ABM Treaty: Bush Opposes Treaty, But Willing to Hear Putin

U.S. President George W. Bush is “willing to listen” to proposals that Russian President Vladimir Putin might offer on the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (see GSN, Nov. 7), Bush said yesterday in Washington.  The two presidents are scheduled to meet next week in Washington and Texas.

“Listen, the ABM Treaty is outmoded and outdated, and we need to move beyond it,” Bush said, “[but if Putin’s] got some interesting suggestions on how to make the ABM Treaty not outdated and not outmoded, I’m more than willing to listen” (U.S. State Department release, Nov. 7).

The Bush administration was not, however, interested in amending the treaty, a senior administration official said yesterday.  The official praised Russia for its “stunning change” in attitude over the treaty, but said “the amendment route is not something we’re considering.”  The treaty is “dangerous” and “an impediment to relations with Russia,” the official said (Nicholas Kralev, Washington Times, Nov. 8).

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ABM Treaty: Putin Sees a Way to Please U.S. and Russia

Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested Monday in an ABC interview that the United States and Russia could reach an agreement on the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty that would permit U.S. missile defense testing while preserving the treaty (see GSN, Nov. 1). 

Putin said negotiators could find “common approaches” to interpreting the treaty in a way to accommodate U.S. missile defense testing plans.  “Experts believe that based on those approaches we would be quite able to formulate terms and conditions on the basis of the existing treaty without violating its substance,” Putin said (ABCNews.com release, Nov. 7).

Putin added that U.S. President George W. Bush’s ABM position was evolving.  “His view is not fixed … We will be basing our position on building international security as we understand it,” he said (Reuters/ABCNews.com, Nov. 7).

As a result of the flexibility on both sides, “we could reach quite quickly mutual agreements,” Putin said (Agence France-Presse/Bangkok Post, Nov. 7).  His comments appear to counterbalance recent efforts by U.S. officials to lower expectations that next week’s Bush-Putin summit will produce a major arms control agreement (See GSN, Nov. 5).

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ABM Treaty: More Doubt on Prospects of ABM Deal by Summit

U.S. and Russian officials continued this weekend to try to lower expectations of a major strategic arms control agreement (see GSN, Nov. 2) at next week’s summit of U.S. and Russian Presidents George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin in the United States.

“The question of the signing of a broad agreement on strategic stability is not on the agenda,” Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said Friday after meeting in Washington with U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell (John Daniszewski, Los Angeles Times, Nov. 3).

“There are still many questions which have to be resolved,” Ivanov said, adding that “things have not yet reached the point of concluding agreements—wide-ranging, large-scale agreements—in this sphere.”

Some experts believe the two sides might announce informal accords that would buy time to forge a final agreement, according to the New York Times (Michael Wines, New York Times, Nov. 3).

The United States continued to complain about the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.  “Oh, I’m not suggesting we delay withdrawing from the treaty.  Where did you  get that?” asked U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld of reporters questioning him Friday enroute to Moscow where he was to meet with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov.  “The president has said we will deploy missile defense.  Now that can’t be done with the treaty there as an impediment,” Rumsfeld said.

Following their meeting, Ivanov sought some middle ground.  “The ABM Treaty is an important component, but not the only component of strategic stability.  We often hear that the ABM Treaty is hopelessly outdated, that it is a relic of the Cold War.  Partially, I stress partially, I agree,” Ivanov said.  “All the Soviet-U.S. accords are relics of the Cold War, to some extent … If I could offer my personal opinion, today’s NATO also is, in many ways, a relic of the Cold War.

“But before scrapping one agreement or another—although it is the sovereign right of the United States to withdraw from this or that treaty—we believe that this should be better done only after something has been created in the ways of replacement,” Ivanov said (U.S. State Department release, Nov. 3).

What About China?

U.S. missile defense plans do not threaten China, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said in an interview with the Far Eastern Economic Review late last month.  “The idea that we would start a war with China because we have the ability to provide defense of our population—if that’s the theory—is just nonsense.  I think what September 11^th demonstrates is there are nasty people out there who are determined to do us harm and a lot of them have invested very heavily in ballistic missile capabilities,” Wolfowitz said.

He added that moving beyond the ABM Treaty was appropriate today because there is “no prospect of that kind of uncontrolled arms race between the United States and Russia.  To the contrary, we are arguing about how low can you go” (see related GSN story, today), Wolfowitz said.

“We have a treaty that is now almost 30 years old that says that in order to preserve that balance of terror between the United States and the Soviet Union, we have to leave ourselves defenseless even to the third and fourth rate powers that are trying to threaten us,” Wolfowitz said.

Wolfowitz hoped China would become a member of  “the club of responsible powerful countries in the world.” 

“I really don’t doubt we can reach a balance in which China feels secure and China doesn’t threaten other people,” Wolfowitz said (U.S. State Department release, Nov.2).

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United States: Missile Interceptor Nearly Ready

A “limited number” of Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missile interceptors recently became available for deployment to U.S. forces, according to the October issue of Arms Control Today, published today.  Unlike previous Patriot systems which exploded a warhead near the incoming target, the PAC-3 system was designed to intercept aircraft and short- and medium-range ballistic missiles by colliding with them.

The interceptor successfully conducted its 10^th intercept test in the developmental stage of testing on Oct. 19, giving it a record of nine hits in 10 tests.  Next the interceptor is to move to operational testing and evaluation, where the systems will be tested under more realistic conditions and where soldiers, not technicians, operate the equipment (Arms Control Today, October 2001).

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