Trump adviser tells Putin: We'll quit arms control treaty you're breaking

[webfact]

Trump adviser tells Putin: We'll quit arms control treaty you're breaking

By Andrew Osborn and Vladimir Soldatkin

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) shakes hands with U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton during a meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia October 23, 2018. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

 

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Washington will press ahead with a plan to quit a landmark nuclear arms control pact despite objections from Russia and some European countries, senior U.S. official John Bolton said on Tuesday, after meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin.

 

Bolton had a 90-minute meeting in the Kremlin with Putin which resulted in an agreement for the Russian leader to hold talks with U.S. President Donald Trump in Paris next month, their first meeting since a July summit in Helsinki.

 

But the Moscow talks appeared to yield no breakthrough over Trump's stated desire for Washington to leave the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF), a step Moscow has decried as dangerous and many European countries have warned could reignite a Cold War-style arms race.

 

"There's a new strategic reality out there," Bolton, who is National Security Advisor to Trump, told a news conference, adding that the Cold War-era treaty did not address new missile threats from countries such as China, Iran and North Korea, and was therefore redundant.

 

"In terms of filing the formal notice of withdrawal, that has not been filed but it will be filed in due course," he said, suggesting it was a process that could take several months.

 

Moscow has warned Washington it will be forced to respond in kind to restore the military balance if Trump carries through with his threat to quit the INF treaty, a 1987 agreement that eliminated all short- and intermediate-range land-based nuclear and conventional missiles held by both countries in Europe.

 

Putin used the start of the meeting with Bolton to take the White House to task over what he said were a series of unprovoked U.S. steps against Moscow. But Bolton told reporters afterwards Russian missiles were a threat and signalled Washington would ignore Russian objections to its exit plans.

 

"The problem is there are Russian INF violations in Europe now," Bolton told reporters, repeating an allegation Moscow denies.

 

"The threat is not America's INF withdrawal from the treaty. The threat is Russian missiles already deployed."

 

He said Russia had first illegally tested a land-based cruise missile in 2008 and described its violations of the treaty as "long and deep".

 

Russia in turn accuses Washington of violating the same treaty, something it denies.

 

Bolton has said the treaty is outdated because other countries remain free to make intermediate-range ballistic missiles and cruise missiles while the United States finds its hands tied. He noted that previous efforts to expand the treaty to include other countries had come to nothing.

 

COAT OF ARMS

Putin made an acerbic reference to the U.S. coat of arms at the start of his meeting with Bolton.

 

"We barely respond to any of your steps but they keep on coming," he jokily complained to Bolton.

 

"On the coat of the arms of the United States there's an eagle holding 13 arrows in one talon and an olive branch in the other. My question is whether your eagle has gobbled up all the olives leaving only the arrows?"

 

Bolton quipped that he had not brought any olives.

 

Before the talks, a Kremlin spokesman said the INF treaty had its weak points, but that the U.S. approach of talking about leaving it without proposing a replacement was dangerous.

 

But Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov, speaking to reporters after the talks finished, sounded a conciliatory note, saying that Moscow viewed Bolton's visit as a sign that Washington wanted to continue dialogue on the issue. He said Moscow wanted the same thing.

 

Ex-Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, now 87 and an original signatory to the treaty, has warned that unravelling the pact could have catastrophic consequences. Countries such as Poland have, however, backed Trump's move.

 

Trump's withdrawal announcement is causing particular concern in Europe which was the main beneficiary of the INF treaty as a result of the removal of Pershing and U.S. cruise missiles from Europe and of Soviet SS-20 missiles from the European part of the then Soviet Union.

 

Without the treaty, some European countries fear that Washington might deploy intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Europe again and that Russia might move to deploy such missiles in its exclave of Kaliningrad which would once again turn Europe into a potential nuclear battlefield.

 

Bolton said Washington was "a long way" from making any such deployments in Europe and said grim warnings about the dangerous consequences of Washington quitting the treaty were wide of the mark and reminded him of similarly hollow warnings when the United States left the Cold War-era Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty in 2002.

 

"It was not true then and it will not be true now," he said.

 

(Additional reporting by Christian Lowe, Polina Nikolskaya, Katya Golubkova and Polina Devitt in Moscow, Paul Carrel and Hans-Edzard Busemann in Berlin, Joanna Plucinska and Pawel Sobczak in Warsaw, and by Robin Emmott in Brussels; Writing by Andrew Osborn; Editing by Richard Balmforth and Alison Williams)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2018-10-24

[YetAnother]

1 hour ago, webfact said:

Bolton had a 90-minute meeting in the Kremlin with Putin

imagine being a career diplomat and having to deal with guys like Putin on a regular basis; non-stop headaches

[Topdoc]

Imagine what would happen if Russia installed something like the "Aegis Ashore Missile System" near US borders.

[Tug]

I don’t think dealing with Putin would be a career diplomats biggest headache it would be dealing with trump this a situation were sanctions would be called for but trump wants a arms race

[Proboscis]

I love the way Bolton talks about this as if the subject never came up before. If anyone remembers, even Putin in 2014 said that this agreement tied up both USA and Russia but let other nuclear powers, such as China, do whatever they wanted. Obama could do nothing because he had no support in both houses to do anything - back then, if Putin said anything, the Republicans were against it.

 

There is a different way of going about this. Beating the Russians over the head by declaring unanimously before any discussion that you are dropping the agreement is not the way to do. Quiet diplomacy is the way to begin, pointing out that you already know of any infringements. THen steer the discussion around to adjusting or rewriting the agreement to bring China in.

 

But then, that would require a strategy, which the USA does not have. All they have now is an enraged Putin and Russia - hardly a way in which to get any new agreement going.

[zaphod reborn]

Amazing how Trump spins this as some kind of punishment against Russia.  Putin and the Rooskies have been dying for years to get out of this treaty.  Trump is being an obedient puppet for his financial master.

[connda]

6 hours ago, webfact said:

Moscow has warned Washington it will be forced to respond in kind to restore the military balance if Trump carries through with his threat to quit the INF treaty, a 1987 agreement that eliminated all short- and intermediate-range land-based nuclear and conventional missiles held by both countries in Europe.

How wonderful.  Back to a policy of Mutually Assured Destruction.  No doubt all these 'leaders' and 'advisors' will be safely tucked away in their doomsday shelters when they push the button to commit global genocide on a scale that is simply unfathomable.  And it's not just humans going down the evolutionary memory hole.

Too many pawns on the table?  Wipe them off and reset the board.  Love them neo-cons.

[farcanell]

8 hours ago, webfact said:

Bolton has said the treaty is outdated because other countries remain free to make intermediate-range ballistic missiles and cruise missiles while the United States finds its hands tied. He noted that previous efforts to expand the treaty to include other countries had come to nothing.

Ummm.... hands tied?

tomahawk missies, mr Bolton.... there ya go...hands untied.

[IAMHERE]

Most likely the Russians WANT the USA to develop these shortish range missiles so they can steal the plans and not have to spend the money to develop them themselves. That Putin is a crafty one. Chinese will steal the plans too. Of course the USA will give the missiles to Europe for free.

[Morch]

11 hours ago, YetAnother said:

imagine being a career diplomat and having to deal with guys like Putin on a regular basis; non-stop headaches

 

Now imagine a 90 minute conversation with Bolton, the man and the mustache.

[Morch]

9 hours ago, Proboscis said:

I love the way Bolton talks about this as if the subject never came up before. If anyone remembers, even Putin in 2014 said that this agreement tied up both USA and Russia but let other nuclear powers, such as China, do whatever they wanted. Obama could do nothing because he had no support in both houses to do anything - back then, if Putin said anything, the Republicans were against it.

 

There is a different way of going about this. Beating the Russians over the head by declaring unanimously before any discussion that you are dropping the agreement is not the way to do. Quiet diplomacy is the way to begin, pointing out that you already know of any infringements. THen steer the discussion around to adjusting or rewriting the agreement to bring China in.

 

But then, that would require a strategy, which the USA does not have. All they have now is an enraged Putin and Russia - hardly a way in which to get any new agreement going.

 

You had me agreeing up until the last bit. I don't think Russia is anywhere near "enraged". I think Putin wanted out, and Trump (unwittingly or otherwise) obliged. Russia apparently either got such weapons (in advanced stages of testing or operational), so the timing is just right from their point of view. Add the bonus of making Trump look like the warmonger (regardless of Russia breaching the treaty).

[Morch]

2 hours ago, IAMHERE said:

Most likely the Russians WANT the USA to develop these shortish range missiles so they can steal the plans and not have to spend the money to develop them themselves. That Putin is a crafty one. Chinese will steal the plans too. Of course the USA will give the missiles to Europe for free.

 

The basis for the US withdrawal move is Russia already developing such weapons. China got them for quite a while now, as they weren't party to the treaty. Doubtful European allies will get anything other than, perhaps the US positioning such weapons in Europe. Maybe they'll have an independent go at developing such.