Tactical Nuclear Weapons and NATO.pdf - Program on Strategic ...

diminishes still further Russian interest in making
TNW-related concessions without compensation in
other areas. 16
The chance to achieve progress still exists, however.
Despite many evident difficulties, the officially
acknowledged Russian concern about at least two
common security threats may serve to lay the groundwork
for future negotiations: (1) the threat of nuclear
weapons proliferation, which could increase the probability
of nuclear war, accident, or a related catastrophe;
<strong>and</strong> (2) the threat of nuclear terrorism, which
could lead to the same dire consequences for Russia.
At the moment, these are broad background issues
both for Russia <strong>and</strong> for <strong>NATO</strong>, with future agreement
on them more likely than on the present sticky details
of TNWs. With TNWs, there are just too many divergent
opinions on the specifics of location, terminology,
transparency, storage, risk calculations, internal
politics, multilateralism, <strong>and</strong> intertwining of TNW issues
with U.S. weapons in space, the CFE Treaty, <strong>and</strong>
European ballistic missile defense, to name just a few.
As a result, both sides are seeking symbolic <strong>and</strong>
confidence-enhancing acts that may permit preliminary
consultations on the working level <strong>and</strong> keep the
TNW discussion alive. This will also allow the parties
to underst<strong>and</strong> each other’s positions better <strong>and</strong> to
consolidate argumentation in the hope that, with time,
when the political environment becomes more conducive,
Russian, U.S., <strong>and</strong> <strong>NATO</strong> experts will have accumulated
enough sound proposals to find a militarily
<strong>and</strong> politically acceptable formula to start serious
negotiations.
As to official consultations <strong>and</strong> exchanges of data
prior to the start of negotiations, Russian experts have
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