MOSCOW. May 17 (Interfax-AVN) - The State Duma lower house of Russian parliament is getting ready for ratification of the Agreement on Adaptation of the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty signed at the OSCE summit in Istanbul on November 19, 1999, Duma Defense Committee Chairman Andrei Nikolayev said in an interview with the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper published on Friday.
"Due to changes in the global situation such as liquidation of the Warsaw Pact, collapse of the Soviet Union and emergence of new states on the map of Europe, a considerable adaptation of the CFE Treaty to new conditions is needed," Nikolayev said.
The CFE Treaty was signed in November 1990. It limited the total number of conventional weapons and hardware in Europe to 40,000 tanks, 60,000 combat armored vehicles, 40,000 pieces of artillery, 13,600 combat planes and 4,000 strike helicopters.
Nikolayev said the agreement on adaptation of the CFE Treaty was a transition from limitation of arms on the level of blocks to introduction of limits for each nation. "After the adapted treaty is implemented, the potential of conventional armed forces of large European military powers, the United States, Canada will decrease considerably, and their offensive capabilities will decline. The 19 NATO member nations will dispose of a total of 4,00 tanks, 4,000 combat armored vehicles and more than 4,000 artillery pieces, which is equal to the inventory of about 10 divisions fully manned and equipped in accordance with NATO standards," he said.
The regime of the adapted treaty creates a basis for establishment of a board stability zone in Central and Eastern Europe. It limits possibilities of deploying conventional forces of the NATO member nations in that region. The strict system of national and territorial limitations introduced by the adapted treaty fixes the upper limit for conventional weapons and hardware and envisages a strict timeframe for possible changes of the limit without undermining the general and regional stability in the application zone.
The agreement's coming into force does not mean that Russia's quota will be automatically reduced, Nikolayev said. The amount of conventional weapons and hardware in Russia's disposal corresponds to the maximum level indicated in the current treaty. At present, Russia is allowed to have 6,350 tanks, 11,280 combat armored vehicles, 6,315 artillery pieces, 3,416 combat planes and 855 strike helicopters. Moreover, its quota for regular army units will be increased. Russia will be allowed to have almost four times more combat armored vehicles in the new flank zone that covers the Leningrad military district without the Pskov region and the North Caucasus military district without the Volgograd and Astrakhan region and east of the Rostov region. Under the adapted treaty, the quota will increase from 580 to 2,140. As to tanks and artillery, Russia will be granted the right to additional temporary deployment of 153 tanks and 140 artillery systems. Russia will also preserve the right to relocate arms and hardware from the northern district to the southern district of the flank zone in crisis cases.