FROM NUCLEAR DETERRENCE TO COMMON SECURITY

Abstract

On October 15, 2010 the Izvestiya newspaper published an article headlined “From Nuclear Deterrence to Common Security”. The article was co-written by Evgeny Primakov, the former Russian Prime Minister (1998–1999), Foreign Minister (1996–1998) and serving member of the governing board of the Russian Academy of Sciences; Igor Ivanov, the former Russian Foreign Minister (1998–2004), Secretary of the Security Council (2004–2007) and Professor at MGIMO-University; Evgeny Velikhov, the President of the Kurchatov Institute; and Gen. Mikhail Moiseyev, former Chief of the Russian General Staff and First Deputy Defense Minister of the Soviet Union (1988–1991). The authors put forward a number of propositions which have yet to win general acceptance. The PIR Center has asked several experts on international security to give us their opinion of the article and answer the following questions: • Has the ideology of mutual nuclear deterrence really become obsolete? • What is the future role of nuclear weapons in national security? • Should nuclear disarmament be linked with conventional arms reductions? • How can other countries be engaged in the nuclear disarmament process? • How can the attraction of nuclear weapons be reduced for the smaller countries? Notes 1. Originally published on October 15, 2010 in Izvestiya, this article was reprinted in Security Index with the kind permission of the authors and the Izvestiya newspaper.