The Hindu http://www.hinduonnet.com/
Saturday, Apr 15, 2006 Opinion - News Analysis Russia to speed up nuclear re-armament http://www.hindu.com/2006/04/15/stories/2006041505161100.htm Vladimir Radyuhin Moscow seeks to counter increasingly aggressive U.S. policies. THOUGH THE Cold War ended over a decade ago, Russia still relies on its nuclear weapons to guarantee the country's security. A top Russian designer of intercontinental missiles said this week that within a decade Russia will overhaul its nuclear arsenal, deploying missiles that will have no rivals for the next 15-20 years and will easily pierce the "star wars" missile shield the United States is building. "Under a [new] weapons procurement programme Russia's land- and sea-based strategic nuclear forces will be effectively re-armed by 2015," Yury Solomonov, Director and Chief Designer of the Moscow Institute of Heat Technology, told a news conference in Moscow. The new weapons programme was to be approved by the middle of the current year, he said. Dr. Solomonov, who designed Russia's newest land-based Topol-M and sea-based Bulava missiles, said these two would constitute the core of the modernised strategic nuclear forces, replacing aging Soviet-built RS-12M, RS-18 and RS-20 missiles. "I assure you that the number of active warheads the strategic nuclear forces will have [in the years to come] will be no less than 2,000," Dr. Solomonov said. This number of warheads will enable Russia to maintain nuclear parity with the U.S. Under a 2002 strategic arms reduction treaty, Russia and the U.S. must cut their nuclear arsenals to between 1,700 and 2,200 warheads each. In the past few years, Russia has made titanic efforts to upgrade its nuclear forces allocating the larger part of its defence budget for the purpose. To make its missiles less vulnerable to an enemy first strike, Russia has built a mobile version of the Topol-M missile mounted on a wheeled chassis. The first mobile regiment consisting of six to 10 Topol-M missiles would be commissioned this year, Dr. Solomonov said. In 2008, Russia would deploy the first 12 Bulava sea-based missiles on the Yury Dolgoruky nuclear submarine now under construction, he said. Russia's new missiles would be armed with six to 10 nuclear warheads each to make sure that even a single missile hit would cause unacceptable damage to a potential enemy. Moscow recently said it had developed a new supersonic manoeuvrable warhead that could penetrate any present or future anti-missile defences. "The Russian people can sleep calmly through 2040," Dr. Solomonov said summing up his overview of the Russian nuclear re-armament programme. Two weeks ago Russia's President Vladimir Putin explained why Russia needed to keep a strong nuclear force to "sleep calmly." "Analysis of the present-day international situation and prospects for its evolution forces Russia to view the nuclear deterrent as the main factor guaranteeing its security," Mr. Putin said at a meeting of top defence and nuclear industry officials. "Keeping a minimum stock of nuclear warheads sufficient to maintain our nuclear deterrent remains a priority for Russia." He did not elaborate, but Moscow's new emphasis on nuclear deterrence comes amid growing clamour in Washington to step up pressure on Russia on the issues of its democracy and assertive foreign policy. The National Security Strategy released by the White House last month warned Russia that its "efforts to prevent democratic development at home and abroad will hamper the development of Russia's relations with the U.S., Europe and its neighbours." A little earlier, the influential U.S. Council on Foreign Relations said Russia was heading in the "wrong direction" that hurts U.S. global interests and concluded that a U.S.-Russian partnership was no longer feasible. Washington has branded Russia's closest ally, Belarus, as "Europe's last dictatorship" and vowed to induct Ukraine into NATO. Last but not least, the U.S. announced plans to deploy an interceptor missile base in Eastern Europe. This will be viewed in Moscow as a patently hostile move as American anti-missiles will arguably be able to shoot down Russian missiles during lift-off. It is against this background that the Kremlin decided to beef up its nuclear arsenal as an essential safeguard against increasingly aggressive American policies.
