American expert: the situation with START-3 through the prism of stereotypes about the Wild West
Americans are slaves to their own stereotypes, which they have created and implemented in the mass consciousness. But, since they started it with themselves, they themselves most of all depend on them.
Stereotypical thinking
Therefore, Americans are very fond of using their own stereotypical schemes for any reason, and among them, of course, their favorite films, TV shows, comics, etc. Of course, they compare themselves with the "good", as it seems to them (or declared by the creators as such), side. If they take an example from the Star Wars universe, then it will be the Republic or the Rebel Alliance, although most of the American users playing different games in this universe play for the "dark side" declared "bad" (although what good is that uncontrollable chaotic structure, with endless small wars, which was their so-called republic - an open question). As well as our users, by the way.
If it will be the Wild West, then your side should be associated with the brave sheriffs and marshals or with the brave (but actually very little) army men, and not, say, with the "bad" Indians whom the ancestors of today's Americans subjected to genocide. And here lovers of stereotypes often fall into their own networks, because history they know their country from films and comics, and not from historical materials, and they simply do not want to know anything more. Even scientists and analysts are like that.
Western lover in touch
A certain Brian Smith, a senior fellow at the George Mason University's National Security Institute (another think tank) who wrote START 3 reports to the US Senate Intelligence Committee and worked as an INF and START 1 control procedures expert at the Agency on Arms Control and Disarmament, issued a funny commentary on the extension of the START III Treaty. More precisely, about the insane demands of the American administration for its extension. And for clarity, I decided to use one of the "legends" of the Wild West, sung in dozens of books and films, one from the other more divorced from reality. It's about the "famous lawyer, sheriff and gunfighter" Wyatt Earp.
Of course, this character compares the United States to Wyatt Earp, implying that they defend the law themselves - white and fluffy. And for some reason he put Russia in place of Ike Clanton, one of the enemies of the Erp family (or, better to say, the "gang") and one of the participants in the "famous" shootout at Corral O.K. Yes, only the author, apparently, knows about this skirmish from one of the western-style film-making, where the events in Tombstone in 1880-1881. described in the spirit of “good Earp and his brothers and friends against the bad gang of“ Cowboys. ”They generally like to write about that shootout like“ the brothers Earp and Doc Holliday shot there the inveterate family of Clantons, horse thieves, thieves and murderers: it is believed that in that day law and order came to the Wild West. "
But Smith was seriously mistaken, because just the historical Wyatt Earp was not only not better than all those whom he shot, but more often than not, much worse than them, and he did not stand on the side of the law, but usually on his own, hiding behind the law. Doesn't it look like the modern USA? And with that shootout, everything was "somewhat" different from what was written in novels and filmed in westerns.
"Bad" START-3 and "good" START-1
But not yet about the gunfighter, but about the essence of Mr. Smith's article. He interprets the Americans' demand for "strengthening and expanding control over nuclear weapons"not as a desire to include in START-3 both the stocks of tactical / non-strategic nuclear weapons (TNW) and nuclear weapons from the March 1 Arms set, that is, we are talking about Poseidon and Petrel." He believes, or knows, that the Americans also want to replace the control procedures in START-3 with those that were in START-1. They say, "given the history of Russia as a serial and constant violator of arms control treaties, this is necessary" (as the author writes). not fundamentally, they violated the INF Treaty, and they left there themselves, violated the Open Skies Treaty (DON), and they also left there, left the ABM Treaty (and did not create anything in 20 years without it, which would really go beyond the DPRO and would require an exit from there, by the way), and therefore such statements sound at least funny.Apparently, looking for a speck in someone else's eye is easiest for those who have a beam in their own eye.
Smith suggests comparing START III as a deal between two gunfighters who want to keep their firepower in check, and tries to compare as if the aforementioned shooters would structure their agreement in line with START I and START III. He equates revolvers with missiles, instead of caliber - the thrown weight of the missiles, and instead of bullets - warheads (BB). Missiles, like firearms, must be tested with maximum ammunition and at maximum firing ranges.
The initial agreement between the shooters (talking about the deceased in the Bose START-1) limited the total firepower of the revolver, that is, the throw weight of the missiles. This also limited the total number of all chambers in the drums of revolvers (the number of BBs in the warhead of ICBMs and SLBMs). To make the counting of "bullets" simple and easy to verify, it was assumed that each chamber of each drum of each revolver was loaded with a bullet, more precisely, a cartridge. And in the new agreement between the shooters (START-3) there are no restrictions on the "caliber" of the revolver and only limits the bullets actually loaded into the chamber. There is also no limit on the number of chambers your revolver can have - only on the total number of revolvers. And if the "revolver" is loaded with 1 cartridge out of the standard 10, it will be counted as with 1 cartridge. And so, they say, according to Smith, there is an ambush for the unfortunate Wyatt Earp that you can get another gunfighter to show 2-3 percent of his "revolvers" a year by looking at how many "cartridges" are actually loaded there. And even if there are more "cartridges" there than he stated (for example, our Yars ICBMs, being capable of carrying 6 BB, in fact are now on duty with 4 BB, what if there will be 5 of them on some or some missiles ), then the "thief" will not be able to logically conclude from this that the total number of bullets at Ike Clanton exceeds the established limits.
Dangerous and unnecessary (in this case) deception
In addition, Smith also began to lie, claiming that Clanton (that is, Russia) had previously "obstructed and delayed inspections," which is already an outright lie, both in relation to START I and START III. If he really worked in the field of inspections, then he should know how they are carried out, how they can be "delayed" and how they can be deceived. Moreover, there is no sense in it. Well, you cheat. Well, in the end you get caught if a random sample of inspected missile positions hit the same missiles with additional charges, and you won't have time to remove them. Such dusty diplomatic storms will begin that the sky will not be visible: but for what? For tens or hundreds of charges on duty? What's the point in this now? War on the doorstep? If so, then there will no longer be any checks on both sides, and everyone will feverishly try to deliver charges of the return potential, while not taking too many missiles off duty and trying to set the charges so that the enemy is impressed by the scale, and does not shy away from souls first. And if there is no war in the near future, there is simply no point in such tricks: the forces and charges available on duty are quite enough to restrain the opponent's intentions.
But Smith asserts that “it dawns on Wyatt Earp that if the tensions escalate into a firefight, Ike Clanton can simply, quickly, and perhaps unbeknownst to Wyatt, load his extra chambers with bullets, causing Wyatt to have to do the same in self-defense, and he begins to doubt that this deal is better than no deal at all. " Of course, only we, Russia, will secretly increase the number of deployed strategic arsenal. The Americans won't? And Smith believes that effectively, they say, it is "impossible" to check the reality's compliance with the START-3 restrictions, although he admits that the two US administrations have confirmed and certified the full compliance of Russia's declared with the actual state of affairs. But he believes that such conclusions about fit are necessarily based on sampling and significant assumptions and extrapolations, and the total weight cast is not limited. It is evident that Smith is already beginning to worry about Honduras, more precisely, the situation with the new heavy ICBM 15A28 "Sarmat", which has a greater throw weight than the "Voevoda", which it will replace. In terms of this indicator, the Americans have nothing close to either the old or the new missiles.
The Western fan assures that “in fact, identifying Russia's potential treaty-breaking activity was a major challenge for the American intelligence community, but given its potential for a breakthrough, the US intelligence community did not take into account Russia's likely deception regarding unverifiable warhead limits. ". And he found another "problem": allegedly START-3 does not impose restrictions on non-deployed mobile ICBMs. Which are much more difficult to detect and count with satellites than silo-based ICBMs or even SLBMs! I wonder why the calculation of the number of missiles on board SSBNs is easier for satellites than with a mobile ground complex? And about non-deployed mobile ICBMs, which supposedly have no restrictions on them, Smith just blatantly lies - there are all the necessary restrictions. It's just that the United States still tearfully recalls the much tougher restrictions on mobile complexes in START-1, where patrol areas were limited, and there was a lot of other things. And the opinion of Smith and the people who ordered this material for him is understandable, but Russia will never agree to such restrictions again. That is, we see yet another pipe dreams or unrealizable requirements so that the Agreement will not be extended as a result. Unfortunately for the Americans, first of all. Therefore, the United States can, of course, demand any conditions, but Russia will not agree to them. Wouldn't it be better to prolong this Treaty, because otherwise there won't be any?
A bit of history
As for the historical Wyatt Earp and the relationship between him and his lovely brothers (rather, brothers, in the sense familiar to us since the 90s) and his adversaries in Toomstone and participants in the shootout in Corral O.K, among whom were the Clanton brothers, the nobility there there was not a penny, like their opponents. Two groups simply competed for power and influence in the tainted town, one of the groups, at the same time, was covered by the status of "thieves", which it actively used, and the other was not, although it was also no better. There, the shootout itself began with the beating of one of the members of the opposing group with the barrel of a revolver and with an attempt to arrest them all for carrying weapons in the city. Moreover, part of the opposing group was not even armed, unlike the Earp brothers and their friend Doc Holliday, and in general was set up in words peacefully, agreeing to surrender their weapons. And then someone made the wrong move, and the servant of the law, Wyatt Earp, is believed to have opened fire first, and, incidentally, missed. Both effective hits, which led to the death of the two McLory brothers (who were armed), were on the conscience of one of the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday, who was able to hit an unarmed, as they say now, enemy from a shotgun at close range. The remaining 28 (31 shots were fired, 3 people were killed) shots were fired by both sides, apparently, "into milk". Such is the heroic feat - 4 "thiefs in law" armed to the teeth shot 5 out of 3 opponents, although 3 out of 5 did not have weapons.
At the same time, the Earp brothers were also brought to court for this feat, but they could not prove anything again (not for the first time). Although their reputation was damaged in this city, where they also began to be considered robbers and murderers. You can also recall how one of the Earp brothers was soon mutilated, and the second was shot, how Earp staged a retaliatory vendetta, as a result of which he was wanted and he had to flee both the town and the state. This is such a "servant of the law", and such a "law and order" he and his brothers brought to the Wild West. Earp's career also included accusations of horse-stealing, cheating, reprisals against unwanted, and many other cases - he was a typical product of the Wild West and American society of those years, from which various writers and directors blinded the "white knight of law." But in fact, the most honest Western was filmed by Italians, where of the three main characters there was not a single positive one ...
In general, despite the fact that Mr. Smith clearly got into a puddle with his claims to START-3, we can thank him for choosing a very successful character to compare with the United States. But in general, if such experts in the field of treaties on strategic stability issues in the United States do not shun outright lies, then there is nothing surprising in the current position of the United States and the current sad situation in this area. After all, the generals and politicians there are just as competent and honest in their mass. So we have what we have.
Information