The Russian State Duma has started building the "last defensive line" in the
path of NATO's eastern expansion, with its Committee on Defense issuing recommendations on the further fate of the main international instrument regulating European security, Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE). Following consultations with the Foreign Ministry and the Defense Ministry, the committee proposed putting off ratification of CFE Adaptation Agreement till "the latter half of this year's fall session." The legislators explain their decision by the fact that the possible accession to NATO of the Baltic countries at the Prague summit of the Alliance planned for September is likely to fundamentally change the existing line-up of forces on Russia's
north-western borders.
The bill on ratification of the CFE Adaptation Agreement came to the Duma as
early as last February. But the Russian military-political beau monde was so
much carried away by the endless negotiations with the U.S. on the May summit and understandings on nuclear weapons and antimissile defense it was supposed to see that it paid almost no attention to that event. Even though, unlike the purely virtual nuclear accords, provisions of the Treaty on Conventional
Armed Forces in Europe concern in the most direct manner the day-to-day activities of the Russian army, be it the operation in Chechnya, re-deployment of bases remaining in Georgia, Transdniestria and Armenia, or revival of Russia's Land Forces in the course of the current stage of the military reform. Moscow had no problem, over the recent years, performing nuclear missile agreements (with U.S. financial aid enabling it to honor its
START-1 and START-2 commitments on arsenal reductions even ahead of schedule), whereas the CFE situation was always much more complicated. Practically at each international meeting, there were always people eager to
remind Russia that it was in arrears on obligations to cut its military presence in Georgia, phase out bases in Transdniestria, etc., which it had assumed at the OSCE summit in Istanbul in 1999. To avoid at least some of those reproaches, the Kremlin suggested that the State Duma ratify the CFE Adaptation Agreement. The Committee on Defense, for its part, called on the president not to rush the issue. It is so far unclear whose point of view will prevail, nor is it who eventually will be the beneficiary. Our refusal to ratify the agreement may be interpreted by the West as yet another sign of Russian obstinacy and an attempt to prevent, by fair means or foul, the NATO
expansion. A rapid ratification can be used against us with as much ease (incidentally, only Ukraine and Belarus performed the procedure since 1999),
allegedly on the grounds that Moscow from now on withdraws all its objections concerning NATO.
The presidential explanatory note that came to the Duma along with the federal bill "On Ratification of the CFE Adaptation Agreement" says this by way of explaining the necessity of that step: "Ratification by the Russian Federation of the adapted treaty will undoubtedly have a favorable "demonstrative effect,' will speed up the launching of ratification procedures in other states." Besides, "It will give us additional leverage with the countries, which link their future to accession to the North Atlantic Alliance." Characteristically, in opposing the immediate ratification, Duma Defense Committee chairman Andrei Nikolayev also refers to the coming NATO expansion, but makes totally different conclusions. According to members of his committee, acceptance to NATO of the Baltic republics, which are not CFE member states, is likely to create an extremely dangerous situation. A "gray zone" is going to arise right on the Russian borders, which will not be regulated by any restrictions whatsoever on the number of arms. Incidentally, official representatives of the Foreign Ministry and the
Defense Ministry, who attended the consultations in the Committee on Defense, had to admit the existence of the problem, although they had been clearly dispatched to the Duma in order to persuade the legislators to ratify the agreement as soon as possible. The Defense Ministry's Nikolai Proshkin of the International Treaty Directorate confessed this: "The Baltic area is a very important issue for us today, particularly so within the context of the second wave of NATO expansion. From the operational-strategic point of view,
it is a crucial region for us. If the three Baltic states join NATO, they must be CFE members, for otherwise there is an uncontrolled "gray zone' emerging, where an unlimited number of conventional weapons may be re-deployed on the de jure basis."