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Russia's war games demonstrating 'nuclear
fist'?
By Sergei Blagov
MOSCOW
- Russia's military has begun large-scale war games -
its largest military maneuvers in two decades -
involving the test-firing of intercontinental ballistic
missiles (ICBMs) and the massive deployment of
long-range strategic bombers. The exercises are intended
to deter unnamed aggressors and they appear to reflect
Russia's increasingly assertive foreign policy, what
some call a "nuclear fist" - yet questions remain about
Russia's first-strike capabilities.
The exercise
is reminiscent of Soviet-era war games held back in
1982, dubbed the "seven-hour nuclear war". Russia
recently indicated the possibility of a first-strike
war, if necessary, to defend Russian interests. Yet
military experts question whether Moscow could indeed
strike first if it felt threatened, and if so, what
would be the target. No potential aggressor was
identified this time, but in previous maneuvers Russian
generals said the obvious target was the United States.
Some observers and critics said the war games
signaled the opening of Russia's election campaign, a
charge vigorously denied. Some said the games already
flopped when a missile failed to fire, another charge
vigorously denied.
On the day of the apparent
flop, President Vladimir Putin boarded the Northern
Fleet Arkhangelsk submarine where he armed 20 ballistic
missiles to observe first-hand the strategic drill on
Tuesday. However, Putin's ride on a nuclear submarine
turned a bit uncomfortable as another Akula-class
submarine, the K-407 Novomoskovsk, did not launch its
RSM-54 missile. It was supposed to be test-fired Tuesday
morning and its dummy warhead was to hit its target at
the Kura missile-receiving facility on the far eastern
coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula.
Novomoskovsk's
failure to launch the missile is likely a great
disappointment to the military, as the submarine
previously had a good record of missile launches - in
1998 it became one of the first submarines to launch a
satellite into space.
Meanwhile, Russia's
Northern Fleet command dismissed speculation there had
been any incidents and denied that any ICBM launches had
been planned for the day. Navy Commander Vladimir
Kuroyedov claimed it was supposed to be a mock launch,
involving just an electronic order to fire an ICBM,
without the missile leaving its launch tube. Kuroyedov
did not elaborate on the value of a mock launch or
clarify why the Russian President was invited to witness
it.
But some Russian media outlets did not
subscribe to the official point of view. The influential
Izvestia daily reported on Wednesday that the drill
ended in failure. On Wednesday, daily Nezavisimaya
Gazeta ridiculed the official version of the war games,
suggesting that Russia basically "asked a potential
aggressor to wait for another day" until the actual
missile launch.
Retired admiral Eduard Baltin,
former commander of the Northern Fleet's division of
nuclear submarines, commented that Russia failed to
demonstrate to a potential aggressor that its nuclear
forces remain in full and constant combat readiness.
Yet despite the problems, the drill was clearly
designed to send a message. The February war games
scenario included the testing of the missile defense
system protecting Moscow, ICBM test launches and
launches of military satellites in a simulation of the
replacement of those satellites lost in military action.
Among other maneuvers, units of the Siberian Military
District and the Volga-Urals Military District are being
deployed westward, while airborne units are being
dispatched by air and rail to unspecified destinations.
The maneuvers also involved Tupolev-195 and
Tupolev-160 Blackjack long-range strategic bombers
test-firing cruise missiles over Russia's Arctic
regions. The supersonic Tu-160 is designed to strike
distant targets with up to 12 missiles. In mid-January
the Tu-160s flew again for the first time since the
entire fleet was grounded after a crash last fall.
The strategic drill was designed "to forestall a
forceful aggression against Russia", Colonel-General
Yury Baluyevsky, first deputy head of general staff, has
announced. The maneuvers "are not the opening of the
election campaign or a demonstration of a nuclear fist",
Baluyevsky said. Russia can not abandon test-firing
ICBM, Baluyevsky said, although he conceded that each
launch costs Russia 300-600 million rubles (US$10-20
million).
It is speculated the February war
games are intended to further boost Putin's popularity
as the March 14 presidential election approaches. The
maneuvers may also serve to back up Russia's
increasingly assertive foreign policy.
The drill
was supposed to end in a victory that would repel
potential "aggressors". Yet such talk of "aggressors"
highlighted the Soviet-style of the war games. The drill
demonstrated that a nuclear conflict with the United
States is still seen as a possibility in Moscow, hence
plans call for it.
But unlike Soviet-era war
games, this time none of the 250 generals involved in
the drill would reveal who the virtual enemy was.
However, some of Russia's top military officials
recently voiced concerns over US missile defense plans.
The fact that units of the Siberian Military District
were being deployed westward during the drill also
indicates that Moscow still sees a threat in the West,
and not in East Asia.
The war games are the
latest in Moscow's series of recent moves designed to
exhibit its strategic deterrent. Last December, the
fourth regiment of Topol-M intercontinental ballistic
missiles was put on combat duty in Tatischevo, central
Russia. Topol-M has been described as a cornerstone of
Russia missile-nuclear shield. The single-warhead RS-12M
Topol-M, which the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO) has nicknamed SS-X-27, can be fired from silos or
from mobile launchers. Eventually, Topol-M mobile
missiles are due to replace 270 silo-based missile
complexes, according to one Russian expert, who conceded
that the Russian army was recently receiving just six
Topol-M missiles a year.
Russia has also moved
to make dozens of previously stored multi-warhead SS-19
ICBMs combt-ready. Last October, President Putin stated
that Russia has SS-19 ICBMs that had been stored without
fuel and had never previously been deployed - and as
such were not part of past disarmament negotiations.
Russians believe that the UR-100N UTTH, also known as
the SS-19 Stilleto, could function for up to 25 more
years and gradually replace decommissioned missiles.
- When the START-I treaty was signed in 1991,
the Soviet Union had a total of 300 SS-19 missiles.
According to the START-II treaty, signed in 1993, Russia
was to dismantle all ground-based ICBMs with multiple
warheads. Under the treaty provisions, a total of 105 of
the SS-19 missiles can be retained provided they are
downloaded to carry only one warhead instead of six.
In May 2002, Putin and US President George W
Bush signed the so-called Moscow Treaty that requires
the two countries to cut the number of warheads on
combat duty to between 1,700 and 2,200 on each side. It
allows both countries to store, rather than dismantle
the warheads. It is the scrapping of the START-II
strategic arms reduction treaty, however, that has
allowed Russia to keep SS-19s on combat duty.
Russia's RT-23UTTH or SS-24 rail missile systems
were subject to elimination under the START-II. However,
following the demise of START-II, after the US backed
out, Russia has reportedly indicated plans to retain one
division of the SS-24 rail mobile missiles. The SS-24 is
cold-launched with 10 warheads each with a yield of 550
kilotons.
Russia now has three missile armies
and 16 divisions that have a total of 735 ICBMs armed
with 3,159 nuclear warheads, according to Russian media
reports.
On October 9, 2003, Putin said that
Russia "retains the right to launch a preemptive strike,
if this practice continues to be used around the world."
Defense Minister Ivanov said Moscow can use preventive
military force in cases where a threat is growing and is
"visible, clear, and unavoidable". Ivanov added a key
detail, saying that military force can be used if there
is an attempt to limit Russia's access to regions that
are essential to its survival.
Russia also
indicated it would act to defend regions beyond its own
borders, encompassing large parts of the former Soviet
Union, now the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).
Defense Minister Ivanov has said that, in case of
"instability in the CIS" or a "direct threat" to Russian
citizens, Russia can "hypothetically" use force if other
means of coercion, like diplomatic and economic
sanctions, fail.
In a practical demonstration of
this approach, Moscow held naval maneuvers in the inland
Caspian Sea August 8-15, 2002. Although Russia presented
the war games as an important measure to safeguard
regional stability, some littoral states remained wary.
The coastal Caspian states were shown that Moscow
retains the growing ability to order its fleet without
notice into theirs waters.
However, East Asia
has not disappeared from the radar screens of Russia's
emerging doctrines of preemption. In July 2003, Russian
media have been speculating about possible military
involvement in North Korea should another war erupt.
"Russia's best response to a possible nuclear conflict
on the Korean peninsula would be a preemptive missile
strike against North Korean nuclear facilities, carried
out by the Russian Pacific Fleet," said an editorial in
Izvestia. It quoted Pacific Fleet sources as saying the
nuclear facilities could be destroyed using cruise
missiles launched from a Russian cruiser.
Meanwhile, Russian officials have pledged that
the country's doctrine differs from the American
doctrine. Under no circumstances would Russia be the
first to strike with nuclear weapons, according to
Defense Minister Ivanov. Nonetheless, the West became
concerned about the "Ivanov doctrine", in which the
minister warns that Russia will be forced to change its
nuclear strategy if NATO continued its "offensive"
doctrine. Therefore, circumstantial evidence indicates
that Russia is attempting to draft its own preemption
concept.
The notion of preemption - the use of
military and / or covert force to disarm an enemy before
it can launch a strike of its own - has resurfaced since
President Bush declared it a viable approach to the war
on terrorism. Only the US has recently made use of
first-strike military action, or "preemption", against
emerging threats abroad - an explicit part of its
foreign policy - in Iraq.
Russia now seems to
follow the US' lead and reserve the same preemption
rights. What remains to be seen is whether proliferation
or the escalation of preemption could eventually ensue.
(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All
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