Putin and Russia in retro and forward: the nuclear dimension

ABSTRACT

Deterioration in security relations as between NATO and Russia reached boiling point in the aftermath of Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its subsequent destabilization of Eastern Ukraine. As a result, some voices in the West look forward to the departure of Vladimir Putin from power, and others to the possible disintegration of Russia as a unitary state. However, both the departure of Putin and the collapse of Russia have a nuclear dimension. Putin has issued pointed reminders of Russia’s status as a nuclear great power, and Russian military doctrine allows for nuclear first use in the event of a conventional war with extremely high stakes. Beyond Putin, a breakup of Russia would leave political chaos in Eastern Europe, Central Asia and elsewhere, inviting ambiguous command and control over formerly Russian nuclear forces.

KEYWORDS:

• Nuclear deterrence
• Russia
• Putin
• Vladimir
• NATO
• Crimea
• Ukraine
• nuclear first use

Acknowledgements

Grateful acknowledgment is made to Elizabeth Koslowski and Roger McDermott for insights related to earlier versions of this study. They bear no responsibility for arguments or errors herein.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. For assessments of Putin, see: Walter Laqueur, Putinism: Russia and Its Future with the West (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2015); Marvin Kalb, Imperial Gamble: Putin, Ukraine, and the New Cold War (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2015); and Fiona Hill and Clifford G. Gaddy, Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2013). See also: Oral Remarks of Dr Fiona Hill, US Congress, House Armed Services Committee, Hearing on Understanding and Deterring Russia: US Policies and Strategies, February 10, 2013, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #39 – February 25, 2016, [email protected].

2. United States European Command, Gen. Philip M. Breedlove, USAF, Commander, Theater Strategy (US EUCOM, October 2015), www.eucom.mil/media-library/documents/201. See also: Andrew Tilghman, ‘Russian Aggression a Top Concern in US European Command’s New Military Strategy’, Militarytimes.com, January 27, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #20 – January 28, 2016, [email protected].

3. PBS Newshour, ‘What the Litvinenko Assassination Accusation Means for the Kremlin’, interview with Steven Lee Myers, New York Times, and Michael McFaul, former US Ambassador to Russia, January 21, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #15, January 22, 2016, [email protected]

4. Possible scenarios for Russian collapse are presented in George Friedman, ‘Putin Has Two Years to Hold Russia Together’, Business Insider, interview, January 22, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #17 – January 25, 2016, [email protected], and Nikolai Petrov, ‘Russia’s Ruling Regime Must Modernize or Face Collapse’, Moscow Times, January 22, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #15, January 22, 2016, [email protected].

5. Nikolai Sokov, ‘Controlling Soviet/Russian Nuclear Weapons in Times of Instability’, in Nuclear Weapons Security Crises: What Does History Teach? (Ch. 4), ed. Henry D. Sokolski and Bruno Tertrais (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute and US Army War College Press, 2013), 87–143.

6. See Neil Buckley, Sam Jones, and Kathrin Hille, ‘Trump v Putin: Is the Spectre of Nuclear War back after 25 Years?’ Financial Times, November 15, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #213 – November 16, 2016, <[email protected]>

7. Robin Emmott and Phil Stewart, ‘NATO Agrees Russian Deterrent but Avoids Cold War Footing’, Reuters, February 10, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #30 – February 11, 2016, [email protected].

8. Stoltenberg, quoted in Emmott and Stewart, ‘NATO Agrees Russian Deterrent but avoids Cold War Footing’.

9. See Dana Rohrabacher, ‘Why Is America Restarting the Cold War with Russia? Washington’s Strategy Toward Moscow Is Outmoded and Misdirected’, The National Interest, February 11, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #31 – February 12, 2016, [email protected].

10. Dmitri Medvedev, speech at the panel discussion, Munich Security Conference, Government.ru, February 13, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #32 – February 15, 2016, [email protected].

11. ‘The Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation’, text, www.Kremlin.ru February 5, 2010, in Johnson’s Russia List 2010 – #35, February 19, 2010, [email protected].

12. Ibid.

13. Jaroslaw Adamowski, ‘Russia Overhauls Military Doctrine’, Defense News, January 10, 2015, http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/policy-budget/policy/2015/01/10/russia-military-doctrine-ukraine-putin/21441759/; Artem Kureev, ‘Russia’s New National Security Strategy Has Implications for the West’, www.russia-direct.org, January 8, 2016, http://www.russia-direct.org/opinion/russias-new-national-security-strategy-has-implications-west.

14. Andrei Kokoshin, Ensuring Strategic Stability in the Past and Present: Theoretical and Applied Questions (Cambridge, MA: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School, June 2011).

15. Roger N. McDermott, ‘Russia’s Conventional Armed Forces: Reform and Nuclear Posture to 2020’, Ch. 2 in Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present and Future, ed. Stephen J. Blank (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, November 2011), 33–97, esp. 70–2. See also Jacob W. Kipp, ‘Russia’s Nuclear Posture and the Threat that Dare Not Speak its Name’, Ch. 10 in Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present and Future, ed. Blank, 459–503.

16. Arbatov, cited in McDermott, ‘Russia’s Conventional Armed Forces: Reform and Nuclear Posture to 2020’, 72.

17. Michael R. Gordon, ‘US Says Russia Tested Missile, Despite Treaty’, New York Times, January 29, 2014. The Treaty bans deployment of nuclear or conventional ground based missiles by NATO or the former Soviet Union (and now Russia) with ranges from 500 to 5500 kilometers.

18. On the concept of strategic history, see Colin S. Gray, War, Peace and International Relations: An Introduction to Strategic History, Second Edition (New York: Routledge, 2012).

19. For pertinent perspective and background, see Stephen J. Blank, Arms Control and Proliferation Challenges to the Reset Policy (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, November 2011).

20. For contrasting assessments, see: Mitchell Yates, ‘How Putin Made Russia’s Military into a Modern, Lethal Fighting Force’, The National Interest, February 25, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #39 – February 25, 2016, [email protected], and Mark Galeotti, ‘Don’t Buy the Hype: Russia’s Military Is Much Weaker than Putin Wants Us to think’, Vox.com, February 23, 2016, in Johnson’s Russia List 2016 – #37 – February 23, 2016, [email protected].

21. For a perspective on Russia’s challenges with respect to information and cyber wars, see Timothy Thomas, ‘Russia’s Information Warfare Strategy: Can the Nation Cope in Future Conflicts?’ Journal of Slavic Military Studies, no. 1 (January–March 2014): 101–30. See also: Thomas, Recasting the Red Star: Russia Forges Tradition and Technology through Toughness (Ft. Leavenworth, KS: Foreign Military Studies Office, 2011).

22. For recent expert commentary on Russian views of future war, see: Daniel Goure, ‘Moscow’s Visions of Future War: So Many Conflict Scenarios so Little Time, Money and Forces’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, no. 1 (January–March 2014): 63–100; and Jacob W. Kipp, ‘Smart Defense from New Threats: Future War from a Russian Perspective: Back to the Future after the War on Terror’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, no. 1 (January–March 2014): 36–62.

23. Russian and Soviet literature on this subject are extensive. See, for example: S. P. Ivanov, Nachal'nyy period voyny: po opytu pervykh kampaniy I operatsiy vtoroy mirovoy voyny [The Initial Period of War: On the Experience of the First Campaigns of the Second World War] (Moscow: Voenizdat, 1974). For an appraisal of Soviet threat assessment between the two world wars, see John Erickson, ‘Threat Identification and Strategic Appraisal by the Soviet Union, 1930–41,’ Ch. 13 in Knowing One’s Enemies: Intelligence Assessment before the Two World Wars, ed. Ernest R. May (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 375–424.

24. For overviews of this issue, see David M. Glantz, ‘The Red Army in 1941,’ 1–37 and Dr Jacob Kipp, ‘Soviet War Planning, 40–54’, in The Initial Period of War on the Eastern Front, 22 June – August 1941, ed. Glantz, (London: Frank Cass, 1993); Richard H. Phillips, Soviet Military Debate on the Initial Period of War: Characteristics and Implications (Cambridge, MA: Center for International Studies, MIT, November 1989), and Jacob W. Kipp, Barbarossa, Soviet Covering Forces and the Initial Period of War: Military History and AirLand Battle (Ft. Leavenworth, KS: Soviet Army Studies Office, undated).

25. Michael Kofman and Andrey Sushentsov, What Makes Great Power War Possible (Moscow: Valdai Discussion Club Report, April, 2016), 10 www.valdaiclub.com.

26. Text, ‘The Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation’, www.Kremlin.ru, February 5, 2010, in Johnson’s Russia List 2010 – #35, February 19, 2010, [email protected]. See also: Nikolai Sokov, ‘The New, 2010 Russian Military Doctrine: The Nuclear Angle’, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies, February 5, 2010, http://cns.miis.edu/stories/100205_russian_nuclear_doctrine.htm.

27. Graeme Herd, ‘Security Strategy: Sovereign Democracy and Great Power Aspirations’, Ch. 2 in The Politics of Security in Modern Russia, ed. Mark Galeotti (Farnham, MD: Ashgate Publishers, 2010), 7–27, citation 8.

28. Nikolai Sokov, ‘Nuclear Weapons in Russian National Security Strategy’, Ch. 5 in Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future, ed. Stephen J. Blank (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, November 2011), 187–260, citation 2. 16.

29. Tendencies toward escalation of Russian threat perceptions with regard to NATO and in defiance of reality are noted in Stephen J. Blank, ‘Lt. Kizhe Rides Again: Magical Realism and Russian National Security Perspectives', Journal of Slavic Military Studies, no. 2 (April–June 2014): 310–57.

30. On the subject of accomplishments and disappointments in Russian military reform, see: Roger N. McDermott, ‘The Brain of the Russian Army: Futuristic Visions Tethered by the Past’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, no. 1 (January–March 2014), 4–35; Alexander Golts, ‘Reform: The End of the First Phase – Will There Be a Second?’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, no. 1 (January–March 2014), 131–46; and Keir Giles, ‘A New Phase in Russian Military Transformation’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, no. 1 (January–March 2014), 147–62. For additional perspective, see: Dale R. Herspring, ‘Russian Nuclear and Conventional Weapons: The Broken Relationship’, Ch. 1, 1–31, and Roger N. McDermott, ‘Russia’s Conventional Armed Forces: Reform and Nuclear Posture to 2020’, Ch. 2, 33–97, both in Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present and Future, ed. Blank (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, November 2011). See also: Ariel Cohen and Robert E. Hamilton, The Russian Military and the Georgia War: Lessons and Implications (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, June 2011); Rod Thornton, Military Modernization and the Russian Ground Forces (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, June 2011); Roger McDermott, The Reform of Russia’s Conventional Armed Forces: Problems, Challenges, and Policy Implications (Washington, DC: The Jamestown Foundation, 2011); and Pavel Baev, ‘Neither Reform Nor Modernization: The Armed Forces Under and After Putin’s Command', Ch. 5 in The Politics of Security in Modern Russia, ed. Galeotti (Farnham, MD: Ashgate Publishers, 2010), 69–88.

31. Janis Berzins, Russia’s New Generation Warfare in Ukraine: Implications for Latvian Defense Policy, Policy Paper No. 2 (National Defence Academy of Latvia, Center for Security and Strategic Research, April 2014).

32. Ibid, 5.