On the issue of ensuring security guarantees, Russia can move to plan "B"

Russian proposals for security guarantees were sent to the United States and NATO leadership on December 15, 2021. On December 17, drafts of the Treaty between the Russian Federation and the United States of America on Security and Safety Guarantees  and the Agreement on security measures between the Russian Federation and NATO member states were published on the website of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Negotiations to discuss these proposals on security guarantees were held in Geneva on January 10, 2022 in the Russian-US format, in Brussels on January 12 at a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council, and on January 13 in Vienna at a special meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council.

Key Russian proposals for security guarantees were rejected by the United States during a bilateral Russian-American meeting in Geneva on January 10. Subsequent discussion formats only repeated the American opinion on this issue. This is obvious, because Washington is the main director, screenwriter and director of the theatre of the collective West. There can be no two opinions here.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov on January 13, 2022, in an interview with the RTVI TV channel, commented on the current situation as follows:

"The main problem is that the United States and its NATO allies are not ready to meet our key demands for the non-expansion of NATO, reduction of the alliance's infrastructure and its return to the borders as of 1997, under any guise or for any reason <...>. And, of course, on the subject that concerns legally binding guarantees of the non-deployment of relevant systems in the immediate vicinity of our borders."

Sergey Ryabkov also assessed the prospect of further negotiations on this issue:

"On the key elements of these texts [guarantees] the United States and its allies actually tell us ‘no’, and where they tell us ‘yes, let's continue to discuss’, we in turn note that for all the importance and seriousness of these very stories, they are secondary to the same non-expansion of NATO. To a certain extent, this is a dead end or a difference in approaches. <...> I don't see any reason to sit down in the next few days, meet again and start the same discussions."

If we talk about the continuation of negotiations, the decision here will be for the President of Russia, because foreign policy is his prerogative, and it is his order to obtain legal security guarantees for our country from the United States and NATO that the Russian Foreign Ministry fulfils.

When Sergey Ryabkov talks about the lack of prospects for negotiations, it is, of course, a positive result for Russia. Some formal events in the format of Russia-US and Russia-NATO will still take place. For example, the North Atlantic Alliance is going to present its proposals on security guarantees in response to Russian ones. It is very likely that the United States will also present its position on the draft Treaty on Security Guarantees between the Russian Federation and the United States of America in writing.

In general, Moscow is waiting for some form of written rejection of its proposals on two draft documents: the Treaty between the Russian Federation and the United States of America on Security Guarantees and the Agreement on Security Measures for the Russian Federation and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Member States.

What remains for Russia? It's time to gradually move on to plan B. Obviously, such a plan is already in place, but it is still under the rug. It has been worked out by the Russian military, foreign policy agencies, and the economic bloc.

We will discuss possible Russian measures in the framework of military-technical and military responses later. But now we will focus on the strategy of indirect actions, which can also cause a lot of problems for the collective West.

Here we need to look at Israel. The country is always on the front line and is very sensitive to the international situation. The air smelled of roasting meat. On January 13, 2022, Vladimir Putin had a telephone conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett:

"In continuation of the Russian-Israeli high-level talks held in Sochi on October 22, 2021, the leaders exchanged views on a number of topical issues on the international agenda. In particular, at the request of Naftali Bennett, the Russian President informed on the merits of the initiative on the development of legally formalised agreements guaranteeing the security of the Russian Federation, and the work being done in this regard with the United States and its NATO allies, as well as on principled approaches to resolving the internal Ukrainian conflict.

Various aspects of Russian-Israeli cooperation in the Syrian direction, the problems of the Middle East settlement, the situation around the Iranian nuclear program were discussed."

Russia's strategy of indirect action could be called "We don't care”. Here are a few examples: we don't care if the Syrian military uses long-range air defence systems against Israeli aircraft carrying out airstrikes from neighbouring Syria; we don't care what actions pro-Iranian forces will conduct against Israel (the closest ally and mainstay of the United States in the Middle East) from Syrian territory; we don't care whether the nuclear deal with Iran is renewed or whether Iran gets nuclear weapons at its disposal; we don't care about the DPRK's nuclear and missile programs, etc.

In other words, Russia refuses to actually participate in the settlement of these issues, maintaining a formal presence, does not give any guarantees, does not restrain anyone, and does not support any sanctions in the UN Security Council in these areas. Legal grounds for such a position can be found, because international law is often applied selectively.

For example, at this point in time, Iran is deterred from obtaining nuclear weapons only by its obligations under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Tehran is confident that in this case it is guaranteed sanctions by the UN Security Council for violating the NPT, and that these sanctions will be supported by Russia and China. And if Russia "doesn't care", then it will be impossible to introduce these sanctions through the UN Security Council.

The collective West has chosen a strategy of selective cooperation in relation to Russia, i.e. to use the Russian potential in those areas where it is profitable for it. But at the same time, the United States and its NATO allies deny Russia the opportunity to have a sphere of vital interests along its borders.

Russia can reasonably refuse the West to use its political, diplomatic, economic and military resources in a number of areas. "We don't care" if the West doesn't want to take our interests into account. Of course, we will also have costs, but the United States and its allies will have an order of magnitude higher costs: they are the ones who signed up for world hegemony, but Russia did not sign up. There is too much at stake for Moscow right now: Russia has not faced such a serious national security challenge since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

During an interview with RTVI, Sergey Ryabkov was asked about the possibility of deploying Russian military infrastructure in Cuba and Venezuela in the event  negotiations with the West fail. Sergey Alekseyevich replied: "I don't want to confirm anything… neither exclude".

Admiral Robert Bauer, chairman of the NATO Military Committee, commented on this response of the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister at a press conference on the same day: "These are not NATO territories, if we are talking about Venezuela and Cuba, but I think that there are allied states that would be concerned about such a development of events."

Obviously, such a military-technical and military response from Russia would cause great concern among the American establishment, which is used to a sense of security in the continental United States. With the advent of Russian missile strike systems in the Latin American region, this feeling will immediately disappear.

By the way, Sergey Ryabkov did not go into details: "[Everything] depends on the actions of our American colleagues. The Russian President has repeatedly expressed himself, including on this topic: what measures can be taken, for example, through the Russian Navy, if things go completely in the direction of provoking Russia and further increasing military pressure on us."

"Through the Navy" means the presence in international waters off the coast of the United States of a ship group of the Russian Navy equipped with “Tsirkon" hypersonic cruise missiles, which have a range of more than 1000 km and a flight speed of Mach 8-9. This will allow the destruction of military and political control centres on the continental territory of the United States in 5 minutes after the launch of these missiles.

It should be noted that from the point of view of deployment, this is the simplest and most independent option from Cuba and Venezuela. In full compliance with international law, the Russian ships will remain in neutral waters off the coast of the United States.

Let's sum up the results. Russia has made significant political and diplomatic efforts to communicate its position on security guarantees to the United States and its NATO allies, as well as to the world community, by making publicly available the draft Treaty between the Russian Federation and the United States of America on Security Guarantees and the Agreement on Security Measures for the Russian Federation and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation member States.

Russia received a negative response to the key provisions of these documents regarding the non-expansion of NATO, the curtailment of the alliance's infrastructure and its return to the borders as of 1997. Further negotiations with such disparate positions of the parties are hopeless for Moscow.

Thus, Russia can move to plan “B”, which may include the use of a strategy of direct and indirect actions. If it was not possible to obtain security guarantees through political and diplomatic means, then Russia must provide them independently by creating similar threats to the security of the United States and its NATO allies.