It is a widely held assumption in America that Russia has aggressive, expansionist ambitions and has created a military with the necessary capabilities since the fall of the Soviet Union.
Recent findings by a prominent U.S. government-funded think-tank say instead that Russia has built a defensive military fearing a NATO first-strike.
Considering NATO expansion after the collapse of the Soviet Union, American withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty and Western meddling in Russian elections, it’s not hard to understand Russia’s claims of reacting to aggression by the west.
A 2017 report published by the RAND Corporation finds “Russia’s forces are primarily postured to defend their homeland” and that “Russia’s capability has not improved to the extent that Russian leadership would use it against a near-peer adversary in the absence of a clear external threat to the survival of the Russian state.” It concludes “the Russian armed forces are not like the Soviet Army in size, depth or global ideological aspirations.”
RAND Corporation is a highly-respected American think tank “that helps improve policy and decision making” through “fact-based research and analysis.”
The RAND Corporation report, entitled The Russian Way of Warfare, was written by Scott Boston, a defense analyst, and Dara Massicot, a policy researcher. In an incredible sentence contradicting the notion of an expansionist Russia, the report states that “Russia’s military posture, capabilities, training exercises, and force structure are consistent with its declared doctrine that its military exists to defend Russia, rather than to project power globally.”
Far from posing a threat to NATO or America, the report concludes Russia is capable of only “limited offensive operations around their periphery,” meaning, at most, they could threaten a small number of their border states but could not continue the aggression long term.
Why has Russia created a primarily defensive military? What perceived threat motivated Russia to invest limited economic resources “heavily in air defenses” to create “one of the most advanced and extensive air defense networks in the world?” And why are “Russia’s most capable defensive system(s) … concentrated in the west?” The answer given by Boston and Massicot is that Russia has observed “how Western nations have conducted conventional warfare since 1991” and is concerned about “a massed conventional aerospace attack on Russia … Russia’s historical experience of repeated invasions over the centuries has created a powerful legacy that shapes its defense and foreign policy.”
The most recent two invasions in Russia killed an estimated 50 million Russians combined and left the country devastated. The Russian territory has also undergone two major political collapses over the past century, once with the revolution of 1917 and again when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. To appreciate Russian-American relations now, understanding the collapse of the Soviet Union and what happened to NATO afterward is critical.
Leading up to the collapse of the Soviet Union, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev met with International leaders and proposed what he called a “Common European Home,” or the creation of a broad, European organization including Western Europe and Russia. It would involve eliminating all military alliances, establishing common economic and security systems, and working towards an integrated future. What former President George Bush Sr. and Secretary of State James Baker instead insisted on was a unified Germany that would join NATO. Considering the last century, Germany as part of a hostile military alliance was a concern for Russia, but Gorbachev agreed.
Declassified Soviet and U.S. files, available at The National Security Archive at George Washington University, show that Gorbachev agreed to this concession because he was assured privately by Baker on February 9, 1990, that NATO would not move “one inch to the east.”
Germany would be unified and would officially join NATO, but NATO would not actually move into East Germany or beyond. National Security Archive documents also show that assurances against NATO expansion were also made to Soviet officials by West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, CIA Director Robert Gates, French President Francois Mitterrand, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, British foreign minister Douglas Hurd, British Prime Minister John Major and NATO secretary-general Manfred Woerner.
Bush Sr. and James Baker moved NATO into East Germany, arguing that there was never an official written commitment. Russia collectively felt betrayed and threatened. In addition to meddling in the ’96 Russian elections to help Yeltsin win, Former President Bill Clinton continued to expand NATO eastward with Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, and former President George W. Bush incorporated Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia.
Additionally, on Dec. 13, 2001, Bush announced U.S. withdrawal from the 1972 ABM treaty. Putin said the move was “an erroneous one” and reiterated Moscow’s position that the ABM treaty was a cornerstone of world security. Former President Barak Obama oversaw Albania and Croatia joining NATO, and current President Donald Trump has included Montenegro.
Russians have remembered Baker’s promise to Gorbachev, “one inch to the east,” every time a new country is added to the east of Soviet-era West Germany. They also remember the point of the ABM treaty, maintaining parity between nuclear powers, and view the placement of ABM systems around their borders as being capable only of stopping a Russian retaliation to a NATO first strike. The ABM systems are viewed by many inside and outside Russia as an attempt by NATO to establish a credible nuclear first-strike capability.
Boston and Massicot presented their report at a June RAND-hosted event on C-SPAN. When asked about Russia’s goals, Masicot said, “they think about developing this polycentric world in the future where there’s not the United States as the sole remaining superpower.” Instead, she said, they want to build “strategic cooperation” with “places like China and India, like the United States and Europe,” and work toward “an idealized strategic future where all regional powers and everybody cooperates and gets along, nobody dominates one another.”
Considering the history, Americans must ask themselves, if this is what a prestigious and historically hawkish Washington-funded think tank says Russia is working toward, everyone cooperating and getting along, why do so many of us and our leaders still call them our enemy?
Sean Chenoweth can be reached at [email protected]