Umstrittene Schweizer Sicherheitspolitik ... - ETH Zürich

Ausland
Orlov Vladimir A.: Switzerland is a very skilful nation. Being neutral
helps Switzerland to be skilful and balanced, given that security architecture
is not made by a single player but by a number of players. Switzerland
has proven to be the best place – in Europe, sometimes on the globe – for
discussing security related issues and finding solutions. For example, the
Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty – a treaty which works though it was
prepared in another era – was agreed upon in Switzerland. Today, quite
a number of European nations are, unlike Switzerland, part of a military
or a politico-military alliance, so that Switzerland is a good place to hold
negotiations about a new security architecture, both formal and informal,
the latter probably being no less important than the former.
When, in Moscow, we read about Swiss security concerns, we not
always agree but we are convinced that it is very indicative that a country
that has reasons to feel more secure than others expresses security
concerns. When Switzerland does so, we don’t take it as a part of some
egoistic kind of policy-making but as motivated by real security concerns.
Sometimes we are able to learn from Swiss statements and comments
because they are less politically motivated than statements of nations that
are a member of alliances may be.
Catrina Christian: What are we to make of the statement recently made
by Russian President Medvedev to a military audience in Moscow about
a big rearmament drive for the Russian armed forces?
Orlov Vladimir A.: The issue here is modernization of the armed forces.
Through the 1990s, not only the size of the Russian armed forces was
drastically reduced – which was not necessarily a bad thing to do – but
also its quality. If we talk about dramatic nuclear arms reductions in the
future, meeting Russia’s as well as other nuclear weapons states’ obligations
to finally eliminate all nuclear weapons, we should be prepared for
current threats, including military threats, and have sufficient and efficient
high-precision conventional arms. Some of the Russian equipments,
particularly the equipment of the navy, had not been modernized since
the 1980s. The plan you mentioned does, in that sense, not completely
change the Russian policy. Rather, the armed forces should have been
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