 Hello and welcome to NewsClicks International Roundup. Today, we look at the developments following the US notification on February 1, declaring that it took a withdrawal from the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. To talk more about this, we have with us Prabhu Prakash, the editor-in-chief of NewsClick. Hello, Prabhu. Prabhu, before we get into the details of the INF Treaty and its implications, let's take a look at the larger picture, so to speak. So today we have, say, around 15,000 to 16,000 nuclear weapons in the world. And when we look at, say, just a couple of decades ago in the late 80s, the number had reached almost 64,000. And this is a drastic decrease. And these treaties, the INF Treaty, the ABM Treaty, and even START were responsible for that. So how do you see the US declaration of its intent to withdraw from the INF Treaty affecting disarmament as a concept as a whole? You know, if we look at what this treaty has achieved, I think more than the numbers, of course, numbers do tell a story. More than the numbers, its intention that was behind what would be called the nuclear restrained regime, that we have to see. Before that, the nuclear arms race was who could strike first, wipe out the other side, and then the retaliatory strike would be so weak that they could declare nuclear victory. I think the 60s saw finally the recognition that nuclear weapons war, a nuclear war is not going to be successful for either side. It was going to see only mutually assured destruction and the destruction of the globe. So it is this ability to recognize that you cannot have nuclear-winnable war that led to the disarmament measures you're talking about, and they're really not disarmament treaties. To recognize them for what they really were, they were what would be called nuclear restrained treaties, that we don't go above a certain threshold, and the threshold is continuously to be ratcheted down. And that's the background within which the nuclear restrained regimes operated. They did not really involve other countries, because all other countries were well below the threshold of 300 to 400, and therefore they didn't fall into what would be considered the overkill part of the nuclear race, arms race. So the ABM treaty had been signed in 1972. So the acceptance there should be a nuclear restrained regime starts from that place, that the shield is effectively an incentive for the other side to put in more weapons. And that was the reason the number of weapons were increasing, that do a first strike, stop the second strike. If you want to stop the second strike, well, the second strike is heavier. So what is the way to make the second strike heavier? More weapons. So this was the arms race, nuclear arms race understanding. So I think that 70s and 80s where you get this recognition of both new mutual assured destruction and the nuclear restrained regime, that is the one which is collapsing now, because what we see, and we shouldn't see the INF treaty in isolation. You should see that what the missile review, which the US has just put into the public domain, also talks about what Trump says, take out missiles from anywhere, at any time, any place. So all of this if you take together the ABM part of the missile review, if you take the tactical nuclear weapons which are not being put in place for a long time, they were a tacit understanding that this lowers the nuclear threshold and therefore the risk. And then the INF treaty withdrawal, if you take all of it together, it appears that Trump is now coming back to the old position, the nuclear wars are winnable and therefore they can bully Russia into surrender through their nuclear prowess. And that seems to be the logic behind the withdrawal from the nuclear old restrained regimes and I don't think the issue is China as sometimes some of the so-called experts talk about that this issue is really China, because the United States is well out of range of Chinese INF missiles and Japan has not said anything. It's also interesting, INF treaty was originally for the European theater, none of the European countries have joined the United States in asking Russia that why are you putting this missile in place. So I think that that is also the bleakness of the current scenario and I don't have much hope that the only one remaining in place which is the number of nuclear warheads, the new start that will also be extended beyond its 2021 date. So I think we are in a situation where the globe is looking at a very visible picture of a renewed nuclear arms race and also the possibility of a hair trigger alert in which small mistake can lead to the extinction of life as we know it. So going a bit more into the details of the treaty and the US position, so the United States reason for notifying its withdrawal was basically that Russia had a unnamed missile which had exceeded the limits of 500 to 1500 kilometer limit of the treaty, whereas the Russians did indicate that they were willing to, they were open to inspections and the US refused to respond to that. At the same time the United States has also been taking a lot of steps which the Russians have been protesting, for instance there's the issue of the drones, like you mentioned the tactical nuclear warheads and even certain launchers which can say send missiles in that range. So could you talk a bit more about what you see as a US strategy in this situation? Let's look at the basic criticism speak bait on both sides and see whether there is any basis to them. The unnamed missile, the NATO has been calling it SSC-8. The Russians have responded that what NATO seems to be talking about is 9M729 missile. Now they have asked the United States to give evidence that it is a violation of the INF Treaty. They have said this range is below 500 kilometers so therefore it doesn't qualify and they have also asked for whatever data document should be referred to the dispute resolution, settlement resolution provisions which the INF Treaty has. The US has done none of these. It has also not put in public domain, whatever information it has claiming that these are all which would endanger the security of their informants etc., etc. Therefore no evidence has been presented, not even what they think the problem is. If we come to the Russian side, there are drone based missiles, let's take that out because that time it was not foreseen, it's not covered in the INF, whether it should or shouldn't be is something which is a good question today. Let's look at what the Russians have been saying and what other experts have also said regarding the missile batteries being set up in Romania and what has already been set up in Poland. The argument about these batteries, the Russians have said that these are in violation because these batteries, the Aegis batteries are capable of both firing anti-missiles, interceptor missiles and also of actual missile strikes which is the cruise missiles. This is therefore they violate the INF Treaty provisions because these cruise missiles, the Tomahawk missiles have a range which is larger than 500 and that's quite well known. This has been their criticism. Theodor Postel, who's a professor in MIT, has written a detailed piece in the bulletin of atomic scientists saying that irrespective of what the US criticism of the Russians may be, what Russians are saying about the Aegis system seems to be true. Now he has given detailed technical documents and given reasons for that. Let's look at the broad picture. One is the Polish batteries and the Romanian batteries are supposed to be against Iranian, not against Russians. Okay, now the range of the Iranians mean that the radar has to be a long-range radar which Aegis doesn't have. So therefore to talk about it being a shield against Iranian missiles seems to be completely, shall we say, a white lie at best that's what we can talk about. The second part of it, the Aegis missiles as we know in their sea-based configurations have essentially canisters which can contain either intercepted missiles or they can contain Tomahawk missiles and all it means is you change the canister and the same battery can fire either a cruise missile or an intercepted missile. Now if that is taken on land and again the pictures, the details of the land-based Aegis and the sea-based Aegis doesn't show any differences, then what means is the same mechanical electrical configuration would be there in both places, all it means you change the container containing the missile and you get the cruise missile firing capability. Now the American response is that the hardware for electronic hardware and the software are not loaded into these missile batteries therefore it does not violate the INF Treaty. Now as we know changing the software could be minutes, it could changing the electronic hardware depends on what is it, is it a plug and play kind of configuration, take out something, plug in something is also a matter of maybe minutes, hours, days. None of these have been answered, no investigations have been allowed, they have not been willing to discuss this or open to a third-party inspection. So given this I would say the Russians have a much stronger case on the Aegis, then the Americans of the United States and NATO powers have on the SSC-8 as they term it. Irrespective of who is right or who is wrong, the dispute settlement not being activated by the United States would indicate they really are not interested in resolving the issue, they are interested in creating an excuse to walk out of the treaty. And if we take Mr. Bolton who is now the National Security Advisor, you take Mr. Trump, I think their predilection for tearing up treaties and going their own way is something that they have done earlier Iran of course, you have the ABM Treaty of which Bolton was the architect, you have the North Korean treaties and the United States post 90s has walked out of every treaty it has signed or it has not ratified any treaty that it has actually negotiated. So given that I think the US INF Treaty exercise is very much in line with the unilateralism and the exceptionalism philosophy of the United States. And let's look at what is likely to be Russia's response, it has already indicated that it might also notify its withdrawal. But tactically and in terms of weapon systems, how do you see them responding to this massive buildup by the United States? Well, let's put it this way the massive buildup has yet to take place and we hope that somewhere before the world faces extinction, better senses may prevail. Of course, it will need a much larger global shall we say peace movement to rise up again because of the collapse of the left globally. And let's accept post Soviet Union and socialist countries fall, there has been a global collapse of the left and unless that rises again, the anti-war movement which it pioneered may also weaken or may also remain weak. If that doesn't happen, of course, then we are looking at a renewed arms race. What is Russia's response? Russia has said that of course, if they get out of the treaty, then so will be. So what has been there? They have talked about symmetric response. In fact, Putin does talk about symmetric response in the conversation, which is now the transcripts of which are available with the defense minister Shoigu and with the laver of the foreign minister. So his response is already out there. This is something he had stated long back, which had unveiled designs of the new missiles. Some of them are hypersonic missiles, which means if their speeds or they have speeds exceeding Mach 5 that the ABM shields that is now envisaged will not have no meaning. They can easily overcome those shields. They just won't have the time to strike them before they hit the targets. So that is one part of it. The second part of it is the other kinds of missiles that they are talking about. Long-range cruise missiles, again, because you don't have this as a trajectory and when you can strike them on the, shall we say the arc going up or coming down, so somewhere in that mid-range. So if that is not the way it operates, it operates hugging the land and it can maneuver in different ways, then also the ABM shield is useless. So that is the second set of missiles they may unfold. They have other what I will call doomsday missiles, which are also there. And those missiles, missile set of hell as somebody has called it, are those missiles if they are actually developed and both sides then will have the incentive to develop and install them. I think we are looking at a very bleak scenario and I think the doomsday clock which the atomic scientists put up is now two minutes to midnight, which shows that is probably the closest to a nuclear holocaust that it has predicted for a very long time. And I think that we are looking at really extremely dismal scenarios. If this is the Russian response and if this is the provocation that the United States is willing to make. Thank you very much. That is all we have time for today. Keep watching Newsclick.