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Russia’s General Staff Chief Shelves Arms Race
Russia won’t revise its military construction program elaborated till 2010 in the wake of the U.S. intention to station missile defense facilities in Eastern Europe, Army’s General Staff Chief Yury Baluevsky said, Interfax reported.
”Radical changes in the world may affect these plans, but no changes that could materially modify the program of arms forces construction have happened so far,” Baluevsky explained.
But in the United States, they intend to determine configuration of Europe’s missile shield exactly by 2010 to 2011. The U.S. intention is to launch interceptors in Poland and a radar in Czechia by 2012.
Russia and the United States are at odds now because of the U.S. project of stationing missile defense facilities in Eastern Europe. President Putin has threatened by the asymmetrical response but specified that Russia won’t be engaged in another arms race.
In late April, Putin urged parliament to deliberate on declaring unilateral moratorium on the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE Treaty). But Russia won’t use the CFE Treaty as the asymmetrical response to the U.S. missile shield in Europe, Baluevsky made clear.
Russia has managed to proceed from “bilateral talks to the OSCE,” Baluevsky specified. The need of this move was emphasized by President Putin in his annual address to the Federal Assembly of April 26. Moreover, the issue of the U.S. missile defense will be raised during the meeting of NATO-Russia Council slated for May 10
www.kommersant.com
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