Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future

14. Daryl G. Kimball, “Obama’s Nuclear Doctrine Could Boost
Reset,” Moscow Times, April 13, 2010, in Johnson’s Russia List
2010, #72, April 13, 2010, available from davidjohnson@starpower.
net. See also Daryl G. Kimball and Greg Thielmann, “Obama’s
NPR: Transitional, Not Transformational,” Arms Control Today,
May 2010, available from www.armscontrol.org/print/4223.
15. Craig Whitlock, “U.S. developing new non-nuclear missiles,”
Washington Post, April 8, 2010, available from www.msnbc.
msn.com/id/36253190/ns/us_news-washington_post/print/1/.
16. Nuclear Posture Review Report, p. 20.
17. David E. Sanger and Thom Shanker, “U.S. Faces Choice on
New Weapons for Fast Strikes,” New York Times, April 23, 2010,
p. A1. According to the same source, the Obama precision global
strike concept envisions that Russia would regularly inspect PGS
silos to reassure itself that the weapons were non-nuclear, and
that American PGS launchers would be located far from those
tasked for strategic nuclear forces.
18. Keir A. Lieber and Daryl G. Press, “The Rise of U.S. Nuclear
Primacy,” Foreign Affairs, March/April 2006, available from
www.foreignaffairs.org/20060301faessay85204/keir-a-lieber-darylg-press/html.
For rejoinders to Lieber and Press, see Peter C. W.
Flory, Keith Payne, Pavel Podvig, and Alexei Arbatov, “Nuclear
Exchange: Does Washington Really Have (or Want) Nuclear Primacy?”
Foreign Affairs, September/October 2006, available from
www.foreignaffairs.com/print/61931.
19. Nuclear weapons, according to Nikolai Sokov, have three
partially overlapping roles in Russian national security policy: (1)
as a status symbol; (2) for existential deterrence; and, (3) as part of
contingent plans for use or threat of use to deter large scale conventional
attacks on Russia. Sokov, “Nuclear Weapons in Russian
Security Strategy,” paper presented at conference on “Strategy
and Doctrine in Russian Security Policy,” Ft. McNair, National
Defense University, Washington, DC, June 28, 2010, p. 5.
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