Putin goes live on TV phone-in to escalate nuclear war of words

Since President Bush came to power there have been many of us who have seen him as the President of nuclear escalation. His stated intention that he reserved the right to use nuclear weapons even against non-nuclear states was thought by many to be likely to result in non nuclear states rushing to get themselves a nuclear weapon as the only way to stave off an American nuclear attack.

The most obvious of these was North Korea which withdrew from the NNPT in 2003 after Bush failed to fulfil the American end of the 1994 Agreed Framework, the deal made between North Korea and the Clinton administration. North Korea then went on to develop nuclear weapons.

However, Bush's threat to use nuclear weapons against even non nuclear states was a blatant breach of the NNPT which, in order to encourage non nuclear country's not to pursue nuclear weapons, explicitly promises that non nuclear country's will not be threatened by nuclear attack.

A further breach of the NNPT was Bush's stated intent to build a new range of bunker busting nuclear weapons, an undertaking which he made shortly after coming to power in the full knowledge that, in doing so, he was in blatant breach of the NNPT.

The vast majority of countries, however, felt that "total elimination of nuclear weapons is the only absolute guarantee against [their] use," and enshrined this conviction in Article VI of the NPT. That is, nuclear weapons per se are a problem, even if they could serve as effective deterrents against certain threats. The United States and the other four nuclear powers accepted this proposition and in May 2000 reaffirmed their "unequivocal undertaking" to eliminate their nuclear arsenals.

Many at the time said that Bush was effectively starting a new nuclear arms race and it has not taken long for that prediction to bear fruit:

President Vladimir Putin said yesterday that Russia was developing a new generation of nuclear weapons as part of a "big, grandiose" plan to boost the country's defences against the US.

Speaking during his annual live question-and-answer session, Mr Putin said Russia was upgrading its nuclear arsenal, including intercontinental ballistic missiles, nuclear submarines and strategic bombers. It was also developing "completely new strategic [nuclear] complexes", he said.

"Our plans are not simply considerable, but huge. At the same time they are absolutely realistic. I have no doubts we will accomplish them," Mr Putin said, during a three-hour phone-in programme shown across Russia on state-run TV.

Putin is reacting, not only to Bush's plans to increase his nuclear arsenal, but also to Bush's highly controversial plans to build a new missile defence system in central Europe which he claims will target rogue states but which Putin believes is targeting Russia.

Putin made clear yesterday that this is also on his mind when as he vastly increases Russia's nuclear arsenal.

Mr Putin said Russia would defend itself if the US goes ahead with its plan to install elements of its missile shield in central Europe. "I can assure you that such steps are being prepared and we will take them," he said.

His comments follow unsuccessful talks last week with the US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and the defence secretary, Robert Gates. Mr Putin began their meeting in Moscow by signalling that Russia might dump the intermediate-range nuclear missiles treaty.

How did we get here? Since the collapse of the Soviet Union the US and Russia had a great chance to forge friendship, and yet here we now see Putin - as a direct result of Bush's arrogance - increasing Russia's nuclear missile capability by a "huge" margin.

Pat Buchanan, of all people, has written on the subject and it is hard to disagree with the conclusion he reaches:

At the Cold War’s end, the United States was given one of the great opportunities of history: to embrace Russia, largest nation on earth, as partner, friend, ally. Our mutual interests meshed almost perfectly. There was no ideological, territorial, historic or economic quarrel between us, once communist ideology was interred.

We blew it.

We moved NATO onto Russia’s front porch, ignored her valid interests and concerns, and, with our “indispensable-nation” arrogance, treated her as a defeated power, as France treated Weimar Germany after Versailles.

Who restarted the Cold War? Bush and the braying hegemonists he brought with him to power. Great empires and tiny minds go ill together.

Bush's arrogant insistence that the ABM Treaty, which had stood firm since the days of Nixon and Brezhnev, would no longer be applicable to United States - and his desire to place a missile defence system in the heart of Europe - have proven too much for Putin to bear.

"Bush and the braying hegemonists he brought with him to power" are on the brink of restarting the Cold War. And the first sign of this is the nuclear escalation that many of us always predicted that Bush's actions would encourage.

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Tags: Bush, Putin, nuclear escalation, missile defence system, NNPT, Nuclear non Proliferation Treaty, North Korea, bunker busting nuclear weapons