any INF
Treaty-prohibited missiles or any equivalent new nuclear capabilities in Europe
so long as Russia does not deploy treaty-prohibited systems where they could
hit NATO territory.
This would require Russia to
dismantle or move at least some currently deployed 9M929 missiles. As the
United States and Russia dispute the range of that missile, perhaps they could
agree to bar deployments west of the Ural mountains. The U.S. and Russian presidents
could agree to this “no-first INF missile deployment plan” through an executive
agreement that would be verified through national technical means of
intelligence and monitoring mechanisms available through the Open Skies Treaty
and Vienna Document.
Finally, if the NATO
secretary-general is truly “committed to effective arms control,” he, along
with all NATO members, need to join the European Union—as well as leading independent nuclear security experts
from around the world—in calling upon the United States work with Russia to
extend New START by five-years and pursue new negotiations to further reduce
excessive strategic, intermediate, and tactical nuclear weapons arsenals in
Russia, the United States, and Europe.
Contact: Daryl Kimball, Executive Director, (202) 463-8270
x107; Kingston Reif, Director for Disarmament and Threat
Reduction Policy, (202) 463-8270 x104
Updated: February 2019
Over the past four decades, American
and Soviet/Russian leaders have used a progression of bilateral agreements and
other measures to limit and reduce their substantial nuclear warhead and
strategic missile and bomber arsenals. The following is a brief summary.
Strategic Nuclear Arms Control
Agreements
Begun in November 1969, by May 1972,
the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) had produced both the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which limited strategic missile defenses to 200
(later 100) interceptors each, and the Interim Agreement, an executive
agreement that capped U.S. and Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles
(ICBM) and submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) forces. Under the
Interim Agreement, both sides pledged not to construct new ICBM silos, not to
increase the size of existing ICBM silos “significantly,” and capped the number
of SLBM launch tubes and SLBM-carrying submarines. The agreement ignored
strategic bombers and did not address warhead numbers, leaving both sides free
to enlarge their forces by deploying multiple warheads (MIRVs) onto their ICBMs
and SLBMs and increasing their bomber-based forces. The agreement limited the
United States to 1,054 ICBM silos and 656 SLBM launch tubes. The Soviet Union
was limited to 1,607 ICBM silos and 740 SLBM launch tubes. In June 2002, the
United States unilaterally withdrew from the ABM treaty.
SALT II
SALT II
In November 1972, Washington and
Moscow agreed to pursue a follow-on treaty to SALT I. SALT II, signed in June
1979, limited U.S. and Soviet ICBM, SLBM, and strategic bomber-based nuclear
forces to 2,250 delivery vehicles (defined as an ICBM silo, a SLBM launch tube,
or a heavy bomber) and placed a variety of other restrictions on deployed
strategic nuclear forces. The agreement would have required the Soviets to
reduce their forces by roughly 270 delivery vehicles, but U.S. forces were
below the limits and could actually have been increased. However, President
Jimmy Carter asked the Senate not to consider SALT II for its advice and
consent after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in December 1979, and the
treaty was not taken up again. Both Washington and Moscow subsequently pledged
to adhere to the agreement’s terms despite its failure to enter into force.
However, on May 26, 1986, President Ronald Reagan said that future decisions on
strategic nuclear forces would be based on the threat posed by Soviet forces
and not on "a flawed SALT II Treaty.”
START I
START I
The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty
(START I), first proposed in the early 1980s by President Ronald Reagan and
finally signed in July 1991, required the United States and the Soviet Union to
reduce their deployed strategic arsenals to 1,600 delivery vehicles, carrying
no more than 6,000 warheads as counted using the agreement’s rules. The
agreement required the destruction of excess delivery vehicles which was
verified using an intrusive verification regime that involved on-site
inspections, the regular exchange of information, including telemetry, and the
use of national technical means (i.e., satellites). The agreement’s entry into
force was delayed for several years because of the collapse of the Soviet Union
and ensuing efforts to denuclearize Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus by
returning their nuclear weapons to Russia and making them parties to the nuclear
Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and START I agreements. START I reductions were
completed in December 2001 and the treaty expired on Dec. 5, 2009.
START II
START II
In June 1992, Presidents George H. W.
Bush and Boris Yeltsin agreed to pursue a follow-on accord to START I. START
II, signed in January 1993, called for reducing deployed strategic arsenals to
3,000-3,500 warheads and banned the deployment of destabilizing
multiple-warhead land-based missiles. START II would have counted warheads in
roughly the same fashion as START I and, also like its predecessor, would have
required the destruction of delivery vehicles but not warheads. The agreement's
original implementation deadline was January 2003, ten years after signature,
but a 1997 protocol moved this deadline to December 2007 because of the
extended delay in ratification. Both the Senate and the Duma approved START II,
but the treaty did not take effect because the Senate did not ratify the 1997 protocol
and several ABM Treaty amendments, whose passage the Duma established as a
condition for START II’s entry into force. START II was effectively shelved as
a result of the 2002 U.S. withdrawal from the ABM treaty.
START III Framework
START III Framework
In March 1997, Presidents Bill
Clinton and Boris Yeltsin agreed to a framework for START III negotiations that
included a reduction in deployed strategic warheads to 2,000-2,500.
Significantly, in addition to requiring the destruction of delivery vehicles,
START III negotiations were to address “the destruction of strategic nuclear
warheads…to promote the irreversibility of deep reductions including prevention
of a rapid increase in the number of warheads.” Negotiations were supposed to
begin after START II entered into force, which never happened.
SORT (Moscow Treaty)
SORT (Moscow Treaty)
On May 24, 2002, Presidents George W.
Bush and Vladimir Putin signed the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (SORT
or Moscow Treaty) under which the United States and Russia reduced their
strategic arsenals to 1,700-2,200 warheads each. The warhead limit took effect
and expired on the same day, Dec. 31, 2012. Although the two sides did not
agree on specific counting rules, the Bush administration asserted that the
United States would reduce only warheads deployed on strategic delivery
vehicles in active service, i.e., “operationally deployed” warheads, and would
not count warheads removed from service and placed in storage or warheads on
delivery vehicles undergoing overhaul or repair. The agreement’s limits are
similar to those envisioned for START III, but the treaty did not require the
destruction of delivery vehicles, as START I and II did, or the destruction of
warheads, as had been envisioned for START III. The treaty was approved by the
Senate and Duma and entered into force on June 1, 2003. SORT was replaced by
New START on February 5, 2011.
New START
New START
On April 8, 2010, the United States
and Russia signed New START, a legally binding, verifiable agreement that
limits each side to 1,550 strategic nuclear warheads deployed on 700 strategic
delivery systems (ICBMs, SLBMs and heavy bombers), and limits deployed and
nondeployed launchers to 800. The treaty-accountable warhead limit is 30
percent lower than the 2,200 upper limit of SORT, and the delivery vehicle
limit is 50 percent lower than the 1,600 allowed in START I. The treaty has a
verification regime that combines elements of START I with new elements
tailored to New START. Measures under the treaty include on-site inspections
and exhibitions, data exchanges and notifications related to strategic
offensive arms and facilities covered by the treaty, and provisions to
facilitate the use of national technical means for treaty monitoring. The
treaty also provides for the continued exchange of telemetry (missile
flight-test data on up to five tests per year) and does not meaningfully limit
missile defenses or long-range conventional strike capabilities. The U.S.
Senate approved New START on Dec. 22, 2010. The approval process of the Russian
parliament (passage by both the State Duma and Federation Council) was completed
Jan. 26, 2011. The treaty entered into force on Feb. 5, 2011 and will expire in
2021, though both parties may agree to extend the treaty for a period of up to
five years. Both parties met the treaty’s central limits by the Feb. 4, 2018
deadline for implementation.
Strategic
Nuclear Arms Control Agreements
00
*On Feb. 2, 2019, both
the United States and Russia announced they were suspending their obligations to the treaty.
**New START allows for the option to
extend the treaty beyond 2021 for a period of up to five years.
Nonstrategic Nuclear Arms Control
Measures
Signed Dec. 8, 1987, the INF Treaty
required the United States and the Soviet Union to verifiably eliminate all
ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges between 500 and 5,500
kilometers. Distinguished by its unprecedented, intrusive inspection regime,
including on-site inspections, the INF Treaty laid the groundwork for verification
of the subsequent START I. The INF Treaty entered into force June 1, 1988, and
the two sides completed their reductions by June 1, 1991, destroying a total of
2,692 missiles. The agreement was multilateralized after the breakup of the
Soviet Union, and current active participants in the agreement include the
United States, Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine. Turkmenistan and
Uzbekistan are also parties to the agreement but do not participate in treaty
meetings or on-site inspections. The ban on intermediate-range missiles is of
unlimited duration.
Both the United States and Russia
have raised concerns about the other side’s compliance with the INF Treaty. The
United States first publicly charged Russia with developing and testing a
ground-launched cruise with a range that meets the INF Treaty definition of a
ground-launched cruise missile with a range capability of 500 km to 5,500 km in
2014.
Russia denies that it is breaching
the agreement and has raised its own concerns about Washington’s compliance.
Moscow is charging that the United States is placing a missile defense launch
system in Europe that can also be used to fire cruise missiles, using targets
for missile defense tests with similar characteristics to INF Treaty-prohibited
intermediate-range missiles, and is making armed drones that are equivalent to
ground-launched cruise missiles. On Oct. 20, 2018 President Donald Trump
announced his intention to “terminate” the agreement citing Russian
noncompliance and concerns about China’s missiles, and on Dec. 4, Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo declared Russia in “material breach” of the treaty. The
Trump administration provided official notice to the other treaty
states-parties on Feb. 2, that it would both suspend its obligations
to the treaty and withdraw from the agreement in six months—per the treaty's
terms—and "terminate" the agreement. The administration has stated
that it may reverse the withdrawal if Russia returns to compliance by
eliminating its ground-launched 9M729 missile, which the United States alleges
is the noncompliant missile which can fly beyond the 500-kilometer range limit
set by the treaty.
On Sept. 27, 1991, President George
H. W. Bush announced that the United States would remove almost all U.S.
tactical (nonstrategic) nuclear forces from deployment so that Russia could
undertake similar actions, reducing the risk of nuclear proliferation as the
Soviet Union dissolved. Specifically, Bush said the United States would
eliminate all its nuclear artillery shells and short-range nuclear ballistic
missile warheads and remove all nonstrategic nuclear warheads from surface
ships, attack submarines, and land-based naval aircraft. Soviet leader Mikhail
Gorbachev reciprocated on Oct. 5, pledging to eliminate all nuclear artillery
munitions, nuclear warheads for tactical missiles, and nuclear landmines. He
also pledged to withdraw all Soviet tactical naval nuclear weapons from deployment.
Under these initiatives, the United States and Russia reduced their deployed
nonstrategic stockpiles by an estimated 5,000 and 13,000 warheads,
respectively. However, significant questions remain about Russian
implementation of its pledges, and there is considerable uncertainty about the
current state of Russia’s tactical nuclear forces. The Defense Department
estimates that Russia possess roughly 2,000 non-strategic nuclear weapons and
the numbers are expanding. The United States maintains several hundred
nonstrategic B61 gravity bombs for delivery by short-range fighter aircraft.
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