The Russian State Duma voted by 288
– 131 to approve the START II treaty. START II would reduce U.S.
and Russian nuclear arsenals to about 3,000-3,500 warheads each by
the end of 2007 and enable both nations to step up efforts to work
out an additional treaty, START III, for even deeper cuts. The
treaty must now be ratified by the Federation Council, the upper
chamber of the Russian legislature, where approval is expected.
The Duma also approved a nonbinding resolution stipulating that
Russia would have the right to revoke the START II treaty if the
United States breaks the ABM agreement. The clause requires the
President of Russia to consult the legislature in such an event,
but does not force the government to break START II. Another
nonbinding clause gives Russia the option to back out of the treay
if NATO deploys nuclear weapons in countries (Poland, Hungary and
the Czech Republic) that have joined the alliance since 1996. The
START II pact was signed in 1993 by Presidents Bush and Yeltsin.
The START II treaty was ratified by the U.S. Senate in 1996. The
Duma also approved a 1997 U.S.-Russian protocol to START II that
extends the deadline for Russia to scrap nuclear weapons from 2003
to 2007. The U.S. Senate has yet to approve this amendment to the
treaty.
The Russian
ratification of START II has ramifications regarding the
availability of launches on converted Russian ICBMs. In
particular, the unlaunched RS-20 (Dnepr), and the RS-18 (Rockot
and Strela) missiles would have to be destroyed by the end of
2007. Russia is expected to deploy its 3,500 warheads on 500 to
800 single-warhead ICBMs, of RS-12M (Topol) and RS-12M2 (Topol M)
models, about 1,750 warheads using about 25 submarines, on RSM-54
(Shtil) and RSM-52 (Rif) submarine-launched ballistic missiles,
with the remainder on bombers. By 2007, in addition to the RS-18
and RS-20 missiles, all RSM-40 (Vysota) and RSM-50 (Volna)
missiles would have to have been destroyed.
In a separate
action, the Russian State Duma passed a bill to ratify documents
related to the 1972 ABM treaty by a vote of 413 – 8, with one
abstention. The package has been signed in New York in September
1997 at a meeting of foreign ministers of Russia, Belarus,
Kazakhstan, Ukraine and the United States with the purpose of
preserving the treaty. It consists of two statements on the
treaty, an agreement on confidence-building measures on defense
systems against nonstrategic ballistic missiles, a memorandum of
understanding on ABM and the statute of the standing consultative
committee. The statements are aimed at preventing ABM systems from
developing the capability of combating strategic ballistic
missiles, i.e. preventing the circumvention of the treaty. The
memorandum deals with questions of legal succession with regard to
the ABM treaty and approves the new list of countries party to the
treaty. After the enforcement of the memorandum, Belarus,
Kazakhstan and Ukraine, as legal successors of the Soviet Union,
will become parties to the treaty in addition to Russia and the
United States. Under the memorandum Russia shall preserve the
right to posses an area for deploying a strategic missile defense
system near its capital on the scale set by the ABM treaty, the
possibility to use an ABM test ground in Kazakhstan and radar
stations of the missile attack radar warning system which remain
in foreign territory after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The
new statute on the standing consultative committee - the body
controlling the observation of the ABM treaty - contains the rules
of its work given the multilateral nature of the treaty. This
document does not require ratification.
 More
information:
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