For Russia and the US, a New Start

For the first time in years, America and Russia have signed a disarmament treaty today in Prague. The last time the two powers, who own 95 percent of all nuclear weapons in the world, did that was in 2002. But that concerned a reduction plan that did not represent much. Although it remains to be seen what the new agreement, which aims to reduce the number of strategic nuclear weapons by half to one-third, really constitutes.

The most important disarmament treaties — like the today revitalized Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) — date back to the 90s. The treaty against mid-range rockets in Europe (INF) marked in 1987 that the Cold War was coming to an end. Also, then, nuclear disarmament was not solely a matter of adding and subtracting SS20s and Pershings, but also of politics.

It goes to show that Obama has characterized the new START as proof that the two nuclear superpowers are still ‘leading.’ According to Minister Lavrov of Foreign Affairs, the treaty illustrates that the cooperation between Russia and the U.S. has now landed on a “higher level.”

But that still does not make it a breakthrough like the INF. The positions of America and Russia are incomparable. After 20 years of dominance, America is now challenged by new superpowers and a mirage of smaller countries that are ruled by fundamentalists or not at all. And Russia is still not at peace with the fact that its old empire has fallen apart. Obama in Prague today takes advantage of the situation to comfort the prime ministers of 11 NATO member countries who were until 1990 almost all members of the Warsaw Pact, under American protection, and it illustrates that imbalance.

Moscow wants economic concessions in return for that. The so-called Jackson Vanik Amendment of 1974, which restricts trade relations with Russia, needs to go. Easing of the demands for entry to the World Trade Organization is also under discussion. The ceremony in Prague is nevertheless an indication for a recovery of relations that were disturbed by the unilateral nuclear policy of Bush and the intimidating politics of Putin. Obama explicitly challenges Moscow to join his new nuclear strategy, which is aimed at preventing new nuclear powers to form in the world, whether countries or terrorist groups, and together march against mainly Iran and North Korea.

Nonproliferation is a spearhead of Obama’s administration, which receives 40 government leaders next week for top deliberations on nuclear safety in a confused, multipolar world. That threatening anarchy cannot be countered with one treaty only. But START can be the beginning of more modern global relations in which mutual frustrations are no longer dominant, but in which a new communal notion of real threats leads.