Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future

assert Russia’s identity as a great power, and most
crucially back up that claim with a real force. Russia’s
nuclear capability ensures Russia’s strategic independence
as an international actor, but even more to the
point, its identity as a truly soveriegn state, i.e., one
that makes policy strictly on the basis of its own calculation
of national interest, not the actions of other
states.
Furthermore, official documents like the new defense
doctrine and the 2009 national security concept
explictly state that the incidence of major power reliance
on force and the bypassing of the United Nations
(UN) is rising, making the outbreak of wars more
rather than less likely. 45 Thus Defense Minister Anatoly
Serdyukov told the Defense Collegium in 2009 that:
The military-political situation has been characterized
by the U.S. leadership’s striving to achieve global
leadership and by an expansion and buildup of military
presence of the United States and its NATO allies
in regions contiguous with Russia. The American
side’s aspirations were directed toward gaining access
to raw-material, energy, and other resources of CIS
countries. Processes aimed at crowding Russia [out]
from the area of its traditional interests were actively
supported. International terrorism, religious extremism,
and the illegal arms trade seriously influenced
the military-political situation. They have been manifested
more and more often in countries bordering on
Russia. Georgia’s attack on South Ossetia was a direct
threat to RF national interests and military security.
This attempt to settle the conflict by force was aimed
first and foremost at destabilizing the situation in the
Caucasus. On the whole the analysis of the militarypolitical
situation permits a conclusion about the
growing likelihood of armed conflicts and their potential
danger to our state [Author’s Emphasis]. 46
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