Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future

Obama, there will appear a new type of Russian heavy
ICBMs. Only the United States will have to conduct
reductions, albeit not very dramatic ones. 77
However a less enthusiastic perspective was offered
by analysts without links to the Russian officialdom.
For example, Major General (Ret.) Vladimir
Dvorkin warned that numerical reductions of nuclear
weapons between the two leading nuclear powers do
not solve numerous global security problems—from
nuclear terrorism to regional nuclear conflagrations.
In the case of Russia, diminished nuclear deterrence
potential raises uneasy questions about the weakness
of Russian conventional forces, vulnerability to attack
with precision weapons; medium- and shorter-range
missiles no longer possessed by Russia and the United
States; and the need to take into account the nuclear
arsenals of U.S. allies, China and other existing and
emerging possessors of nuclear weapons. 78
Some government critics came to regard the new
START as a “conspiracy” to eventually deprive Russia
of its nuclear deterrence entirely. The signing of the
treaty gave rise to numerous publications in Russia on
the “fallacy” of unilateral nuclear disarmament. 79
Parallel to the arms control activity, Medvedev,
who prides himself on legal expertise and adherence
to “international legality,” engaged in preparation
of numerous internal Russian doctrinal documents,
including an update of the RF Military Doctrine and
Foreign Policy Concept. In effect, the work on the revision
of the 2000 RF Military Doctrine started long
before Medvedev’s coming to power. For years, Moscow
periodically and apparently purposefully circulated
rumors on the imminence of the document and
its forthcoming major novelty, particularly related to
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