Russia suspends nuclear missile treaty in tit-for-tat with US

Russia vowed Saturday to develop "new types of weapons" as it suspended a Cold War-era nuclear missile treaty with the United States, which pulled back from the pact a day earlier, raising the spectre of a new arms race.

In a high-stakes tit-for-tat with US President Donald Trump, Russian leader Vladimir Putin said: "Our American partners have announced they are suspending their participation in the deal, and we are also suspending our participation."

And he said Russia would seek to develop medium-range missiles in response to what he said were similar projects in the US.

Russia would "not be drawn into a costly new arms race", the president said in a televised meeting with foreign and defence ministers Sergei Lavrov and Sergei Shoigu, adding it would only deploy intermediate- and short-range missiles in response to similar moves from the US.

"We will wait until our partners have matured enough to conduct an equal, meaningful dialogue with us on this important topic," Putin added.

On Friday, Trump said Washington would start a process to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) agreement within six months.

Both countries have accused each other of violating the INF arms control agreement concluded between the US and the former Soviet Union in 1987.

On Saturday, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev tweeted: "The Russian Government will procure funds and mechanisms for financing R&D and design of new types of weapons in view of the US withdrawal from the INF Treaty and response steps announced by the Russian President."

He called the US withdrawal "unilateral and totally unprovoked", and warned it "aggravates the situation in international security and strategic stability. It will certainly receive an effective response".

Brokered by US president Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, the treaty ended a superpower buildup of warheads that had frightened Europe.

It banned ground-launched missiles with a range of 500 to 5,500 kilometres (300 to 3,400 miles).

The deal addressed Soviet nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles targeting Western capitals, but put no restrictions on other major military actors such as China.

Trump had said he would like to "get everybody in a big and beautiful room and do a new treaty", but in the meantime, the US "can't be put at a disadvantage".

- Disputed missile -

The US in December gave Moscow a 60-day deadline to dismantle missiles it said breached the agreement.

But Moscow insists the disputed 9M729 missile is allowed under the treaty.

Lavrov on Saturday repeated accusations that Washington itself has been in violation of the deal for many years, while Russia "tried everything to save the treaty" in several rounds of diplomatic talks.

Russia's defence ministry, in turn, accused the United States of having taken the decision to withdraw from the INF already "two years before the unfounded public accusations against Russia".

By 2017, "Washington had not only taken this decision but also had started preparations for the production of short-range and intermediate range missiles prohibited by the treaty", a ministry statement alleged.

European leaders have voiced fears over the consequences of the treaty's demise, and have called on Russia to address concerns before the US formally leaves in August.

Beijing also expressed concern Saturday, and called for "constructive dialogue".

China's foreign ministry has ruled out the possibility of negotiating a new multilateral pact that includes Beijing.

NATO has said that US allies "fully support" its withdrawal from the pact, and agreed that Russia's 9M729 ground-launched cruise missile systems violates the treaty.

Lavrov at Saturday's meeting voiced concerns that Washington's decision to withdraw from the INF could jeopardise the extension of the New START treaty.

That agreement, which caps the number of nuclear warheads held by Washington and Moscow, expires in 2021.

INF Treaty: a 1987 US-Soviet nuclear pact
Washington (AFP) Feb 1, 2019 - The Cold War-era INF arms control treaty, signed by the United States and Soviet Union in 1987, obliged the two superpowers to reduce their nuclear arsenals for the first time.

At the time of its signature by US president Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in Washington, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty was hailed as historic.

It opened the way to a new era in relations between the Eastern and Western blocs.

Nuclear accords had already been concluded, including SALT I in 1972 and SALT II in 1979, freezing the number of strategic ballistic missile launchers held by each country.

With the INF treaty, the two powers agreed for the first time to destroy a whole range of nuclear missiles.

The treaty bans missiles that can travel distances of between 310 and 3,400 miles (500 and 5,500 kilometers). They were to be destroyed no more than three years after the treaty entered into force.

It led to the destruction of 2,692 missiles by 1991, almost all the intermediate range, which made up a little more than four percent of the total nuclear arsenals of the two countries in 1987.

One of the innovations of the INF treaty was that inspectors from the other country could verify that the missiles had been destroyed.

- Dangerous arms race -

The 1987 treaty put an end to a mini-arms race triggered by the Soviet Union's deployment of SS-20 nuclear missiles targeting Western European capitals.

NATO at the time responded by deploying US nuclear-tipped Pershing IA and II missiles. This led to massive pacifist demonstrations across Europe.

During what was known as the Euromissiles crisis, Reagan described the Soviet Union as "the evil empire."

The arrival in power of Gorbachev in 1985 and his Perestroika reforms, however, signaled the opening of the Soviet bloc to dialogue with the United States.

Three summits between Gorbachev and Reagan between 1985 and 1987 were necessary to achieve the signature of the INF treaty.

In October 2018, President Donald Trump accused Russia of not respecting the accord and threatened to withdraw from it, despite pleas from the European Union to preserve it.

Trump announced on Friday that he was withdrawing, with European allies agreeing that Russia's 9M729 ground-launched cruise missile system has a range that violates the treaty.

Related Links
Learn about nuclear weapons doctrine and defense at SpaceWar.com
Learn about missile defense at SpaceWar.com
All about missiles at SpaceWar.com
Learn about the Superpowers of the 21st Century at SpaceWar.com

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NATO 'fully' supports US withdrawal from missile treaty
Brussels (AFP) Feb 1, 2019
NATO said Friday it fully supported the US decision to pull out from a Cold War missile treaty with Russia, saying Moscow was in breach of the agreement. "Allies fully support this action," the North Atlantic alliance said in a statement. NATO issued the statement in the name of its council of member states shortly after US President Donald Trump announced Washington's withdrawal from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. Russia failed to meet a deadline set by the United States ... read more