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DE RUEHNO #0495/01 2551229
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O 121229Z SEP 07
FM USMISSION USNATO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 1172
INFO RUEHZG/NATO EU COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC PRIORITY
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHDC PRIORITY
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHDC PRIORITY
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC PRIORITY

S E C R E T USNATO 000495 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/12/2017 
TAGS: PREL NATO PINR KACT RU
SUBJECT: ALLIES EMBRACE A/S ROOD READOUT OF US-RUSSIA MD 
TALKS 
 
REF: USNATO 490 
 
Classified By: AMB V. NULAND; REASONS 1.4 (A) (B) (C) (G) AND (H). 
 
 1.(S) Summary:  NATO Secretary General (SYG) Jaap de Hoop 
Scheffer and Allies warmly welcomed A/S for International 
Security and Non-Proliferation Affairs John Rood's Sept. 11 
immediate read-out on the U.S.-Russian Sept. 10 Missile 
Defense (MD) talks in Paris (septel).  Allies seemed neither 
surprised nor overly concerned by the reported "cool" tone of 
the Russian delegation and praised the U.S. for transparency, 
commitment to pressing Moscow for a cooperative approach, 
maintaining open to NATO and NATO-Russia roles in various 
cooperative options and providing Allies with technical 
insights to respond to and refute a "barrage" of Russian MD 
technical pitches which they are receiving.  Allied Permanent 
Representatives (PermReps) looked forward to the October 1 
reinforced NAC/NRC MD meetings to continue the consultations 
with MD experts present.  End Summary. 
 
¶2. (S-REL NATO)  A/S Rood briefed Allied PermReps and the 
NATO SYG Sept. 11 on the Sept. 10 U.S.-Russian MD talks, 
reminding them these talks followed on an earlier set of 
talks in July and would continue with at least another round 
in Moscow at the expert level on or about Oct. 10 followed 
directly by the two-plus-two Foreign and Defense Ministerial 
talks.  A/S Rood led the U.S. delegation and Russian Deputy 
Foreign Minister Sergey Kislyak led a Russian delegation 
which also included MoD's LTGEN Buzhinskiy and SVR General 
Venetsev.  A/S Rood explained that the talks had three basic 
elements: comparative analysis of the threat, U.S. MD program 
capabilities and possible cooperation options. 
 
THREAT EXCHANGE 
--------------- 
 
¶3. (S - REL NATO)  Throughout the briefing, A/S Rood 
underscored U.S. efforts to take Russian concerns seriously 
and address them point by point. The U.S. threat briefing 
covered the North Korean (DPRK) and Iranian ballistic missile 
programs, transfers of systems and technology between the two 
countries, and the general missile proliferation environment 
among roughly two dozen countries with missile efforts. 
Russia only presented an assessment of the Iranian indigenous 
ballistic missile program and downplayed the possibilities of 
transfers of missile technology from the DPRK or the 
availability of such technologies and components globally. 
The U.S. presentation noted the DPRK's advancing program led 
by Taepo Dong multi-stage long-range missiles and BM- 25's, 
their history of non-traditional development methods (which 
could allow leap frogs in development which are hard to 
predict), past cases of transfers of technology and whole 
systems, including to Iran (such as the case of the BM-25 
missile transfer, which now has been made releasable to 
Allies at the NATO SECRET level - reftel - and on Sept. 10 
was briefed to Russia) and the general DPRK perspective of 
seeing ballistic missile sales as a cash cow.  Russia, on the 
other hand, claimed Iran only had SCUD-family technology with 
limited range, could not master improvements on it (no engine 
clustering to bolster range, e.g.), and did not agree that 
the BM-25 missile had been transferred to Iran.  They further 
claimed that any major Iranian advancements would be visible 
in testing which they had yet to see, adding that testing 
would give two to three-year warning times for fielding of MD 
systems. 
 
U.S. MD Program capabilities 
---------------------------- 
 
4.(S - REL NATO)  A/S Rood, noting earlier Russian concerns 
about the ability of the U.S. interceptor and radar sites 
proposed for the Czech Republic and Poland, told Allies that 
the U.S. made technical presentations to the Russians which 
demonstrated that such U.S. systems could not adequately 
track a Russian inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM) 
launched at the U.S. into the post-burn phase where its 
target trajectory could be determined in time to permit 
interceptors in Poland to intercept it.  The U.S. also 
demonstrated that the Czech-based radar, because of the 
earth's curvature, could not observe the Russian missile test 
range at Plesetsk for intelligence-gathering purposes, 
another previously-raised Russian concern.  Again responding 
to another previous Russian assertion that placement of the 
interceptor site and radar in European locations other than 
in the Czech Republic and Poland (Russia mentioned UK, 
France, Italy, Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey as alternatives) 
would be of less concern, the U.S. showed how the 
Czech/Polish architecture optimizes coverage of the U.S. and 
 
as much territory of NATO Allies as possible. In later 
discussions with Allies, A/S Rood also noted that Russian 
presentations at the NRC and in earlier bilateral talks 
attributed greater capabilities to U.S. sea-based systems 
than was accurate, noting that they would not be an effective 
alternative to ground-based interceptors. 
 
Cooperation 
----------- 
 
¶5. (S - REL NATO)  Underlining a serious U.S. commitment to 
pursuing MD cooperation with Russia, on both a bilateral and 
possibly NATO/NATO-Russia track, A/S Rood noted that the U.S. 
laid out high and low-end cooperation paths for Russia.  He 
said that Russia was offered the opportunity to focus now on 
radar, threat fusion and warning information cooperation 
(Qabala, Armavir radar/U.S. X-Band and other sensor systems), 
with both Moscow and Brussels-based centers as possibilities, 
to develop cooperative systems which it need not portray or 
consider as MD systems, but as cooperative radar and threat 
monitoring capabilities. A/S Rood also explained that 
possible regional MD architectures with inter-connected 
command and control, radar, interceptors, and command and 
control could be pursued, again with bilateral, Allied and 
NATO-Russia versions which could be configured.  Russia's 
reaction was "brusque," he said, but they committed to study 
the ideas seriously and respond at a later date.  Kislyak 
also underlined that proposals made by President Putin were 
only an alternative to the U.S.-proposed European MD element, 
not an addition.  Russia clearly said that suspending or 
freezing the U.S. bilateral talks with Poland and the Czech 
Republic was a precondition for deeper exploration of 
possible U.S.- Russian cooperative avenues. 
 
Allied Reactions 
---------------- 
 
6.(C- REL NATO)  Allied reactions were extensive and 
generally reflected interest in: 1) possible motivations or 
explanations underpinning differing U.S.-Russian threat 
perceptions; 2) Russian future intentions toward exploring 
cooperation; 3) a possible role for verification/transparency 
measures to address Russian concerns; 4) whether there was a 
way ahead on U.S.-Russian strategic talks; and 5) how NATO, 
NATO-Russia channels figure in current U.S. MD thinking. 
 
7.(C - REL NATO)  Responding to questions from Canada, Spain 
and Luxembourg, A/S Rood explained that Russia seemed to have 
a threat assessment of Iranian capabilities and intentions 
that did not credit the effect of foreign assistance in the 
same manner as the U.S.  They also did not show an interest 
in exploring the DPRK program or its transfer tendencies in 
the context of discussing the Iranian ballistic missile 
program.  A/S Rood said that Russian responses and tactics in 
the threat exchanges suggested a political interest in 
downplaying the reach and pace of development of the Iranian 
threat and an unwillingness to delve into the proliferation 
risks and analytical challenges posed by widely-accepted 
understanding of the scope of missile technology exchange in 
the grey market. A/S Rood also clarified that while the U.S. 
was pleased with progress at the Six-Party Talks, the 
agreement to date did not cover the DPRK missile arsenal nor 
foreclose the avenue of foreign assistance to Iran from the 
DPRK. 
 
8.(C - REL NATO)  In response to multiple Allies (Norway, 
Germany and Portugal), on Moscow's attitude toward prospects 
for future cooperation, A/S Rood said Russia's attitude had 
BQQQf;QQ+Q measures), Kislyak in these talks had not raised 
or shown interest in such steps.  He also had not raised the 
Bulgarian-posited question of limiting the azimuth coverage 
 
of the Czech radar to assuage Russian concerns. 
Additionally, Moscow had declined the U.S. request to visit 
the Armavir radar site, however it was working with the U.S 
and Azerbaijan to facilitate a Qabala site visit later this 
month.  This was complicating U.S. efforts to assess the 
radar cooperation proposal which President Putin generally 
raised at the Kennebunkport summit. 
 
¶10. (C - REL NATO)  Responding to questions from Spain, the 
Netherlands, and Hungary, A/S Rood confirmed that the U.S. 
and Russia in other channels were conducting talks on 
extending the START Treaty, and that the Russians in these 
recent MD talks had not raised withdrawal from, or the future 
of, the Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty.  INF 
withdrawal, however, had been a U.S.-Russian discussion 
several years ago and the U.S. had declined the suggestion of 
withdrawing from the treaty as Moscow proposed.  Responding 
to Poland, A/S Rood said that the recent Russian statements 
about U.S. MD facilities in Europe crossing a Russian red 
line were not constructive, as were previous public Russian 
comments about targeting MD facilities with missiles.  A/S 
Rood said that Russia had said in earlier discussions that 
part of its concern about the U.S. European MD facilities 
related to perceived diminished options in a nuclear 
second-strike scenario, but the U.S. had found this 
unpersuasive and had told Kislyak so because the most likely 
Russian strategic systems to figure in such a scenario were 
sea and mobile land-based systems, which would not be 
affected by interceptors in Poland.  He also said that the 
U.S. had addressed Russian concerns about possible multiple 
vehicles on the European-based interceptors noting that the 
system design prohibited using kill vehicles to attack 
hundreds of missiles.  Such kill vehicles were designed to 
help the same interceptor have a higher probability of 
successfully intercepting the warhead when mixed with other 
objects, such as missile shrouds, a simple decoy or large 
post-burn phase debris. 
 
¶11. (C- REL NATO)  Finally, A/S Rood affirmed real U.S. 
interest in both NATO and NATO-Russia cooperative elements as 
modifications of the cooperative options offered to Kislyak. 
When asked by Canada about how U.S. Congressional budget 
consideration might affect possible NATO or NATO-Russia 
cooperation possibilities, A/S Rood said that Congress was 
still working on authorization and appropriations bills, but 
had stressed the need to complete U.S. bilateral talks with 
Prague and Warsaw. 
 
¶12. (SBU) A/S Rood cleared this cable. 
NULAND