Tuesday, Nov 04, 2003
Russia flexes its muscles
By Vladimir Radyuhin
Reference to pre-emptive use of force is a new element in Russia's defence strategy. It sends a clear warning to the U.S. to accept Russia's dominant role in the former Soviet states.
SIX MONTHS after the United States led the war against Iraq, Russia has come up with a tough response to Washington's new interventionism, vowing to use military force to uphold its strategic interests, and unveiling plans for an all-round defence build-up.
A new defence policy paper prepared by the Defence Ministry makes it clear that Russia is putting enhanced emphasis on military power in reaction to the U.S. President, George W. Bush's doctrine of using military force against sovereign nations without U.N. mandate.
"Attempts to dilute the role of the U.N. Security Council and the growing practice of using armed forces on the basis of national decisions are viewed as a dangerous trend that could create a serious threat to Russia's political and military interests," the defence paper said.
Russia is also concerned over NATO's continuing "anti-Russian" thrust and plans to redeploy military bases from Western Europe to the newly admitted members in Eastern Europe, as well as to the former Soviet Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, which are to join NATO next year. This will put NATO aircraft within a three-minute flight of St. Petersburg. Russia "expects the alliance to remove all direct and indirect anti-Russian elements from its defence planning and political declarations made by its members," the Russian defence policy paper warned. If, however, NATO retains its "offensive military doctrine", this will prompt a "thorough reformation of military planning", and a "change of Russian nuclear strategy".
The new defence concept presented in Moscow last month says Russia is ready to use military force to defend its interests in the former Soviet states. "The CIS is an extremely important security zone for Russia," the Russian Defence Minister, Sergei Ivanov, said explaining Moscow's new defence policy. "Russia retains the right to preventive use of military force, including in the CIS countries," the defence chief said. Russia could deliver pre-emptive strikes not only if threatened militarily, but also if faced with attempts "to limit Russia's access to regions that are essential for its survival, or those that are important from an economic or financial point of view."
Reference to pre-emptive use of force is a new element in Russia's defence strategy that was absent from the military doctrine adopted in 2000. It sends a clear warning to the U.S. to accept Russia's dominant role in the former Soviet states. The U.S. intrusion into Russia's traditional turf worries Moscow more and more. What began as temporary American military presence in Central Asia endorsed by Russia to facilitate the anti-terror war in Afghanistan, far from winding up, is expanding today. In addition to airbases in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, the U.S. is helping Kazakhstan set up a naval base on the Caspian Sea close to the Russian border and is seeking to lease three military bases in Tajikistan. Washington is stepping up military-technical assistance to former Soviet states in Central Asia, conducts regular war games with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan under NATO's Partnership for Peace programme, and has launched officer training programmes for Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.
Control of energy resources is the main driving motive behind American push into Central Asia and the Caucasus. Earlier this year Washington openly, if unsuccessfully, pressed Georgia and Azerbaijan to turn down tie-up proposals from the Russian natural gas monopoly, Gazprom, on the grounds that they may jeopardise U.S.-lobbied pipeline projects in the region. Washington has signed a defence cooperation pact with Georgia, is helping Azerbaijan boost its naval power in the row with Iran over the sharing of Caspian oil fields, and has offered military assistance to Armenia. It has also warned Ukraine not to join a single economic zone with Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus. Following up on the publication of its new defence concept, Russia opened an airbase in Kyrgyzstan last week, which will enable it to quickly deploy large air and ground forces in the region. This is the first military base Russia has set up abroad since the collapse of the Soviet Union 12 years ago, but not the last one, Russian officials said.
"We have closed down our bases in Cuba and Vietnam, but have boosted and will further boost our presence in the Commonwealth of Independent States," Mr. Ivanov said stressing that Russia maintained military presence in 10 out of 12 CIS countries. He reminded the U.S. that it had promised to shut down military bases in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan after the operation in Afghanistan has been completed.
"We did not object [to the bases], but set a condition that they operate only as long as it takes to stabilise the situation in Afghanistan," Mr. Ivanov told a NATO conference in Colorado Springs, U.S. Russia's new assertiveness towards the former Soviet republics is part of a broader revision of its defence doctrine post-9/11.
"We are against this policy [of pre-emptive strikes without the U.N. approval]. But if this practice continues to be asserted in international relations, Russia retains the right to act in the same way," the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, said in an interview to Al-Jazeera TV last week. Russia is also reviving the concept of nuclear deterrence. During a high-profile visit to the Federal Nuclear Centre in August the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, said that n uclear weapons "are have been and remain the basis of Russia's security" and asserted that Russia "must and will remain a great nuclear power."
The new defence policy calls for deploying newest land and submarine-based strategic missiles to replace the old missiles as they are decommissioned, for upgrading the nuclear-capable long-range bombers, the Tu-160s, and increasing funding for the development of more sophisticated missile systems.
Speaking at the presentation of the defence paper, Mr. Putin announced the impending deployment of "dozens" of the Soviet era's most powerful missiles, the SS-19 "Stiletto" armed with six nuclear warheads each. The mothballed missiles would be put on duty to phase out the aged missiles and would remain in service till the mid-2030s.
"Their capability to overcome any anti-missile defence is unrivalled," the Russian leader stressed. Russia is also developing a "fundamentally new missile system", which will take 10 to 15 years to build, according to the Strategic Rocket Forces Commander, General Nikolai Solovtsov.
There is also a provision for a gradual restructuring from a conscript to an all-volunteer army, creation of mobile "units of permanent readiness," and development of high-precision conventional weapons, reconnaissance, targeting and automatic command and control systems.
Russia has declared that the strength of its armed forces will now depend on the tasks assigned to them. "The armed forces build-up and military planning will henceforth be geared to geopolitical needs and defence sufficiency, rather than to the available potential," the new defence doctrine said. Contrary to earlier plans, there will be no further troop reductions from the current level of 1.1 million servicemen.
For the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia has projected a global role for its armed forces as "the factor in preventing the final collapse of the system of international relations based on international law." "It is the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation that can ensure global stability in the broader sense of this term," the paper said.
At the same time the defence policy paper ruled out an all-out confrontation with the West.
"A global nuclear war and large-scale conventional wars with NATO or another U.S.-led coalition have been excluded from the spectrum of the most probable conflicts for which the Russian Armed Forces prepare." This has opened the way for "substantive reductions in the nuclear and conventional arms without jeopardising the security of the nation."
The paper hailed military-to-military contacts with NATO and called for development of a "strategic partnership" with the U.S. on the basis of "strict adherence to international law and the primacy of Russia's national interests." However, it is not the new detente but the resurgence of the military factor in international relations that has inspired Russia's defence policy revision.
"Contrary to the many predictions that prevailed in the early 1990s, the significance of military force has not decreased in the post-bipolar world," the defence paper said. "On the contrary, the beginning of the 21st century has seen the military force assume increased role in promoting the countries' political and economic interests amid a severe crisis of global security institutions."
This admission marks the final parting of the Russian leadership with the illusion that the end of the Cold War would also signal an end to great-power rivalry.
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