By Mark Kramer--research fellow and deputy director of the European Security Project at Brown University's Center for Foreign Policy Development.

One of the many oddities of life in the first days of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was the lingering presence of a military establishment whose chief mission had been to defend a regime and a country that no longer existed. As recently as the late 1980s, the Soviet military was a formidable institution. With some 5 million soldiers, it maintained a highly visible and intimidating presence in Europe, East Asia, and distant portions of the third world. Its alliance with six Eastern European countries in the Warsaw Pact not only provided a defensive "buffer zone" against the West, but also facilitated elaborate Soviet military plans for combined nuclear and conventional attacks against NATO. As backward as the Soviet Union may have been in most respects, the country had sufficient military strength to warrant being called a global "superpower."

That status was abruptly lost, however, when first the Warsaw Pact collapsed and then the whole Soviet state disintegrated, giving way to 15 independent republics. The United States was left as the world's only superpower. And yet, even after the Soviet Union was dissolved, the Soviet military and the vast military-industrial complex that supported it remained in place, albeit at a somewhat reduced level.

The failure of the CIS to develop into a viable institution raised further complications for the ex-Soviet armed forces. Despite initial attempts by the Russian government to preserve a joint military structure under the Commonwealth's auspices, the former republics moved swiftly to create their own armies. This trend soon compelled Russia to set up its own national armed forces, leaving the CIS with virtually no military or any other functions. The decline of the Commonwealth, in turn, has expanded Russia's direct control over many key aspects of post-Soviet military policy.

The Rise of Independent Forces

From the time the CIS was founded in December 1991, the 11 member-states (Georgia and the Baltic states did not join) agreed on only one important military issue: namely, that all nuclear and "strategic" forces should remain under unified central command. Matters pertaining to nonnuclear forces, and even some issues connected with nuclear weapons, were subject to dispute. Equally contentious were attempts to fund the central defense budget.

The difficulty in resolving the status of the former Soviet armed forces stemmed from a fundamental tension between the two preponderant members of the Commonwealth--Russia and Ukraine--over what the CIS should be. Ukrainian leaders considered the Commonwealth a purely transitional organization whose chief purpose was to dispose of the former Soviet nuclear arsenal. Officials in Kiev often intimated that Ukraine would withdraw from the CIS as soon as the last of the Ukrainian-based nuclear weapons were eliminated. Russian leaders, however, hoped to make the Commonwealth a permanent (and ideally, Moscow-dominated) coordinating body that would oversee key economic, military, and political affairs. These divergent conceptions of the proper role for the CIS lay behind most of the specific disagreements about the former Soviet army.

In the first few months of this year, the difference between the Russian and Ukrainian approaches was particularly evident on the question of forming separate national armed forces. As early as July 1990, when the Ukrainian parliament adopted a declaration of "sovereignty," Ukrainian leaders had insisted on the right to deploy an independent army as part of a larger drive to establish and maintain Ukraine's political independence. Even before Ukraine formally regained its independence in late 1991, Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk had created a defense ministry under the leadership of General Konstantin Morozov, who promptly began organizing a full-fledged national army.

In line with this effort, Kravchuk soon asserted Ukrainian jurisdiction over all nonnuclear forces based in Ukraine, and also laid claim to the Black Sea Fleet, based at Sevastopol on the Crimean peninsula. In both cases Russia strongly objected to Ukraine's attempts to gain control. Equally controversial was Kravchuk's directive that all troops based on Ukrainian territory and sailors deployed with the Black Sea Fleet swear an oath of loyalty to Ukraine. Hundreds of thousands agreed to take the oath, but the requirement aroused vehement protests from Russian leaders and from some CIS military officers of Russian descent.

In contrast to Ukraine's determination to form an independent military force, Russian President Boris Yeltsin tried for several months to avoid creating a separate Russian army. Instead, he sought to preserve the centralized command network and "common military-strategic space" of the CIS, and to head off attempts by other republics to set up their own armed forces. Yeltsin and his aides knew that any announcement about the establishment of a Russian army, even one nominally under CIS joint command, would undermine the Commonwealth's military viability.

Initially, Yeltsin's desire to consolidate military forces under the CIS was widely shared within the Russian government, not least because Russian officials hoped the existence of the joint military command would thwart Ukraine's bid to set up an independent army. But as a Ukrainian army quickly became a reality, Russian leaders had to look anew at the option of forming their own military. This prospect gained greater urgency when Azerbaijan and Moldova followed Ukraine's lead in pressing ahead with independent armies and in eschewing most CIS joint military activities. Other former republics, such as Belarus and Uzbekistan, indicated that they also intended to create armed forces, though they were more willing than Ukraine to continue participating in the CIS command structure, at least temporarily.

Pressure to form a separate Russian army also increased when successive meetings of the CIS heads of state in late 1991 and early 1992 failed to produce agreement on important military issues, including an acceptable command structure for "nonstrategic" weapons and a proper definition of "strategic" forces. The Russian government wanted as expansive a definition as possible, while Ukrainian leaders insisted that strategic forces be limited only to nuclear weapons and some aerospace defenses. The CIS leaders were also at odds over funding for Commonwealth military activities. Although they had agreed to share the financing of the CIS defense budget, most governments reneged on this commitment, and Russia effectively ended up providing all the funds.

The movement toward a separate Russian army was also spurred by political infighting and disputes within the Russian government. On many issues, Yeltsin and his aides encountered criticism and outright opposition from more hard-line officials, particularly the vice president, Aleksandr Rutskoi, and the chairman of the Russian parliament, Ruslan Khasbulatov. By early 1992, both Rutskoi and Khasbulatov were publicly urging reconsideration of the question of the establishment of a Russian army. Although both men claimed to prefer "retaining the unity of the armed forces," they left no doubt that Russia should be prepared to organize its own military establishment.

The mounting problems CIS units encountered in areas of ethnic conflict were an additional factor contributing to the Russian government's shift in favor of deploying a separate army. In Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Moldova, soldiers under nominal CIS command were being drawn into local ethnic fighting, often without a clear idea of their objectives. The CIS machinery proved inadequate to cope with these security demands, and Russian leaders such as Rutskoi began calling for ethnic Russian soldiers to be pulled out of "areas where it no longer makes sense to keep them." Their calls became more strident and frequent as hostilities escalated in the different non-Slavic regions, especially after 10 CIS officers were taken hostage for four days this March by Armenian forces in the Armenian town of Artik, near the Turkish border.

These developments led Yeltsin in mid-March to issue an eight-part decree setting out preliminary steps for the establishment of a Russian ministry of defense and a Russian army. The decree marked the informal death-knell of the CIS military establishment. The formal end came two months later, when Yeltsin issued another decree implementing his earlier directive. Shortly thereafter, nine of the eleven CIS defense ministers who had assembled in Moscow (the Azerbaijani and Moldovan ministers did not attend) agreed that the CIS armed forces should be virtually abolished. The ministers declared that units under CIS Commander-in-Chief Evgenii Shaposhnikov "should be reduced to a minimum," comprising only nuclear weapons. All other forces that had previously been regarded as "strategic," including the Black Sea Fleet, were removed from CIS command. With that, the military functions of the CIS effectively ceased.

Since then, the Northern, Baltic, and Pacific Ocean Fleets of the Soviet navy have become part of the new Russian navy, and the Black Sea Fleet, which has been the subject of protracted negotiations between Russia and Ukraine (as well as Georgia), will be under joint Russian-Ukrainian control until 1995. Ground and air forces once considered "strategic" have now become part of the Russian army or, in some cases, have been transferred to the army of the state on whose territory they were deployed.

Even CIS control over nuclear forces seems likely to be phased out as the Russian government assumes ever greater supervision of the entire nuclear arsenal. All tactical nuclear weapons were transferred to Russia by May of this year, and are to be eliminated by the mid-1990s in accordance with a pledge made by Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and reaffirmed by Yeltsin. Although Russian officials said at midyear they would leave strategic nuclear forces under CIS command, this arrangement is little more than a fig leaf for the Russian president's ultimate control. When all remaining long-range nuclear missiles in Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan are eliminated by 1994 (or shortly thereafter), Russia will be the only former Soviet republic with nuclear weapons. At that point the Russian government is bound to establish de jure as well as de facto control over the nuclear arsenal.

A Russian Army Emerges

The reduction of the CIS's military functions has been accompanied by a brisk expansion of Russian plans to set up an independent army. Yeltsin's decree in May left the president himself interim defense minister, but he soon relinquished that post and appointed General Pavel Grachev, the former commander of Soviet airborne forces, for the job. Grachev had earned wide respect for his defiance of the August 1991 coup attempt, but his selection as defense minister disappointed those who had been hoping Yeltsin would designate a civilian for the top post.

Other appointments to senior command posts have been more controversial. The designation of General Viktor Dubynin as chief of the Russian General Staff was one of many cases in which a hard-line officer from the Soviet military was given a leading position in the Russian armed forces. By contrast, younger officers supporting radical military reform were excluded from the top ranks. Most surprising of all was the appointment in late June of General Boris Gromov, the former commander of Soviet forces in Afghanistan, as a deputy defense minister. Rumors of Gromov's complicity in the August coup, it was thought, had removed him from consideration for any high-ranking position in the post-Soviet armies.

As soon as Grachev and his deputies took office, they embarked on the formation of the new ministry, general staff, and other administrative organs. All of these were based on the corresponding institutions in the Soviet (and then CIS) armed forces. In effect, what remained of the Soviet army was transformed into a new Russian army.

As part of this process, Russian military officials reaffirmed that all troops and weapons located outside the boundaries of the former Soviet Union (mainly in Germany, Poland, Mongolia, and Cuba), as well as all forces that until this spring had been under CIS joint command (primarily in the Baltics, Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia), would become an integral part of the Russian army. Most of these forces will be withdrawn gradually onto Russian territory, but some Russian units--mainly those in Central Asia--will remain permanently deployed outside Russia. The status of all such "Groups of Forces" abroad will have to be arranged through bilateral negotiations.

The core of the new Russian army will be the elite divisions of the Western Group of Forces, which are now being withdrawn from eastern Germany. Roughly 175,000 troops had returned to Russia from Germany by midyear, leaving nearly 220,000 still to be pulled out. Traditionally, these were the best-trained and most combat-ready units in the Soviet armed forces, and Russian leaders hope these traits will carry over into the Russian army.

Like the Soviet military, Russia's armed forces have separate ground, missile, air defense, air, and naval forces. The ground forces, however, are being shifted from their old army-division command system to a unified corps-brigade set-up, as was done in Hungary in the mid-1980s. This new structure should permit the more efficient use of personnel and weaponry. Grachev also plans to form mobile forces, similar to the American rapid deployment force, which will "include airborne assault formations, military transport, ground forces aviation, and mobile logistical support from all branches of the services."

The troop strength of the Russian army is around 3 million, but a reduction to 2.1 million is planned by 1995. A further cut to 1.5 million is scheduled to occur by 2000, though it was originally slated for the end of 1994. The projected cuts have been greatly slowed down because of concerns about unemployment and a shortage of housing, both of which are likely to intensify as hundreds of thousands of troops return from abroad. Indeed, one of the reasons Russia has not pulled its Northwest Group of Forces out of the Baltic states is that the soldiers have nowhere to go. The long delay in the withdrawal has caused anger and resentment in Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, but they are too weak to force out the Russians.

Drastic shortfalls in conscription, however, are likely to generate pressure to return to a faster pace of reductions in the officer corps, lest the Russian army become even more top-heavy with officers than the Soviet army used to be. The CIS call-ups for the spring of 1992 encountered widespread evasion and resistance, and only 25 to 30 percent of the quota in most regions was eventually met. Because roughly 60 percent of the Russian army (like the Soviet army before it) is composed of conscripts, the CIS draft caused widespread shortages of personnel.

Future rounds of conscription geared specifically to the Russian army may not be quite as widely defied, especially if unemployment in Russia increases as a result of Yeltsin's free- market economic reform program. Nevertheless, the problem of drafting new soldiers is serious enough that the Russian army plans to adopt a mixed (volunteer and conscript) personnel system no later than the end of 1993. The new system will offer incentives for reenlistment, and will for the first time include provisions for alternative service. Whether this arrangement will be either economically or politically feasible remains to be seen.

The Army's New Mission

Even if the Russian army is cut back to 1.5 million soldiers, it will still be the largest force in Europe, and one of the largest in the world. It will also be much larger than the combined armies of all the other former Soviet republics. The Ukrainian army will number about 220,000 troops by the end of the century (down from its current size of 700,000), and the armies of Belarus and Kazakhstan will consist of roughly 90,000 and 45,000 soldiers respectively. No other former republic will have a standing army of more than 25,000 soldiers (and most will be a good deal smaller).

Furthermore, the Russian army's weaponry and equipment should be vastly superior to those of the other post-Soviet armies. The Soviet Union's military plants were disproportionately concentrated in Russia, with as much as 85 percent of the total located there. (Most of the remaining factories were in Ukraine, and virtually all the rest were in Belarus or Kazakhstan.) In some sectors, such as military aviation, even larger proportions of manufacturing capacity were located in Russia, and for some weapons (including nuclear warheads), all relevant factories were located in Russia. The breakup of the union has left Russia with a military-industrial base that dwarfs comparable facilities in the other former republics. Moreover, Russian defense plants are generally self-sufficient, whereas most in the other states depend on Russian factories for components and spare parts.

The Russian government's plan to convert military industry to civilian production, if successfully implemented, will clearly limit the types and quality of weaponry the Russian army can expect in the future. So far conversion has made almost no headway, and the Russian government has allowed weapons factories to continue producing arms if they try to sell more of them abroad. In the longer term, however, the government's efforts to convert military industry and demilitarize the Russian economy could impose severe constraints on the army. A harbinger of what may lie ahead is the 85 percent reduction in weapons procurement that the Russian parliament approved earlier this year. In the future, enough defense research and production facilities will remain operating in Russia to equip a full-fledged Russian army (as well as to export weapons for hard currency), but Yeltsin's economic reforms, if successful, will significantly reduce the country's military-industrial sector. Of course, if the economic reforms do not succeed and the Russian economy continues to deteriorate, the situation is likely to prove even bleaker for the army.

Economic constraints aside, the government's assessment of potential external threats will help determine the size of the Russian military. To deter incursions by outside powers, Russian leaders will undoubtedly want to deploy forces sufficient to deal with two or more large-scale threats simultaneously at either end of the country. The extensive air defense network that Russia inherited from the Soviet army will be invaluable for this, although serious gaps in coverage have been created by the loss of facilities in the Baltics, Ukraine, and Azerbaijan. Just as important will be the "mobile forces" that Grachev proposes for rapid deployment around the country.

Far more controversial will be the use of the Russian army for internal purposes. The experience with CIS units in Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia, and the Russian government's own brief (and abortive) attempt to use force in Chechen-Ingushetia in late 1991, confirmed the general belief that most armies are not well-suited for domestic policing on a large scale.

The dangers of army involvement in intra-CIS upheavals have become all too apparent in Moldova, where troops have joined in the bloody fighting in the Trans-Dniestrian region between Moldovan security forces and secessionist ethnic Russians. To keep the army's role in check, Yeltsin issued a decree in early April transferring jurisdiction over the Fourteenth Army (based in Moldova) from the CIS to Russia. Despite this change the fighting merely escalated and led to a virtual state of war between Russia and Moldova.

To make matters worse, Russia's own problems with the independence-minded Chechen government, and the even more serious threat of secession in Tatarstan, are unlikely to go away. Although Russian leaders have indicated they will do all they can to prevent the autonomous republics from seceding, the Chechen and Tatar governments have been insistent on achieving outright independence. Both governments refused to sign the federation agreement that Yeltsin sponsored with the other autonomous republics in late March, and the Russian government may eventually come under intense pressure to send in troops.

If attempts to hold the Russian Federation together prove futile and the Russian army has to intervene in several places for a prolonged period, the entire military could fragment along political or ethnic lines. For that reason if for no other, Russian leaders will be extremely wary of using the army to maintain domestic order. Instead, they will probably work to establish a strong internal security network that includes riot police and peacekeeping units.

Collective Security and Peacekeeping

Most of the military-related documents that the CIS states have concluded since late 1991 have been of no practical importance. One of the few exceptions is the Treaty on Collective Security signed in Tashkent in May 1992 by Russia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. In addition, Belarus and Turkmenistan indicated that they might eventually sign as well. (Turkmenistan did, in effect, join the collective security arrangement in midyear when it agreed to form a small army under direct Russian command.)

This treaty is noteworthy because it is the first agreement that specifically commits a group of former Soviet republics to undertake cooperative military action. But ironically, the commitments set out by the treaty are based on the assumption that the signatories will field their own armies. Thus, the treaty reinforced the trend toward independent national armies and effectively undermined any lingering rationale for joint forces under the CIS.

The provisions on mutual security in the treaty are similar to those in the NATO charter and the charter of the defunct Warsaw Pact. Under Article 4 of the new treaty, "an act of aggression committed...against any of the participating states will be regarded as aggression against every participating state." States that come under attack will receive "all necessary assistance, including military assistance," from other signatories.

Characteristically, Ukraine refused to have anything to do with the treaty, and its leaders reaffirmed their intention to remain outside all post-Soviet military alliances and blocs. Moldova also declined to sign, apparently to prevent the treaty from being applied directly to the escalating Trans-Dniestrian conflict (though Russian troops in Moldova have been involved through other means). Azerbaijan, too, spurned the collective security agreement and sought instead to withdraw from the CIS because of Russia's alleged tilt toward Armenia.

The two states other than Russia that have been the most eager to retain close military ties, Kazakhstan and Armenia, were enthusiastic supporters of the collective security treaty. Kazakhstan's president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, followed up on the treaty by establishing a "defense alliance" with Russia, including joint operation of key space facilities at Tyuratam and Sary-Shagan. Nazarbayev had been dismayed by the breakdown of the CIS military framework, and it was with great reluctance that he proposed the formation of a "national guard" and ministry of defense for Kazakhstan in May, after the Russian army began taking shape. The new treaty helped make up for the decline of the CIS.

The collective security arrangements with Russia are of even greater importance for Armenia than for Kazakhstan, especially if Armenian officials seek to invoke Article 4 in their ongoing war with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh. Russian leaders have tried to avert this possibility by indicating that the agreement covers acts of aggression only at the "external borders" of the Commonwealth (that is, the old borders of the Soviet Union). However, there is nothing in the agreement that warrants such an interpretation, and a future Russian government might change its policy. The collective security treaty could thus end up giving Russia a direct role in the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

The decision by virtually all the Central Asian states to embrace a mutual security pact with Russia apparently grew out of concerns raised by the demise of the pro-Soviet regime in Afghanistan. After Afghan President Najibullah's government collapsed in late April, leaders in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and other neighboring states feared that instability might spill into their own countries. The violent unrest that engulfed Tajikistan in May reinforced these anxieties. As a hedge against further instability, the Central Asian governments perceived a distinct advantage in formally aligning themselves with Russia.

The collective security treaty effectively codifies a new political-military relationship between Russia and the other signatories similar to that between the Soviet Union and the members of the Warsaw Pact. Russia will not have the same degree of influence over the other states' internal affairs that the Soviet Union used to exercise in Eastern Europe, but the collective security treaty (combined with bilateral "framework" agreements that Russia has been signing with the Central Asian countries) will enable the Russian government to wield substantial influence over the other states' military activities and alignments.

Indeed, Article 1 of the treaty forbids the signatories from "entering into military alliances, or participating in any group of states, or taking part in any actions directed against another participating state." This is precisely the kind of language Soviet officials kept trying to include in bilateral treaties with the Eastern European countries in 1990 and 1991. Except for Romania, the Eastern European governments firmly rejected such a clause because of concerns about the restraints it would impose on future actions. The resurfacing of this concept in the collective security treaty is indicative of the sort of agreement it is.

Despite its drawbacks, the collective security treaty has facilitated a broader agreement on peacekeeping that nine of the CIS member states adopted this July. The new peacekeeping forces, which consist of units assigned by individual former republics, are to monitor cease-fires in areas of ethnic conflict. The first test of the new forces came in Georgia's South Ossetia, where peacekeepers were deployed as a buffer between warring parties, though with only partial success. Another test was projected for Moldova, where units were to be supplied by Romania and Bulgaria as well as by members of the CIS. This assignment ran into difficulty, however, after numerous cease-fires broke down and after General Aleksandr Lebed, the belligerent commander of Russia's Fourteenth Army, denounced the Moldovan government as "fascist."

The new peacekeeping forces were nominally placed under CIS command, but the main responsibility actually lay all along with Russia. Thus, the fate of intra-CIS peacekeeping arrangements in the future will depend on Russia's willingness to place its forces in harm's way and on the willingness of other states to accept Russian intervention.

An Improved Arms Control Environment

Once the cold war ended, far-reaching arms control agreements finally became practical. These agreements may not seem as important as they once did, but they will clearly have a major impact on the armies of the post-Soviet states.

The Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty, which was signed by the Soviet Union and 21 other countries in November 1990, sets limits on heavy weapons deployed in Europe, including main battle tanks, armored combat vehicles, artillery, and military aircraft. Implementation was delayed in 1991 when disagreements arose about specific provisions. These were ultimately resolved, but the fate of the treaty was left in doubt when the Soviet state disintegrated. After several months of wrangling within the CIS, the treaty was finally given new life at the meeting in Tashkent in mid-May 1992, when representatives from eight former Soviet republics (whose territory was covered by CFE) adopted an "Agreement on Principles and Procedures for Implementing the CFE Treaty." (The three Baltic states were not required to sign the agreement because all heavy weapons on their territory are being transferred to Russia.) This document was the basis for an agreement signed by the 32 members of the North Atlantic Cooperation Council (NACC) in June, which allocated weaponry among the former Soviet republics in line with cuts required under CFE. The NACC agreement in turn paved the way for the treaty's ratification and formal implementation in July.

The CFE treaty will significantly alter the military forces of the post-Soviet states. The treaty does not limit troops, but it requires a nearly 30 percent reduction in the total number of heavy weapons deployed by the former Soviet republics. Some former republics, such as Georgia and Azerbaijan, will have to make drastic cuts of up to 75 percent overall. The nearly 2-to-1 advantage in heavy weapons that Azerbaijan currently enjoys over Armenia will be eliminated under CFE. Russia's quantitative superiority over Ukraine will be pared by more than 20 percent (although this does not include Russian weapons based east of the Urals). The treaty will thus eliminate some of the most glaring inequities in current force levels.

The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which covers long-range nuclear missiles and heavy bombers, was signed by the Soviet Union and the United States in July 1991. Before it could be implemented the Soviet Union collapsed, and START was temporarily in limbo. At the time, Soviet heavy bombers and long-range nuclear missiles were based only in Russia and three other republics--Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Belarus--but even this limited dispersal of weapons was enough to cause problems when the republics became fully independent. Belarus quickly indicated that it would transfer its missiles to Russian territory, where they would be eliminated under START, but uncertainty prevailed in the early months of 1992 about the willingness of Ukraine and Kazakhstan to do the same.

Finally, in late May both states, as well as Belarus, Russia, and the United States, signed a protocol to START requiring the elimination of all former Soviet missiles launchers based outside Russia within seven years (and presumably earlier, by 1994). The protocol treated the three non-Russian states as full parties to START alongside the United States and Russia; but it also stipulated that they must also join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as nonnuclear-weapons states "within the shortest possible time." This arrangement ensured that START could be enforced as originally signed, bringing cuts of a few thousand deployed nuclear warheads on both sides. (The treaty requires that launchers be dismantled; it does not require that warheads or most missles be destroyed. Ukraine and Kazakhstan have expressed interest in using decommissioned missiles for commercial space launches.)

As significant as the reductions under START may have seemed, they were overshadowed by a "joint understanding" that the United States and Russia signed this June. The agreement set forth targets for much larger reductions of strategic arms to be carried out in two stages by the early twenty-first century. Under the agreement, both sides would be left with between 3,000 and 3,500 deployed warheads, and all Russian SS-18 "heavy" missiles would be eliminated. (Again, this statement did not require the actual elimination of any warheads or most missiles; only launchers would be destroyed. Moreover, the "counting rules" to determine how many warheads are on a particular missile are generous enough to allow each side to retain a substantially larger force than is generally realized.) If these targets are met, the American and Russian nuclear arsenals will be reduced to about one-quarter their current size.

The reductions envisaged under CFE, START, and the June 1992 agreement will be complicated and expensive for Russia and the other states to carry out. The extensive monitoring and verification required will increase costs. Other agreements that may soon follow, such as a second CFE accord limiting troops, a ban on chemical weapons, and an agreement to dismantle nuclear warheads, will lead to even greater expense. In light of the economic hardships plaguing the former Soviet republics, arms control may be reaching the limits of what the post-Soviet governments can afford. It is no small irony that after the Soviet authorities allocated so much money to a buildup of military forces, the post-Soviet governments will have to expend considerable resources to undo that buildup.

Constraints on Military Spending

The Soviet economy's accelerated deterioration last year, and the continued economic decline in all the former republics this year, led to much steeper reductions in military spending than had been initially planned. The Soviet military budget reached a peak in 1988, but over the next two years it declined by some 12 percent. (Data on military spending are from US Central Intelligence Agency, "Moscow's Defence Spending Cuts Accelerate" (Langley, Va., May 1992).) A further reduction of 5 percent was planned for 1991, but the chaotic state of the economy brought about a contraction of between 15 and 20 percent instead. The spending cuts took a particularly heavy toll on weapons procurement, research and development, and operations and maintenance. Many Soviet weapons programs were sharply reduced and some were halted; moreover, troops in the field suddenly found themselves without adequate fuel, support equipment, and food. Training of ground and air forces was sharply cut back, and deployments of naval units were curtailed.

The economic problems that gave rise to these unplanned reductions did not abate once the Soviet Union collapsed. On the contrary, the economic plight of Russia and the other states has grown steadily worse despite the ambitious reform program Yeltsin's government has undertaken, and no end is in sight.

Consequently, the resources that can be devoted to military spending over the next several years will be severely limited. Yeltsin has sought to maintain the loyalty of senior military officers by offering pay hikes and increased benefits, and he has also pledged to improve the living conditions of ordinary soldiers. The expenses these steps have entailed will increase still further if the Russian army adopts a mixed personnel system. This means even less money will be available for weapons production, research, and training.

Some constraints on the defense budget could be eased if Russian and Ukrainian military factories exported more weapons for hard currency. Russian leaders have made a determined effort to ship more arms abroad, and some officials in Moscow have talked about earning as much as $30 billion a year from foreign arms sales. In practice, however, the campaign to export more weapons has been a striking failure. Arms deliveries from the Soviet Union reached a peak of $25 billion in 1986 and fell precipitously thereafter, reflecting a downturn in the global arms market. In 1991 weapons exports fell 55 percent, earning only $5 billion. Moreover, the conditions that have brought about the contraction of worldwide arms purchases are unlikely to dissipate soon. A recent study by NATO earlier this year predicted that Russia and the other former republics will find it difficult just to maintain their arms transfers at 1991 levels. (North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Economic Committee, Soviet Economic Performance in 1991: A Weak Foundation for a New Political Beginning (Brussels, January 1992).)

Thus, the post-Soviet states will face tough decisions. The intensive militarization of the Russian and Ukrainian economies under Soviet rule means the two countries cannot simply dismantle their arms industries overnight, creating mass unemployment in the process. Yet the longer they hold back in converting--or, better yet, closing--their weapons factories, the more difficult the task of long-term economic restructuring will be. Given the magnitude of the economic problems that the post-Soviet states confront, they have little alternative but to proceed with drastic military spending cuts.

A Diminished Threat

Despite Russia's military preeminence in Europe, what has come undone over the past three years cannot be put back together. The demise of the Warsaw Pact, the dissolution of the Soviet state, the arms control agreements of the post-cold war era, and the difficulties bedeviling the Russian economy ensure that the Russian army will be a mere shadow of the old Soviet army. This is not to say Russia will never again pose a serious danger to its neighbors or even to more distant countries. The Russian government's domineering posture toward the Baltic states over the past year illustrates the sort of problem that could arise in more virulent form elsewhere, especially if a hard-line, militaristic regime comes to power in Moscow. Even after the projected reductions under START are carried out, Russia will retain sufficient nuclear forces to destroy any potential enemy, including the United States. Nevertheless, the global threat of military expansion that he Soviet army posed for so many years has evaporated, and it will be extraordinarily difficult for the post-Soviet armies to present a remotely comparable danger.

[Mark Kramere is also a fellow of Harvard University's Russian Research Center and an adjunct research fellow at Harvard's Center for Science and International Affairs.]