Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future

sion of the Military Doctrine was obviously intended
to coincide with the U.S. election campaign. This was
Moscow’s way of sending a message to the future U.S.
Administration on prospects of bilateral strategic relations.
Russian observers also linked the flurry of statements
on the imminent appearance of the new RF
Military Doctrine to the new effort by Defense Minister
Anatolii Serdyukov at reforming RF Armed Forces
undertaken under Dmitrii Medvedev. From the very
beginning, the reform met with considerable skepticism
and criticism by various military and civilian authorities.
94 It clearly affected the interests of powerful
groups in the military-political establishment besides
thousands in the Officer and General Corps.
Announcing the resumption of work on the RF
Military Doctrine, and especially the appointment of
Yuri Baluyevsky to chair the Editorial Commission to
define the Doctrine’s basic parameters and substance,
may have represented a concession to the conservatives
who began to regard the Serdyukov reform as
an attempt to undermine Russia’s ability to engage
actively in geopolitics and, especially, to use military
might in the promotion of Russian interests abroad. 95
Long before his forced transfer to the RF Security
Council from the post of General Staff Commander,
Baluyevsky campaigned for turning the original 2000
RF Military Doctrine into an aggressive tool justifying
the use of nuclear weapons not only for retaliation purposes
but as a practical tool for defeating aggression
against Russia with the use of superior conventional
forces, and even for preemption and suppression of
activities inimical to Russia’s interests outside its borders,
for example those by terrorists and radicals. 96
Baluyevsky also consistently spoke in favor of offering
an “adequate asymmetrical response to American
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