Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future - Strategic ...

eration and war prevention: this belief was borrowed
from American political science literature during their
formative years in the 1970s and 1980s.
Another complicating factor is the weakness of
economic and political levers of influence in the international
arena, which serves to enhance the perceived
importance of military instruments. Although Russia
could potentially use its position as an exporter of oil
and gas, this is, in reality, a double-edged sword: an attempt
to use it could harm the most important source
of revenue for the government and private (semi-private)
business and vastly strengthen the desire of its
customers to diversify energy sources (thereby eliminating
Russian influence as well as profit). Instead,
Moscow is trying to build a reputation as a reliable
supplier and has been reluctant to even hint at interruption
of exports. The fact that dependence on Russian
oil and gas exports does not affect the rather cold,
sometimes even hostile, attitude of Eastern European
countries (such as Poland) toward Russia suggests
that the utility of this dependence as a political lever
is, at best, very limited. Seen through Russian eyes,
Russian exports actually depend on other countries—
on Ukraine, which provides the main transit route,
and on Central Asia, which is an important source
of natural gas that is re-exported to Europe. Instead
of using oil and gas exports as a lever, Moscow has
to fight to hold on to its market against alternative
routes (across the Caspian Sea and South Caucasus).
Several crises in relations with Ukraine, when transit
to Europe was interrupted or nearly interrupted (all of
these cases were blamed on Russia), created an acute
sense of dependence in Russia and a desire to build alternative
routes of its own through the Baltic Sea and
the Balkans. Strong objections by Poland, the Baltic
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