The State Duma recently supported a draft law suspending the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE Treaty). This action was preceded by a period of moratorium i.e. suspension of the Treaty without approval of the respective law. The State Duma’s decision means that now the armed forces will be deployed and redeployed in the territory of the country without a backward glance at the West.

The CFE Treaty was time and again referred to during the last six months because it is the first arms-limiting agreement with NATO that was de facto suspended by Moscow. This decision actually relates not only to the treaty itself but to a package of agreements for which the CFE Treaty is used as “an envelope”. In this sense, both treaties, i.e. the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty (1972) and CFE Treaty (1990), have a principal framework status.

The latter treaty was concluded rather not “to grow into” but to balance the passed phase of the arms race – to provide for gradual transition to the disarmament. In this sense, it was a kind of our declaration on changing over our military potential from offensive to defensive one. The number of flank weapons, i.e. tanks, guns of 100 mm and more, and aircraft (including helicopters) was reduced by 12,000 units. Besides, outside the area of the treaty we additionally destroyed about 20,000 units of similar weapons.

In the strategic aspect, it meant not only refuse from “the second echelon” but readiness to return to the discussion of the entire disarmament “package” in new more favorable conditions. For a short period of the 90-th, the number of weapons on the both sides remained parity indeed. But as NATO started expanding to the East, the alliance increased its agreed quotas threefold versus our quotas, viz. the quota of tanks (rounded here and thereafter) – by 6,000 units, of APCs – by 10,000 units, of guns – by 5,000 units, of combat fixed-wing aircraft – by 1,500 units and of helicopters – by 500 units.

The treaty that was based on the reduction concept, has become obsolete not only due to the changed military-political realties but due to the changed paradigm – restraining us by the obsolete obligations, the treaty gave the green light to the other party. But the key problem, I suppose, is in the opposite intentions – our previous and current interest is to stop the arms race, while the West is interested in the arms race expecting that the weaker party would be more exhausted versus the stronger one.

For instance, the Baltic component, the most painful treaty component for us, is excluded from the negotiation format, under formal pretence of our military presence in Georgia. For now, this presence is actually over although the West prefers to take no notice of it. The subject matter is confused with the presence of our peace-keepers in Abkhazia, Southern Ossetia and Transdniestria. But we believe that the Treaty does not cover the peace-keepers – we do not just take into account the NATO contingents in the Balkans! But they say: the peace-keeping mandate was issued to NATO by the UN Security Council, while Russia got it from the OCSE, i..e. from the lower authority. Abkhazia where the peace-keepers have the same UN mandate as the alliance has, is also excluded from the format due to the presence of the Russian but not Multinational Forces in this area.

In these conditions within the period from 1999 to 2007, our side has been accumulating the complaints to the alliance. As the United States made a decision to build military bases in Romania and Bulgaria, the entire CFE Treaty structure finally ruined. The Washington’s reasoning that these bases are American but not NATO, seems to us pure cheating regardless of any statuses and authorities. Has the USA already withdrawn from NATO?

A question arises: Does the West indeed fail to understand our concern? Surely, they do understand. But they firstly manipulate the anti-terrorist rhetoric: ”Any action taken by the alliance is for the war on terror!”; secondly, the Americans hope to succeed in their favorite “linkage”, i.e. linking dissimilar political circumstances together.

As a matter of fact, they expect “to barter” the renovated CFE Treaty for our concessions with respect to Kosovo, Iran or deployment of the American NMD elements in Eastern Europe. By and large, the diplomatic practice and especially public diplomatic practice accepts examination of mutually addressed proposals in package. It is indicative that Moscow suspended the CFE Treaty not upon expiration of the moratorium period (July 13 – December 12 this year) but actually on the eve of the decision on Kosovo.

The earliest date when Kosovo may become actually independent is late November. Thus, Russia so far took a step to keep the Kosovo “theme” pure. The same logic relates to the NMD - in the current context we think that it is also unreasonable to link it with the CFE Treaty.

The problem is that the suspending party and defaulting party are of different “weights”. Surely, the arms race is less beneficial to us than to the NATO members, yet they are not all “alike in appearance”, therefore, the bargaining as a method to resolve the situation around the CFE Treaty is hardly may be ignored. The tradeoff may be resumed on other terms and conditions, that still seem to be under development.