Russia Withdrawal From Arms Deal Shows Failure Of Obama Reset

[Geee]

Investors Business Daily:

Foreign Policy: Russia announces it will withdraw from a post-Cold War deal to dismantle nuclear and chemical weapons when it expires next year. Is this what President Obama meant by a "reset" in U.S.-Russian relations?

The so-called Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program, which had been renewed twice by the U.S. and Russia, was a major post-Cold War success.

It led to the deactivation of more than 7,650 strategic warheads from the old Soviet Union, and seemed to put the former USSR onto a far more peaceful path. It helped seal President Reagan's hard-won U.S. victory in the Cold War against its former foe.

But after four years of Obama's weak stewardship of our nation's national security, the Russians are saying "nyet" to renewing the deal in 2013. It's easy to see why.

Everywhere they look, they see U.S. weakness and a failure to respond to overt provocations by others.

They see world affairs as the U.S. retreats from previous strong alliances, such as those with Britain and Israel, and ignores or downplays others, including our ties with Japan.

Why continue to disarm after losing a cold war if your enemy is already busy disarming itself?

[Valin]

Reuters:

 

10/10/12

 

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia will not renew a decades-old agreement with Washington on dismantling nuclear and chemical weapons when it expires next year, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was quoted as saying on Wednesday.

 

The death of the 1991 agreement, which had been renewed twice, is the latest in a series of hitches in relations between the United States and Russia and casts doubt on the future of the much-vaunted "reset" in relations between the Cold War-era foes.

 

(Snip)

 

During his trip to Moscow Lugar said he had brought up the idea of Moscow and Washington working together to reduce Syria's chemical weapons stockpiles, though he said response to the idea had been cool.

 

(Snip)

[SrWoodchuck]

Russian weapon storage is lax & prone to accidental explosion. Mushroom clouds on the horizon, are not fun.

 

https://therearenosunglasses.wordpress.com/2012/10/09/another-massive-russian-ammo-dump-explosion-this-time-on-a-train/

 

MOSCOW, October 9 (RIA Novosti)

Residents were evacuated on Tuesday after munitions at a military ammunition disposal site exploded near the Donguz rail station in Russia’s Orenburg region, the Emergencies and Civil Defense Ministry said.

A total of more than 4,000 tons of ammunition exploded, the Investigative Committee’s Chief Military Directorate said.

“That included 1,379 tons of 100-mm shells, 400 tons of aviation bombs, and 2,000 280-mm rockets from Uragan multiple rocket launchers,” committee said in a press release.

“Donguz has been partially evacuated, and road traffic on the Sol-Lipetsk highway has been stopped,” a ministry source said.

The alarm was sounded at 10:57 a.m. Moscow time, after a fire broke out at the depot 25 miles (40 km) from Orenburg, followed by three explosions. There were no reports of casualties so far, the ministry said.

The explosion took place after a fire,

The incident is the latest in a series of blasts involving munitions disposal sites and firing ranges in Russia in the last few years.

Three servicemen were injured in a blast on a military range in Russia’s Far East Khabarovsk Territory on May 30.

On May 18, another person was injured in an ammunition depot fire in the nearby Primorsk Territory.

Last June, huge explosions shook an ammunition depot in Russia’s Urals republic of Udmurtia, leaving 95 people injured.