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Russia Plans New ICBMs, Nuclear
Subs
VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV
AP
Wednesday, February 7, 2007
MOSCOW -- Russia's defense minister on Wednesday laid out an ambitious
plan for building new intercontinental ballistic missiles, nuclear
submarines and possibly aircraft carriers, and set the goal of exceeding
the Soviet army in combat readiness.
Sergei Ivanov's statements appeared aimed at raising his profile
at home ahead of the 2008 election in which he is widely seen as
a potential contender to succeed President Vladimir Putin. But they
also seemed to reflect a growing chill in Russian-U.S. relations
and the Kremlin's concern about U.S. missile defense plans.
Ivanov told parliament the military would get 17 new ballistic
missiles this year -- a drastic increase over the average of four
deployed annually in recent years. The purchases are part of a weapons
modernization program for 2007-2015 worth about $190 billion.
The plan envisages the deployment of 34 new silo-based Topol-M
missiles and control units, as well as an additional 50 such missiles
mounted on mobile launchers by 2015; Russia so far has deployed
more than 40 silo-based Topol-Ms.
Putin and other officials have described the Topol-M as a bulwark
of Russia's nuclear might for years to come, and said it can penetrate
any prospective missile defenses. Last week, Putin dismissed U.S.
claims that missile defense sites Washington hopes to establish
in Poland and the Czech Republic were intended to counter threats
from Iran, and said Russia would respond by developing more efficient
weapons systems.
In 2002, Putin and President Bush signed a treaty obliging both
sides to cut their strategic nuclear weapons by about two-thirds
by 2012, down to 1,700 to 2,200 missiles. But Russian-U.S. ties
have since worsened steadily over disagreements on Iraq and other
global crises, and U.S. concerns about an increasingly authoritarian
streak in Russia's domestic policy.
"The Russian leadership believes that a nuclear parity with
the United States is vitally important because it allows it to conduct
an equal dialogue on other issues," said an independent military
analyst, Alexander Golts.
A rising tide of oil revenues has enabled Russia to boost defense
spending following a squeeze on the military in the 1990s. "The
question now is whether the industries are capable of producing
what the military needs," Ivanov said.
Analysts warn that building any sizable numbers of new weapons
would pose a daunting challenge to the defense plants that received
virtually no government orders for a decade following the 1991 Soviet
collapse.
"Links to subcontractors have been broken, and the defense
plants now need to rebuild them to produce weapons," Golts
said.
Alexander Pikayev, a senior analyst at the Moscow-based Institute
for World Economy and International Relations, said the military
had failed to set the right priorities for weapons procurement in
the past.
Russia's defense budget, which stood at $8.1 billion in 2001, nearly
quadrupled to $31 billion this year, Ivanov said. While this year's
military spending is Russia's largest since the 1991 Soviet collapse,
it is still about 20 times less than the U.S. defense budget.
Ivanov said the military now has enough money to intensify combat
training.
"Combat readiness of the army and the navy is currently the
highest in the post-Soviet history," he said, adding the task
now is to "exceed Soviet-era levels."
Ivanov said the military now has about 1.13 million servicemen,
compared with 1.34 million in 2001. By 2015, the military plans
to have about 1 million servicemen as Russia continues to reduce
its bloated armed forces. "We can't go below that," he
said.
The Kremlin has rejected liberals' calls to abolish the draft,
saying Russia needs a large number of conscripts to protect its
huge territory.
Ivanov said the weapons modernization program would allow the military
to replace 45 percent of existing arsenals with modern weapons systems
by 2015.
As part of the plan, the navy will commission 31 new ships, including
eight nuclear submarines carrying intercontinental ballistic missiles,
Ivanov said.
He played down recent failed launches of the Bulava missile being
developed to equip these submarines. The Bulava, developed by the
same design bureau that built the Topol-M, failed in three consecutive
launches late last year.
"If we already had commissioned this missile and had failures,
that would have been a nightmare," Ivanov said, adding that
launch failures were "within the norm" in the testing
phase.
He also said the government would decide in 2009-2010 whether to
start the construction of a new shipyard for building aircraft carriers.
Russia now only has one Soviet-built medium-sized aircraft carrier
capable of carrying about 30 jets and helicopters.
INFOWARS:
BECAUSE THERE'S A WAR ON FOR YOUR MIND
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