Peace and Security Review, Vol.1 No. 2 - International Centre for ...

S. Mahmud Ali Post-Cold War Great Power Security Dynamics 41
early 2007. In February, Vladimir Putin told an international conference on
security:
Today we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force, military
force, in international relations, force that is plunging the world into an abyss
of permanent conflict ... We are seeing greater and greater disdain for the
basic principles of international law ... We must seriously think about the
architecture of global security ... One state and, of course, first and foremost
the United States, has overstepped its national borders in every way. This is
visible in the economic, political, cultural and educational policies it imposes
on other nations. Well, who likes this? Who is happy about this? 26
After attacking US policy, Putin invited US Defence Secretary Robert Gates
to Moscow where Gates, despite his considerable diplomatic sophistication,
failed to allay anxiety and unhappiness over Washington’s determination to
pursue strategic objectives apparently challenging Russia’s core interests. Bush
invited Putin to an informal summit at the family home in Kennebunkport,
Maine, and sent Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to Moscow for talks. But
America’s decision to install ten BMD interceptors in Poland and an ABM
radar in the Czech Republic, and its support for Kosovar independence against
Serbian refusal to renounce sovereignty over the province, ensured these
talks failed. With the Russian economy forging ahead in a bullish energy
market and Putin acquiring almost dictatorial control over the country,
resurgent Russian nationalism found new expression in a conventional and
nuclear force build up, notably since 2005 when large budget-increases were
announced. One aspect of that robust military response was the Sino-Russian
“Peace Mission 2005” exercise in China’s Shandong peninsula which tested
the two forces working together against an imaginary common enemy in the
western Pacific region. This was the foundation on which a more extensive
effort would be built two years later.
Under the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) rubric, Chinese
and Russian forces ⎯ with token Special Forces teams from other member
states ⎯ conducted a series of complex exercises in Xinjiang and the Ural
Mountains. As the six SCO Presidents formally ended “Peace Mission 2007”
after their summit in Bishkek, Putin announced the resumption of Russia’s
strategic bomber missions, suspended in 1992. British and US fighters were
soon intercepting and turning back “Bear” bombers near Britain and Guam
while BMD talks among America, Russia and Azerbaijan sputtered on. Denying
any warlike intent, Putin ordered strategic rocket forces to prepare for defensive
action while asserting a revived Russia would no longer tolerate challenges
to its core interests. Just before his United Russia party won a landslide
26 Vladimir Putin, International security: Russian perspective, Munich, 10 February 2007.
Vol.1, No.2 2008 pp.27-47