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The messages the Russian Federation are sending off after the US has announced its intention to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF-Treaty) is rather the use of the nuclear power argument to bring relations to a point where they might converge, and that is Moscow's only serious claim to support its international actor position, defence policy expert Hari Bucur-Marcu told AGERPRES.
"The most serious claim for Russia being an international player argument is that it is a big nuclear power. Other arguments - economic or otherwise - are not quite there insofar as this leverage of Russian gas transmitted to Germany and other parts of Europe is diminished in importance by the American bid to alternatives sources from elsewhere," he said.
The announcement that the US intends to withdraw from the INF Treaty "has greatly surprised Moscow," says the expert.
"Russia is maximising the argument it considers to be the most credible and most serious, the nuclear weaponry, which has received a total unexpected response from the Trump Administration," he added.
On Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that a US withdrawal from disarmament treaties, such as the one on intermediate-range nuclear forces, would lead to an arms race and an extremely dangerous situation.
The Russian president's reply, says Bucur-Marcu, is "a relative threat."
"This is not an escalation of tensions between the two countries on this nuclear component, but rather the use of the nuclear claim to bring bilateral political relations between the two states, namely the United States and the Russian Federation, at a point where they may somehow converge, where they have some common solutions," he pointed out.
Giving the circumstances, a meeting between US President Donald Trump and Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin, has been announced for November 11 in Paris.
Bucur-Marcu said that such a high-level meeting should have an agenda, which he called "very unlikely."
"There is American domestic pressure on President Trump to clarify and resolve this type of unconventional aggression that saw actions being funded favouring a certain side in the US election, and now the US has elections again in about two or three weeks," said the Romanian expert.
He mentioned that "there is currently no common agenda between the United States and Russia." "There should be an agenda featuring Russia's aggression or interference with America's political affairs at the top of the list, but President Trump greatly diminishes this issue," he said.
Bucur-Marcu said the previous Putin-Trump meeting in Helsinki this summer was one that also lacked an agenda.
"A proper meeting without agenda is not justified. Because items on the agenda should be prepared by specialists, the positions of each party should be negotiated, after which, when they meet, they just shake hands and agree, only make last-minute concessions that no one else can do except at their level."
At the same time, Bucur-Marcu addressed President Vladimir Putin's statements on the possible consequences of the US withdrawal from the INF Treaty.
Putin has warned that the main issue is what the United States will do if it withdraws from the INF Treaty, and if the US chooses to deploy missiles in Europe, Russia will obviously have to respond symmetrically.
"The European nations that would agree to that should understand that they would expose their territory to the threat of a possible retaliatory strike," the Russian President insisted, adding that he hoped to address the issue with President Donald Trump at their meeting in Paris on November 11.
Against this background, Bucur-Marcu brought up the situation of Romania, which hosts a ballistic missile shield at Deveselu.
"Everyone now has the impression that when President Putin says I'll hit, he's already pushing the nuclear button. That is not so. It's a largely psychological game, and especially as far as Romania is concerned, Russia knows very well a historical fact: in 1962, during the missile crisis, humankind was at the closest time, just seconds away from zero hour, the time when a global nuclear war would start, at which point Romania reminded the Americans that on its soil there are no such nuclear arms, and maybe it will be spared the strike, even though it was part of the Warsaw Treaty," added Bucur-Marcu, pointing out that at this moment Romania does not have such weapons.
He said that Russians officials' rhetoric is out of synch with reality "The Russians speak the language of the mid-20th century, that is form 70 years, 60 years ago," he said.
The Romanian expert added that it is more about an exchange of arguments.
"We do not have to disregard them, but we do not have to get scared either. We are at the stage of statements, rhetoric, exchange of messages, where each side - Russia and the United States - puts their arguments on the table. And the Russians don't have much more than the nuclear arguments," added Bucur-Marcu.
AGERPRES .
