Politically Incorrect

President Obama and Russian President Medvedev have reached a preliminary agreement on the reduction of nuclear weapons.  It is far from a land-breaking accord.  A close look at the numbers reveals that, at the end of the day, either Obama became a realist or Medvedev made the more persuasive case.  My hope is the former.

The two leaders reached an agreement on limiting the number of deployed strategic nuclear warheads to 1,500 – 1,675.  The previous limit, under the Moscow Treaty of 2002, was within the range of 1,700 – 2,200 deployed strategic nuclear warheads.  Therefore, President Obama, the nuclear abolitionist who advocates a world free of nuclear weapons, has brought the limit down by 25 deployed strategic nuclear warheads.  Perhaps that is too cynical – after all, the lower limits are for all intents and purproses meaningless – so perhaps he can be credited with reducing the number by 525.  Though it seems like a radical reduction, it is still within 25 warheads of the range the Bush Administration determined was adequate for U.S. national security.

The Russians had previously stated they would be unwilling to go below 1,500 deployed strategic nuclear warheads.  It is therefore likely that Obama pushed for the lower limit (1,500) while Medvedev pushed for as high of a limit as he could achieve (1,675) that was still below the Moscow Treaty lower limit of 1,700.  In this aspect of the accord, it is likely that Medvedev’s tenacity is mostly responsible for the warhead levels.

The range that Obama and Medvedev reached on strategic nuclear delivery vehicles (SNDVs) is a much wider gap of 500-1,100.  The Russians, whose SNDV levels will decline from roughly 680 to less than 400 within ten years due to systems reaching the end of their service lives, pushed for the lower limit for two main reasons.  They wish to maintain parity with the U.S. and, if they could not push the U.S. to reach that lower limit, could at least save face by insisting on a low SNDV limit to make it look like they were disarming more willingly.  The U.S., which deploys less than 1,100 SNDVs (see here), will have to do little in terms of staying within this limit.

Prior to the summit, the Russians had been insisting that the SNDV limit of START (1,600) be drastically reduced, some calling for it to be lowered to 600, others to as low as 300-400.  The only conceivable reason the upper limit would be set at 1,100 is that President Obama listened to his military advisors and became a realist – that is, he recognized that it is completely unnecessary to cut our SNDVs to 50% of their current levels, especially since the Russians will have to make their cuts regardless.  It makes no diplomatic sense to get nothing for something.  Furthermore, U.S. SNDV levels may provide valuable leverage in dealing with Russian tactical nuclear weapons in any future treaty.  Therefore, in this part of the agreement, it is likely that Obama’s realism and the strength of the U.S. position is responsible for maintaining an upper limit of 1,100 SNDVs.

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of this agreement is the timeline.  Obama and Medvedev have agreed to achieve these reductions within 7 years, almost 4 years after Obama’s first term will have expired.  It seems to suggest that President Obama is not at all confident that he will get another strategic arms reduction treaty within this term or any future ones.  His rhetoric notwithstanding, perhaps he has accepted that the Russians will simply not work towards “global nuclear zero” and will hold out next for reducing their tactical nuclear weapons.  In any event,  with the decommissioning of aging warheads, de-MIRVing of ICBMs (replacing multiple warheads with one per missile), and de-tubing of SSBNs (reducing the number of missiles on each submarine), the U.S. should easily reach the new limits within seven years.

Assuming there are no egregious caveats that emerge in this preliminary accord, such as linking missile defense to offensive systems or limiting U.S. conventional strategic capabilities (prompt global strike), this is a good agreement for the United States.  It appears that President Obama took the advice of former Secretary of Defense (and nuclear abolitionist) William Perry (D) to keep it “simple and modest.”  This agreement, again assuming no drastic compromises on missile defense or conventional capabilities, should be ratified by the Senate (after sufficient debate) before START I expires on 5 December 2009.  If this is not a clear case study of realism dashing idealism, then nothing is.