Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future

Not only did Serdyukov accept this General Staff
threat assessment, he intensified it by saying that the
likelihood of threats to Russia in the form of wars and
military conflicts is increasing. Yet, when he spoke, the
share of modern armaments in the armed forces only
made up 10 percent of their arsenal. At that time, 2008,
only 19 percent of defense spending was earmarked
for re-equipping the Army and Navy with that being a
third priority behind organizational reform and maintenance
of the nuclear forces. 47 So the priority of the
nuclear deterrent while Russia undergoes modernization
is already evident from here. Neither has that priority
changed since 2008 despite the current financial
crisis or the increase in nuclear spending discussed
above.
Beyond the presupposition of actual militarypolitical
conflict with the West and China (the latter
being the threat that we dare not speak of), a constant
factor in the relationship with the West irrespective of
its political temperature at any time is the fact that the
nuclear forces of both sides remain frozen in a posture
of mutual deterrence that implies a prior adversarial
relationship that could easily deteriorate further under
any and all circumstances and devolve into that
kind of shooting war. 48 This point is critical: The problematic
nature of the bilateral relationship, just as was
the case during the Cold War—albeit less intensely today—is
not due to deterrence. Rather, deterrence is a
manifestation of a prior, underlying, comprehensive,
and fundamental political antagonism in which Russia
has settled upon deterrence as a policy and strategy
because that strategy expresses its foundational
presupposition of conflict with America and NATO. 49
The fundamental basis of the rivalry with Washington
is political and stems from the nature of the
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