Russia’s military intervention in Georgia and U.S. opposition to the decision has led many Russians and Americans to urge a reassessment of the key pillars of the strategic relationship between the two nations, including in the realm of arms control. A week into the conflict, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said that, “Russia’s behavior over the past week has called into question the entire premise of that dialogue and has profound implications for our security relationship going forward, both bilaterally and with NATO.” Gates added that, “If Russia does not step back from its aggressive posture and actions in Georgia, the U.S.-Russian relationship could be adversely affected for years to come.” [1] The U.S. Department of Defense subsequently suspended several scheduled military exercises with the Russian armed forces. By September, however, Gates was relating that the Bush administration had adopted “a long-term strategic approach — not one where we react tactically in a way that has negative strategic consequences.” [2]

As of late September, the Georgia War appears to have had a diverse impact on the Russian-U.S. arms control relationship. The most immediate effect was the White House’s decision to recall the proposed civil nuclear cooperation agreement with Russia. Yet, the prospects for WMD-related arms control in other areas, especially strategic arms control and ballistic missile defense, appear largely unaffected—if only because their prospects were so poor even before the recent Georgia War. [3] [For more information on ballistic missile defense issues, see “Eurasian Missile Defense Dispute Intensifies” in this issue of WMD Insights.]

‘123’ Agreement Recalled
The most immediate casualty of U.S.-Russian tensions over Georgia has been the long-discussed U.S.-Russia Agreement for Peaceful Nuclear Cooperation. On September 8, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced that President George Bush was recalling from consideration by Congress the proposed agreement which had been submitted for legislative review on May 13. [4] While Secretary Rice expressed regret at the decision, she described the rescission as “unavoidable” in the new post-Georgia international climate: “given the current environment, the time is not right for this agreement.” [5]

President Bush and then-Russian President Vladimir Putin originally announced their intent to negotiate a so-called “123 Agreement” at their joint news conference on the sidelines of the July 2006 G-8 summit in St. Petersburg. [6] Formal negotiations toward the agreement began in October 2006 and concluded in April 2007. The U.S. and Russian governments formally signed the draft agreement on May 6, 2008, Vladimir Putin’s last day in office as Russian President. [7]

The proposed U.S.-Russian deal, which was slated to last 30 years, would have facilitated the transfer of technologies, materials, equipment, and other components used to conduct nuclear research and produce nuclear power between Russia and the United States. Section 123 of the U.S. Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended, requires the United States to negotiate a separate bilateral accord with each country before initiating cooperation on commercial nuclear projects. [8] The terms of these agreements typically stipulate that the recipient of “significant” nuclear exports from the United States, including such items as power reactors, research reactors, nuclear material (including reactor fuel), and major reactor components, agree to specified nonproliferation conditions and controls. These accords also regularly obligate the recipient country to secure explicit American approval before any U.S. nuclear material and equipment provided under the agreement is used for uranium enrichment or reprocessing. In addition, the original recipient normally needs U.S. permission to transfer items supplied under the accord to a third party.

These bilateral agreements also establish the legal frameworks for U.S. and the partner nations’ companies to negotiate specific nuclear deals directly among themselves, including joint ventures, without requiring further government consent. Until now, Russian and U.S. companies have required intergovernmental agreements to engage in major joint commercial nuclear activities. [9]

Representatives of the Russian government and the country’s nuclear industry have eagerly sought the proposed cooperation agreement. Its realization would enhance their ability to expand Russia’s role as a provider of international nuclear fuel services. In particular, Russia’s nuclear energy managers desire to encourage reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel that originated in the United States – as most of the world’s nuclear fuel does – and was then used in third countries for the generation of electricity. Although other countries have expressed interest in using such services, they have been unable to send their U.S.-origin nuclear fuel without the required 123 Agreement that would establish the legal foundation for such transfers. After the agreement’s signing in May, the Director of the State Corporation for Atomic Energy (Rosatom), Sergei Kiriyenko called the deal a “‘win-win” arrangement “as huge opportunities open up for the companies of Russia and America, in cooperation on their national territories and third countries.” [10] A U.S-Russian civil nuclear energy agreement could also encourage other countries, such as Japan, to sign similar agreements with Russia.

Some arms control advocates opposed the U.S.-Russia agreement for fear it would encourage international interest in using plutonium, which can be used to manufacture nuclear weapons, as a nuclear fuel. Russia has been a leading advocate of utilizing a closed nuclear fuel cycle, in which spent uranium is reprocessed to be reused as fuel for nuclear reactors. Russia’s nuclear industry already reprocesses imported spent nuclear fuel from Bulgaria and Ukraine. Opponents of the technique fear that the 123 Agreement would allow other countries to send their U.S.-origin spent fuel to Russia for reprocessing. [11]

Other arms control experts endorsed the proposed agreement because it might enhance U.S.-Russian cooperation against nuclear weapons proliferation. For example, the two countries could collaborate on developing more proliferation-resistant nuclear reactors or nuclear fuel cycles. This could include U.S. participation in the International Center for Uranium Enrichment in Angarsk, Siberia, established by Russia and Kazakhstan in May 2007, as Russian officials have indicated that they require a peaceful nuclear energy agreement with the United States before U.S firms could participate at the Angarsk facility. [12] Several arms control experts who backed the accord also emphasized the importance of giving Moscow financial benefits and other incentives to increase its cooperation with Western countries to constrain Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program. They expressed hope that by offering Russian nuclear energy companies new markets in the United States and elsewhere, the Russian government would find it easier to reduce nuclear cooperation with Iran. [13] This situation could prove especially likely if Tehran continues to reject Moscow’s proposed fuel-leasing arrangement, which has received the explicit endorsement of President Bush and other U.S. officials. [14] Advocates of the proposed agreement also cautioned that a failure to approve it would adversely affect U.S.-Russian cooperation on Iran and other nonproliferation issues. [15]

Members of the Bush administration were reluctant to abandon the nuclear accord since the agreement represents one of the few concrete achievements in U.S.-Russian relations in recent years. Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia, William Burns said that the accord’s realization symbolized a transformation in the U.S.-Russian relationship: “The U.S. and Russia were once nuclear rivals. Today we are nuclear partners with unique capabilities and unique responsibilities for global nuclear leadership.” [16] The Bush administration also saw the accord as contributing to the revival of the U.S. nuclear power industry, which has never recovered from the Three Mile Island accident of March 1979. After the deal’s signing, State Department Spokesperson Sean McCormack said the 123 Agreement would “benefit U.S. industry by allowing U.S. and Russian companies to partner in nuclear joint ventures, and by permitting commercial sales of nuclear materials, reactors, and major reactor components by U.S. industry to Russia.” [17]

The deal could also have helped sustain support for the administration’s controversial Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP). The GNEP envisages international cooperation in increasing nuclear energy use worldwide while promoting nonproliferation objectives. For example, participants aim to design more secure nuclear reactors and aspire to establish reliable multinational nuclear fuel supply centers, obviating the need for countries to develop their own uranium enrichment capabilities and other sensitive nuclear technologies. Russia is a leading member of the GNEP, and the 123 Agreement was seen as playing a major role in joint U.S.-Russian nuclear collaboration in line with GNEP principles. [18] The State Department fact sheet describing the accord noted that, “It will also enhance U.S.-Russia cooperation in developing Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) technologies, in particular the development of advanced fast burner reactors, the fuel for which would likely be developed in the United States and transferred to Russia for test irradiation.” [19]

If the Bush administration had pushed for legislative approval of the proposed agreement, the Congress would almost certainly have killed the pact by voting it down. [20] Even before Russia’s military intervention in Georgia, some members of Congress had expressed opposition to the deal, citing Moscow’s continuing nuclear collaboration with Iran as well as other objectionable Russian government policies. [21] By recalling the agreement before Congress considered it, the Bush administration retained the option of either resubmitting the accord or allowing the next U.S. president to do so. The Russian Duma must also ratify the proposed agreement, but this step was not expected to have been difficult.

In her September 8 announcement, Secretary Rice stressed that the administration still sought to cooperate with Russia on nuclear energy and nuclear nonproliferation issues. The Secretary left open the possibility that future conditions might allow the agreement to proceed: “We will reevaluate the situation at a later date as we follow developments closely.” At this point, however, it appears improbable that the current U.S. administration or Congress would act before the next president assumes office.

In any case, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement denying that the agreement’s recall should be interpreted as a “penalty” or “restriction” for Russia: “To us such interpretations are unconvincing, as are the explanations along the lines that this ‘minimizes the damage’ which could increase had the administration decided not to recall the agreement from Congress. The civil nuclear cooperation agreement is equally advantageous to both Russia and the United States, and therefore owing to its recall America’s nuclear industry will suffer no less than Russia’s.” [22]

Post-START Talks Stalled
A second area of U.S.-Russian interaction on critical nuclear issues on which the Georgian War may have had an impact is strategic nuclear arms control. The governments of Russia and the United States continue to disagree about how to codify their balance of strategic offensive nuclear forces after the existing Strategic Arms Reductions Treaty (START) accord expires on December 5, 2009. [23]

After Russia intervened militarily in Georgia, U.S. officials reviewed their arms control relationship with Moscow, and administration representatives soon reaffirmed their interest in negotiating a new strategic arms control accord with Russia. [24] In late August, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Rood insisted that, despite the Georgia War, “We remain interested in negotiating such an agreement with the Russians.” [25] In early September, Assistant Secretary Paula DeSutter confirmed that the State Department still hoped that “things can evolve in a positive way so that we can move forward on a post-START agreement.” [26] Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko also stated in late August that, “We are still seeking a meaningful dialogue with the United States” on “arrangements to replace the strategic offensive arms treaty” as well as missile defenses. [27]

When asked in late September about the status of the strategic arms control talks with Moscow, however, Secretary Rice offered a series of reasons why a new arms agreement, though helpful, might not be a major priority for the remainder of the Bush administration’s term. First, she noted that, “We have a treaty, the Moscow Treaty, which limits deployed warheads and which…continues to be enforced and the numbers continue to come down.” Second, “this is not like the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union, where the goal was to reassure everybody that we had no intention of annihilating each other although we didn’t agree on anything else.” Third, “I would just note that the United States will continue to maintain and, to the degree necessary, modernize its strategic nuclear deterrent. And that is plenty of insurance against any modernization that Russia might undertake.” Fourth, despite the limited progress on a possible START replacement and the Georgia War, bilateral “strategic cooperation on North Korea, on Iran, on the Middle East, on global nuclear terrorism, on proliferation matters, on the Proliferation Security Initiative – do I need to go on? – is probably more robust than anything that certainly would have been the case in the ‘80s.” [28]

Then-U.S. President George H.W. Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev signed START on July 31, 1991, after a decade of contentious negotiations and only months before the USSR’s disintegration. The accord required both countries to decrease their strategic holdings to 6,000 nuclear warheads on a maximum of 1,600 strategic delivery systems (land- and sea-launched ballistic missiles or long-range bombers) by December 5, 2001. START did not come into force until December 5, 1994, after the parties agreed that Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Ukraine were the legal successors to the Soviet Union for the purposes of the treaty. START’s initial duration was fifteen years, but the parties can agree to its extension for successive five-year periods. Each side also has the right to withdraw from the treaty by giving the other party six month’s notice.

The START provisions remain in force, and reductions of delivery vehicles and nuclear warheads have proceeded as required. [29] In May 2002, however, Washington and Moscow signed a new Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (SORT), which obligates both Russia and the United States to reduce their long-range nuclear arsenals far below START levels—to between 1,700 and 2,200 “operationally deployed strategic warheads” -- by December 31, 2012. [30] Until recently, U.S. officials argued that the implementation of SORT (also known as the Moscow Treaty) would suffice to place the bilateral strategic arms control relationship on a stable basis.

One complication with respect to SORT, however, is that the treaty does not include its own verification measures, but depends heavily on START’s extensive on-site inspections, data exchanges, and other compliance measures. When SORT was signed, Russian-American political relations had improved sufficiently that concerns about verifying the new accord had declined, certainly when compared with the Cold War period. In addition, the assumption was that Russia and the United States would either simply extend START beyond 2009 or negotiate new measures before then. A related issue is that, unlike SORT, START provides detailed criteria for counting both warheads and launchers. Without an extension of START or a comparable follow-on agreement, Russia and the United States will have to rely primarily on less effective national means of verification after 2009. This situation could prove problematic. Questions also exist about the treaty’s lack of either a timetable or rules for warhead reductions, its 90-day withdrawal clause, its lax accounting rules, and other uncertainties associated with the three-page document. [31] The U.S. intelligence community has indicated that these ambiguities prevent its analysts from verifying Russia’s treaty compliance with high confidence. [32]

Despite several years of detailed talks, Russian and American negotiators made very little progress in negotiating a follow-on accord to START. Thus far, the main point of agreement between the two governments has been their decision not to extend the original treaty past its scheduled expiration date. At the time of the July 2007 Russian-American presidential meeting in Kennebunkport, Secretary of State Rice and Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov issued a three-sentence statement that simply reaffirmed both governments’ intent to pursue further strategic arms reductions, provided that any lower levels would remain “consistent with their national security requirements and alliance commitments.” [33] At the time, Putin hailed the agreement as “a breakthrough in terms of creating a safe and transparent world.” [34] During a joint press conference at their April 2008 summit in Sochi, Putin recalled that, “Last year in Kennebunkport, Mr. Bush and I agreed to start work on a new agreement that would replace the START Treaty…. We agreed that it would be necessary to maintain all the useful and necessary parts of the START Treaty. We’re going to continue working on this.” [35] The problem is that Russian and American negotiators continue to disagree over what “useful and necessary parts” of the treaty should be preserved and which should be abandoned or altered.

Some arms control experts urge the next U.S. administration to make negotiating a new strategic nuclear arms control treaty with Russia a priority because “it could prove key to reestablishing a better relationship with Moscow....By engaging the Russians on nuclear weapons cuts, the next president can provide a positive boost to the broader relationship, now at its lowest point since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.” [36] Yet, the experience of the past few decades suggests that achieving success in U.S.-Russian arms control often requires good political relations between Moscow and Washington as a prerequisite. Most notably, during the past few years, the political relationship between Russia and the United States and arms control progress have moved in tandem, sharply downward.

Other experts advocate simply extending the current START agreement a few years, perhaps with lower ceilings and looser verification rules, and possibly on an informal basis, in order to give the next U.S. administration time to review the U.S. nuclear posture, U.S.-Russian political and military relations, and related subjects. These analysts worry that Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, and other issues will preoccupy the new White House team, rendering it unable to negotiate a new strategic arms accord and secure its ratification by the Congress before START expires. [37] START provisions provide the option for a five-year extension, but only if the signatories begin discussing such an alternative by December 2008, so any extension beyond that time would have to involve parallel action by Russia and the United States, or some other ad hoc mechanism. [38] On October 17, however, the State Department’s spokesperson announced that the START parties – including Belarus and Kazakhstan, as well as the United States and Russia – intend to meet in Geneva in November to begin considering whether to extend the treaty, which would give the next administration a year to finalize its position regarding START. [39] Eleven days later, Secretary of Defense Gates reinforced this approach, saying, “I am confident that…whoever is elected president will go to the bargaining table. If we don’t have time to get a new START agreement before the…Moscow Treaty expires, there is a provision for both sides to extend the existing treaty, with the verification procedures and so on. And I have every confidence that we will do that.” [40]

Another proposal is to modify the SORT accord, which lasts through 2012, by reducing its ceiling for deployed nuclear warheads, requiring the counting of conventional warheads on strategic delivery vehicles against that ceiling, and applying relaxed versions of the START rules limiting the permissible “downloading” of nuclear reentry vehicles from missiles capable of carrying multiple nuclear warheads. In this scenario, after 2012, Russia and the United States could discuss lower numbers for their strategic forces and other complex issues that affect their strategic balance: missile defense, non-strategic nuclear weapons, space weapons, verifying the elimination of warheads, and conventional force balances, as well as the nuclear forces of third countries. [41]

The boldest position has been that of proposing very deep cuts, if not nuclear abolition. [For more information on the U.S. and Russian take on the subject of nuclear abolition, please see “Four Statesmen Promote Revitalized Interest in Nuclear Disarmament Efforts” in the October 2008 issue of WMD Insights.]

Conclusion
While the Georgia War has disrupted movement on two major Bush administration initiatives with Russia, it has not totally eliminated the desire of either side to move forward their relationship in the nuclear arena. Exactly how that will be done, however, and what steps can and will be taken to overcome the barriers that the recent conflict created, will have to await the arrival of the Obama administration in Washington.

Richard Weitz – Hudson Institute