The late 1980’s brought to an end the widespread concern of nuclear war with the Soviet Union. The Cold War ended with Reagan’s controversial but effective defense spending strategy, which essentially turned Moscow’s competitive nature against itself, as the Soviet government spent itself into economic, and subsequent political, ruin trying to match the United States. The sense of security that the Cold War had ended outweighed the damage to the health, and inequity, of the U.S. economy for many people. United States National Debts, controversial tax redistributions, and faltering domestic programs were a welcome alternative to the detonation of nuclear warheads on American soil. The economic damage was clearly the lesser of two evils. Ironically, however, in just ten years, Russian economic woes have changed from a perceived blessing for Americans to a sobering threat and source of concern. Whereas Soviet economic hardship meant security for the United States of the late 1980’s, it means just the opposite to the nuclear security of the world today. Russia’s economic and political problems have elevated new concerns of nuclear war, nuclear terrorism, and accidental nuclear disasters, by weakening security, safety, and tracking measures. If the threat of nuclear weapons is the predominant crutch in foreign policy today, then economic motivations run a close second, or vice versa; and when these two interests conflict, as they now appear to be doing so in Russia, there is clearly reason for concern.

Students today often hear from adults how imminent the threat of nuclear deployment was during the cold war. There is talk of Bay of Pigs, of Cuba, of Kruschev slamming his shoe on the table at the United Nations while promising harm to the United States, of an early 1980’s when the specter of nuclear war was clear and present. We are told how lucky we are today that this threat has been eliminated; that we do not need to enter young adulthood with the fear of nuclear war, as are parents did. We are lucky. Or are we?

Some argue that the threat of nuclear war today is greater than it has ever been. The danger of nuclear deployment today is greater than it was during the cold war. Things are worse, not better. The economic and political chaos in Russia, coupled with the upswing of global terrorism on the whole, has rendered a world fraught with discrete instability and predisposed to possible nuclear mistakes. Today, the threat of nuclear deployment is very real. Is it a danger? Yes and no. Several situations resulting in a heightened nuclear threat seem to be, for the mean time, balanced by a more impassioned pursuit, by many governments, for nuclear containment and deterrence. To better understand the situation, it helps to first look at what the problems and concerns are, and then how economic woes have exacerbated or sparked these problems, and finally what is being done to fight these.

The breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991 meant the end of the nuclear threat for many. The sight of Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev shaking hands, on many occasions, all but eliminated the fears residing in the backs of peoples minds. Many, however, wrongly mistook the division of Soviet power for a diminishing of Soviet power; and the nuclear threat that was coupled hand in hand with this power. In actuality, the breakup of the Soviet Union just complicated the matter; weapons were split up, they did not disappear. Russia's 22,000tactical nuclear weapons now line the Russian border, as well as in Kaliningrad and Byelorus (Blair, 2).

With the breakup of the Soviet Union came a disintegration of its conventional army. With disappearing conventional forces (non-nuclear weapons such as tanks airplanes and troops), Russia has compensated by growing more dependent on nuclear weapons as a source of defense against forces that they perceive as threatening, chiefly China and NATO (Balir, 87). Nuclear weapons, in contrast to typical conventional weapons, are fairly easy to maintain, much faster to deploy, and are unlikely to become outdated in the near future; all of which makes them more economically appealing as a last line of defense for an impoverished country such as Russia is today. Additionally, the Russians have officially abandoned their "no first use" pledge of 1982. There is growing mistrust between officials in Moscow and officials in Washington concerning the mutual reliance on weapons that both governments, on paper, have promised to reduce. This, however, concerns only official government policy. The truly scary threat of nuclear deployment moves way beyond this.

Russia’s nuclear weapons are not guaranteed against illicit, inadvertent, or accidental use. Clearly, today the danger of an accidental attack is much greater than the threat of an intentional missile attack. The dispersal of the former Soviet Union’s nuclear force has created a logistical problem concerning security, with not only theft but the possibility of technical failures as well. There has been increasing contraband trade of nuclear material between the former Soviet republics and terrorist countries, such as Iran and Libya (START I's requirement for materials to be broken down into bulk form, has actually worsened this problem by making transport of these materials much easier) (Crock, 47). Ironically, "of all the types of [ Russia’s] weapons, tactical nuclear weapons have the poorest safeguards" in that the weapons built before 1980 (a large portion of Russian missiles) do not have a safety lock known as a permissive action link (Blair, 2).

Closely related to these concerns of discrete illicit attainment and deployment, are the very visible signs of diminishing security and health of the warheads caused, in part, by mediocre efforts by the Russian government of protecting the weapons. Problems are arising concerning the reliability of those entrusted with protecting the nuclear weapons and the command and control systems. In February of 1995, at the Impulse State Scientific Production Association, a center outside of St. Petersburg where scientists maintain Russia’s nuclear weapons systems, the scientists went on strike and walked out of work, after having not received a pay check from Boris Yeltzin’s government in eight months (Powell, 50). For five days, the center was vacant from the scientists responsible for maintaining the technological security and maintenance of Russia’s command and control centers. The obvious lack of commitment from the employees opens a whole new question and doubt as to the quality of security when they are working. A serious, and related, concern among U.S. officials is the possibility of nuclear circuits, weakened with age, overloading and blowing. Sufficient funds have not been spent on technological maintenance, and according to Vladimir Petukhov, the chief system designer of the Impulse systems, "Russian command and control systems are in dire need of an overhaul" (Powell, 50). This is not merely a United States government belief, this is a matter of fact.

Weakness in the chain of command of Russian nuclear strategic forces has also raised concerns. Inefficient funding has created organizational confusion and structural problems. Unsteady payrolls have led to less job training and a decline in the quality of employees, some of whom play significant roles in the Russian nuclear force. Russia best option today, in response to a nuclear strike detection, is to launch on warning, before missiles land. This has led to a much more "trigger happy" policy with the missiles, and this situation has only been heightened by Russian fears of the U.S. D-5 missiles (Blair, 2). These submarine launched missiles have a high accuracy and short flight time, and necessitate the readiness of a quick Russian counterattack; this has only led to greater concerns. In 1995, for example, Russian Nuclear command came within six minutes of launching a nuclear counter-attack when confusion in the chain of command led to the mis-identification of a Norwegian atmospheric-research rocket as a pre-emptive nuclear strike (Powell, 50). If it decides to fire its nuclear weapons, the Russian General Staff can proceed in two ways. First, they can send launch codes to individual weapons commanders who in turn fire the weapons (Up until 1991 these codes shared between the General Staff and the KGB, today they are possessed by the General Staff alone). The alternative is direct push-button launching by the General Staff. This heightens the danger of a malicious or insane individual causing great harm.

Contrary to popular belief, the 1994 agreement between Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin about detargeting intercontinental ballistic missiles was "cosmetic and symbolic" (Blair, 3). Neither country removed the data in the missiles for targeting. All changes made, such as new settings, can be returned to the original positions in a matter of 10 seconds if the need to fire missiles should arise. Both sides remain mutually distrusting.

Russia's current economic turmoil, as is often the case with governments experiencing similar circumstances and hardships, directly result from economic problems. Political approval and stability has always been connected to the economic vitality and success of the citizens under their government, though this idea constitutes a whole other paper in itself. Russia is no exception to this general principle.

Political turmoil directly equates concerns with missile security and use/misuse because it is the government officials who direct the military. Russia's continued discontent with its president, coupled with the abundance of new leaders popping up to challenge the president, keeps alive the possibility of an elected president that is less than friendly with the United States, the western powers, or even NATO. A nationalistic leader, invoking nationalist pride in a people already discontent with the status quo, could further shorten the fuse on the powder keg that is international relations. The danger of Russia becoming disenchanted with western agreements to the point of security concerns is very real. Even now, in what seems to be one of the most peaceful times in recent history between the United States and Russia, there are strains and tensions. Russia's economic hardships and political chaos can only exacerbate these strains and tensions.

Most of the issues and concerns discussed to this point have indirectly related to economic problems and insufficient funding. Clearly the biggest threat to Russia’s nuclear security seems to be economic problems and not as much world political instability, though the two often are related through causality. Before discussing the current economic state and meltdown occurring in Russia, it helps to look at the fairly recent history of Russia’s economy, in relation to nuclear weapons, to better put the current situation in context.

Russia fueled it’s cold war economy by pumping nearly one quarter of it’s budget into defense spending. By far, defense, which included capital, labor, weapons, and research and development, was the largest industry in the Soviet Union and served as an invaluable source of stimulation for the Soviet Economy during the 1980's. The Soviet defense sector, an integral, multi-branch, organizationally independent complex, helped raise GNP (Defense accounted for 22%) and nationalistic pride while lowering unemployment (Pierre and Trenin, 10). By the late 1980’s, Soviet defense enterprises employed 7.3 million people, with the cost of fixed-production assets amounting to 108 billion rubles. Additionally, in an effort to strengthen and better intertwine the defense industry into the heart of the Soviet economy, many household products were built in the defense factories. Microwaves were being manufactured along side tanks, to overstate the situation just a little. By the mid- 1980’s, 97% of refrigerators, 70% of vacuum cleaners, and 50% of motorcycles were being produced by the defense industry. By the time of the breakup of the Soviet Union, the defense sector accounted for a whopping 80% of the manufacturing capacity of the former Soviet military-industrial complex (Pierre and Trenin, 13).

As scary as the Cold War was, the Soviet government, in some ways, was quite dependent on it as a source of economic vitality, and with it’s end came an end to this vitality. This dependence was only heightened by the effort to match the Reagan administration in arms production. This led, in effect, to the Soviet Government living beyond its means and sparked the end of the Cold War by driving the Soviet economy into disaster. Consequently, a second huge nightmare evolved for the Soviet/Russian government: an end in demand for the largest industry in the Russian economy; and guaranteed subsequent economic desperation, the next step in the downward spiral.

Russia’s dependence and investment in the defense industry of the Soviet economy rendered it susceptible to potential economic difficulty if the defense industry ever fell into trouble, and vice versa. Recent history has showed this situation that has heretofore played out quite accurately since the disintegration of the Soviet Union. The bleak economic recession plaguing Russia has been closely intertwined with the defense sector. Between 1992 and 1995, defense sector production fell by 60% annually (Pierre and Tenin, 9). With Russia’s huge dependence on the defense industry prior to the break-up of the Soviet Union, it is quite clear the negative implications to the economy of Russia with such a decline in defense spending. This was the spark that ignited the economic meltdown in Russia, which has led to the severe political, social, environmental, and security problems, today.

Since the pre-World War II era, when United States isolationist policies helped pave the way for Adolph Hitler to sweep through Europe and consequently spark the most costly human conflict in modern history, the United States has committed itself to a policy of containment. This policy has manifested itself in post-World War II engagements such as the Korean War, Vietnam, and the Persian Gulf War, as the world is still haunted by the international policy mistakes which led to the war. The United States ended World War II as the strongest economy and undisputed superpower in the world. As a world leader, many countries looked to the United States for stability, aid, and leadership. A new responsibility was born for the United States, a responsibility that has remained up to today.

It is no surprise then, that the United States, as well as many other countries, looks to itself to help secure the situation with post-Cold War Russia. It is a frustrating and tiresome burden, but a requisite to be a world leader. Additionally, since the majority of the intercontinental ballistic missiles from the Cold War are targeted at the United States, or at least have the ability to be so in a minimal amount of time, there is extra incentive to see a peaceful and equitable security solution.

There is the potential, and a set of very similar circumstances, that a nationalist leader could come to power amongst the economic hardship and create an international security threat, much like Adolph Hitler did in the 1930's in Germany. With at least the knowledge gained by hindsight, the United States is working closely with Russia to see that this does not happen (Perry). The forging of treaties, as cosmetic as they may be or not, at least present some kind of mutual desire on paper; it seems that they can only help, though there is the potential for them to spark mistrust.

In terms of international relations between the United States and Russia, the joining of the Space programs has done much to strengthen ties, and at least symbolically serves as a distinct end to the Cold War. Through programs including the docking with Mir and the creation of a new international space station, strong ties are being forged between two former competitive programs. Additionally, the joining of both programs has probably saved both programs, in that the two respective countries were losing interest and consequential funding for advancements in space.

The United States is also attempting to ease the threat economically. According to William Perry, former Secretary of Defense under President Clinton, the United States has been pumping large amounts of the defense budget into securing the state of international affairs. One step is helping the Russian economy since this is the major cause of political and nuclear instability. Better health for the Russian economy can only mean a more stable and peaceful state of affairs, since there would be less discontent to potentially breed turmoil. European superpowers, namely France and England, are also trying to help stabilize Russia through a similar strategy to that of the United States. Several treaties, promising financial aid in return for disarmament, have been ratified.

Another area of defense spending is countering the spread of nuclear materials. William Perry notes that the U.S. has bought many millions of dollars of insecure plutonium before it could be apprehended and sold by criminal elements in Russia. Though an extremely ineffective way of deterring a nuclear danger, obligation and necessity warrant its purchase.

In the long run, it is Russia itself that can effectively reduce the threat of its nuclear weapons. A friendly relationship between the United States and Russia, coupled with a healthy economy in Russia to preserve its means of security and stability, is likely the best solution. Of course, no one really knows for sure how great the threat of nuclear deployment is today. One can only hope that the forces working for security and stability are more effective than those working in the opposite direction.

Works Cited

Blair, Bruce. "Avoiding Nuclear Anarchy: Containing the Threat of Loose Russian Weapons and Fissile Material". National Interest Summer, 1998: 87-93.

Blair, Bruce G. "Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Military Research and Development, U.S. House of Representatives Committee on National

Security". Russian Nuclear Policy and the Status of Detargeting March 13, 1997: 1-4.

Crock, Stan. "After the Cold War, the Nuclear Threat Grows". Business Week August 28, 1995: 47.

Perry, William. Lecture. May 1998. Larkin House, Stanford University.

Pierre, Andrew J. and Dmitri V. Trenin. Russia in the World Arms Trade.

Washington, D.C. : Brookings Institute Press, 1997.

Powell, Bill. "A Looming Disaster?" Newsweek June 23, 1997: 50.