President Clinton and Russian President Vladimir Putin signed two security agreements Sunday with great fanfare, but they made little progress on the most pressing issue before them, Clinton’s desire for a sweeping arms control deal.
The two leaders agreed to set up a joint early-warning center and greatly reduce stockpiles of plutonium.
But Clinton also wanted Russia to accept a U.S. proposal to build 100 interceptors in Alaska that would be designed to shoot down missiles from so-called rogue states or terrorist groups, even though the project would violate the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty between the United States and Soviet Union.
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Putin did not budge Sunday from his insistence that the plan would threaten Russian security, saying pointedly, “We are against having a cure that is worse than the disease.”
Clinton sought to put a positive spin on the outcome, emphasizing that he and Putin signed a joint statement that recognizes, among other things, a “dangerous and growing threat” from the proliferation of nuclear weapons and acknowledges that the ABM treaty can be amended.
“We acknowledge that there is a threat, it needs to be met, and we’re trying to bridge our differences,” Clinton said. “And I think that’s where we ought to leave it.”
The two presidents spoke in the Hall of St. George in the Kremlin’s Grand Palace, a dramatic czarist-era room with inlaid wooden floors, marble panels engraved with the names of Russian war heroes, and carved golden doors.
The ancient throne of the czars sits nearby, and a portrait of Lenin has been replaced with a historic battle painting.
Earlier in the day, Clinton and Putin announced an unprecedented agreement that each country would destroy 34 tons of weapons-quality plutonium, in most cases actually removing it from existing missiles.
They also agreed to create an early-warning center in Moscow, to avoid tragic mistakes by alerting each other when any country launches a missile in their direction.
The two deals, while not insignificant, had been long expected.
Putin seemed to be looking past Clinton’s presidency to some degree, raising the U.S. presidential campaign without being asked.
“We’re familiar with the programs of the two main candidates,” said Putin, who was just elected to a four-year term. “No matter who is elected, we’re willing to go forward on either one of these approaches.”
Some saw that as a slap at Vice President Al Gore, who has spearheaded U.S. relations with Russia for seven years and has characterized Texas Gov. George W. Bush, his presumed Republican opponent, as uninformed and irresponsible on arms control.
Clinton’s National Missile Defense proposal is a smaller version of President Ronald Reagan’s plan that was ridiculed by some as Star Wars.
But instead of protecting the United States against a superpower, Clinton’s plan is designed to thwart the much smaller arsenals of nations such as North Korea.
Russian officials object, fearing the system would render their missiles obsolete. And Clinton obviously did not change their minds.
“President Putin made absolutely clear to President Clinton that Russia continues to oppose the changes to the ABM treaty that the United States has proposed,” said Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott.
Russian leaders, Talbott added, believe the system “will undermine strategic stability, threaten Russia’s strategic deterrent and provoke a new arms race.”
U.S. and Russian negotiators have discussed plans to cut each nation’s nuclear arsenal to 2,500 missiles, but the Russians would like even further cuts, to 1,500.
Clinton has suggested he would consider this if the Russians agreed to his anti-missile plan.
The White House portrayed the two security deals as major breakthroughs.
“These are highly significant agreements,” said a senior administration official. “They will remove from possible circulation plutonium that is directly usable in weapons if they were to fall into the wrong hands.”
Under the plutonium deal, each country will get rid of 34 tons of plutonium, in most cases removing it directly from existing weapons.
Russia will use some of this plutonium for power plants and will bury the rest, while the U.S.will encase and bury all of its excess plutonium, though where remains unclear.
This project is expected to take 20 years and be extraordinarily expensive, costing $1.75 billion in Russia and $4 billion in the United States. The two countries plan to ask other nations to help pay the cost.
The U.S. and Russia over the next year or so also will create a “shared-early warning” center in Moscow, in which the two nations’ military officers will sit side-by-side in front of computer terminals showing global missile and satellite launches.
This information would include all launches by the United States and Russia, as well as those by other countries that could reach U.S. or Russian airspace.
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The idea was prompted in part by an incident several years ago when Russian forces mistakenly went on alert after Norway launched a scientific projectile.
This will be the first long-running joint operation of the U.S. and Russian militaries. Putting Americans and Russians in the same room will help avoid disastrous mistakes, White House aides said. “There certainly is a symbolic element, but it’s much beyond that,” one official said. “It provides a direct, face-to-face ability to do consultations.”
Clinton did win a small victory on the missile defense issue. He and Putin agreed to direct top officials to continue seeking a resolution.
Talbott sought to portray the summit, which ends Monday, as a moderate success. “What you see here today, I think, is neither what many were predicting or were concerned about, which is a dead end, nor is it a destination,” Talbott said. “But it’s a clarification of the path forward.”
While the two leaders did not immediately demonstrate the sort of warm relationship Clinton enjoyed with former Russian President Boris Yeltsin, they did profess admiration for each other.
“President Clinton is a person who is a very comfortable and pleasant partner in negotiations,” Putin said. “If everyone behaves the way President Clinton has behaved–not trying to find dead ends and problems but to seek ways of moving ahead–I think in the future our relations really will be successful.”