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

in Krasnaya Zvezda. Their proposal that Russia should
withdraw its TNW from Kaliningrad was highlighted
as not only politically incorrect, since a similar appeal
was not directed towards the United States, but entirely
flawed in as much as these weapons are not based
there. The Kola Peninsula was treated differently, and
here the author argued that such an appeal could only
be considered if the United States eliminated its naval
bases in San Diego or Norfolk. It further asserted that
the United States, by basing these weapons on the territories
of European allies, had violated the first and
second articles of the NPT, and stressed that such articles
must be followed without exception. The list of
flaws in the Sikorski and Bildt hypotheses was extensive,
and placed high value on the sovereign right of
any state to freely deploy its armed forces in any way,
place, or time on its territory. The proposal was described
as ill-conceived and unfounded, as the author
then proceeded to outline a plausible compromise:
Before the beginning of official discussions on this
theme, Washington and Moscow must take the same
starting position in the negotiations. [The United
States must agree] to withdraw all of its TNW from the
European continent and bring them back to its own
territory. That is, it must do what Russia did 15 years
ago.” 103
During the 46th International Security Policy Conference
in Munich, Germany, in February 2010, Russian
Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov, who led
a 30-person strong Russian delegation, said that it
was likely that following the signing of the follow-on
START, Washington and Moscow would come under
pressure to negotiate joint reduction of their tactical
nuclear stockpiles. Ivanov expressed a similar position
82