U.S. Missile Defense System Could Spark New Nuclear Arms Race, Russian General Warns

The fledgling U.S. missile defense system would never be able to counter a large-scale missile attack and is likely only to spark another nuclear arms race, a senior Russian military official said yesterday (see GSN, Feb. 15).

“If the USA deploys a national missile defense [system], other nuclear powers may opt for increasing their nuclear missile potential, which will worsen the situation in the world,” said Col. Gen. Varfolomey Korobushin, first vice president of the Military Science Academy.

Korobushin also warned Eastern European countries not to allow Washington to deploy missile defense interceptors within their territories. He said doing so would nullify agreements “aimed at making the positions of Russia and NATO closer.”

“If Americans insist on deploying their [missile defense] elements in Eastern Europe and space, the balance of power in the nuclear missile domain will be shattered,” he added.

Korobushin also said the U.S. system would only be capable of intercepting a few missiles.

“It will never intercept hundreds of combat elements that would be sent as part of the retaliation strike,” he said (Interfax I/BBC Monitoring, Feb. 27).

Russian Major Gen. Vladimir Vasilenko said yesterday that U.S. missile defense deployment would determine the types and numbers of missiles deployed by Russia, Interfax reported yesterday.

Russia should “give priority to high-survivable mobile ground and naval missile systems when planning the development of the force in the near and far future,” Vasilenko said.

“The quality of the strategic nuclear forces of Russia will have to be significantly improved in terms of adding to their capability of penetrating [missile defense] barriers and increasing the survivability of combat elements and enhancing the properties of surveillance and control systems,” he said (Interfax II/BBC Monitoring, Feb. 27).

Back to top
About Newswire  |  Contact National Journal  |  Re-Use Guidelines © Copyright 2008 by National Journal Group, Inc. The material in this section is produced independently for NTI by National Journal Group, Inc. Any reproduction or retransmission, in whole or in part, is a violation of federal law and is strictly prohibited without the consent of the National Journal Group, Inc. All rights reserved.