Averting a New Arms Race in Europe

September 2024
By Oliver Meier

Getting a grip on the problem of shorter- and medium-range missiles in Europe is an urgent problem. Russia is using ground-, sea-, and air-launched shorter- and medium-range missiles in its war against Ukraine and wreaking havoc on the civilian infrastructure. For example, on July 8, Russia hit a children’s hospital in Kyiv with an air-launched Kh-101 medium-range missile.

Russian shorter- and medium-range missiles also directly threaten NATO members. It is particularly worrisome that all Russian medium-range missile systems are dual capable, meaning that the missiles can be fitted with conventional or nuclear warheads.

The militaries of some NATO members have air- and sea-based medium-range missiles, but they do not have any ground-based systems that can hold at risk targets deep inside Russia. This is about to change. On the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington on July 9-11, Germany and the United States announced that the United States will “begin episodic deployments of the long-range fires capabilities of its Multi-Domain Task Force in Germany in 2026, as part of planning for enduring stationing of these capabilities in the future.”¹ These deployments would include the shorter-range Standard Missile-6 (SM-6), as well as medium-range Tomahawk cruise missiles and Dark Eagle hypersonic missiles, the latter of which are still under development. The stationing would mark the first time since 1991 that Germany will host ground-based missiles that can target Russia directly.

In response to the announcement, Moscow hinted at the possible deployment of additional medium-range missiles, which could be nuclear tipped. Thus, Europe is standing at the brink of an arms race with ground-based medium-range missiles. These missiles, because of the short flight time and the difficulties of detecting attacks with the hypersonic variant, are particularly destabilizing. All of this makes it important to pursue arms control now and to tackle the threat posed by medium-range missiles before Russia and NATO deploy such systems in larger numbers.

Patchy Explanations

In Germany, the agreement to deploy medium-range missiles came under fire from different directions. Some observers were surprised that Berlin and Washington had announced the decision bilaterally and not through NATO, especially while leaders of the 32 alliance members were gathering nearby for the organization’s 75th anniversary summit.

The backstory around the deployment remains hazy. Germany initially said that Washington “offered” the new systems to Berlin, which accepted that proposal. By contrast, the Süddeutsche Zeitung later reported that Berlin quietly had pressed the Biden administration for more than a year to deploy the new missiles in Germany. According to the newspaper, the U.S. Department of Defense initially hesitated because it preferred to deploy such assets in the Asia-Pacific region, but eventually relented.2

The bilateral nature of the agreement also is surprising because Germany historically has avoided being singled out in NATO and has been critical of other allies for making bilateral agreements with the United States outside of the alliance. The stationing of the missiles is a NATO affair because it affects the security of other allies. In a July 27 interview, Jasper Wieck, political director at the German Ministry of Defense, emphasized that these weapons would “protect not only Germany.” All missiles would be mobile and although they would be stationed in Germany during peacetime, could be deployed “outside of Germany’s borders,” Wieck explained.³ This possibility of moving the missiles to other NATO countries alone should necessitate a joint alliance approach.

Such allied coordination also would be important because of the risks associated with the deployment. Tomahawk cruise missiles and hypersonic missiles are counterforce weapons. In war, they likely would be used to destroy high-value targets, including Russian missile launchers deep in the Russian hinterland. Even though the U.S. weapons would carry only conventional warheads, they could fuel a crisis dynamic that could lead to nuclear weapons use. The chair of the Social Democrat Party in the German Parliament, Rolf Mützenich, has warned that the “danger of an unintentional military escalation is considerable” if the U.S. weapons were deployed.⁴

The Arms Control Void

Lawmakers in Berlin criticized the agreement because it lacked any reference to arms control. Ever since suspicions arose that Russia was violating the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty by developing and deploying the ground-based, mobile SSC-8/9M729 cruise missile, NATO has urged Russia to come clean on the violation and eliminate the system in question. The alliance had hoped to save the accord, which prohibited both sides from deploying ground-based missiles with a range between 500 and 5,500 kilometers. Concerns about Russian ground-based missiles persisted after the Trump administration withdrew from the treaty in 2019. They intensified against the background of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and subsequent use of medium-range missiles.

In the NATO summit communiqué, allies stated that “arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation have made and should continue to make an essential contribution to achieving the alliance’s security objectives and to ensuring strategic stability and our collective security.”⁵ As critics in Berlin pointed out, however, the German-U.S. agreement did not even attempt to use the forthcoming missile deployment as a lever to bring Russia back to the negotiating table.

A week after the summit, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz acknowledged that arms control gap, saying that “even if it is not on the agenda, we should not lose sight of the arms control issue.”⁶ Arms control options to avert a missile arms race likely will be among the issues discussed in the German Bundestag and possibly other European parliaments. Nils Schmid, foreign policy spokesperson for the Social Democrats, argued in an August 11 interview that ”it is crucial that we combine the announcement of the deployment decision with offers to Russia on arms control.” Schmid said this moment is an “opportunity to test, whether the Kremlin is willing to talk about medium-range weapons.” He cautioned that “over the last years, that willingness did not exist,” but announced that Germany “will try it now anyway.”⁷

It is not too late to combine the deployment decision with an arms control proposition that, if Russia seriously engages, could delay permanent deployment of medium-range missiles, limit their numbers, and, should political conditions allow, open a path to reductions of the most destabilizing systems. Even an unsuccessful arms control initiative could have benefits by making the NATO-Russian deterrence relationship less risky if it increases NATO cohesion, improves empathy between Russia and NATO, and delineates those issues where both sides see arms control as feasible and desirable. To prepare for such an opening, it is necessary to think through the rationale behind such an approach, the obstacles that would have to be overcome, and the shape of the arms control proposal.

Arms Control Hurdles

Any thinking about an arms control proposal on shorter-range (500-1,000 kilometers) and medium-range (1,000-3,000 kilometers) missiles has to account for Russia’s refusal to engage on this issue. As long as Russia continues to wage war against Ukraine, nuclear arms control seems impossible. Since early 2023, Russia has rejected any nuclear arms control talks with the United States, including a new framework to succeed the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), which expires in 2026, arguing that the West would first have to change its “anti-Russian attitudes.” This policy of leveraging arms control in an attempt to weaken Western support for Ukraine has been unsuccessful, but Russia is sticking to its position.

Meanwhile, NATO is divided over arms control with Russia. In June 2023, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan stated the U.S. “willingness to engage in bilateral arms control discussions with Russia and with China without preconditions.”⁸ One year later, Pranay Vaddi, another senior National Security Council official, did not repeat the “without preconditions” formula, but still affirmed that the Biden administration remains “ready to pursue critical arms control measures” in order “to reduce nuclear threats to the United States and our allies and partners by limiting and shaping adversary nuclear forces.”⁹

Some central European countries, including the Baltic states, take a different stance and argue that Russia cannot be a trusted now or in the future. For example, former Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, who recently became the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, has made it clear that she thinks that a dialogue with Russia is futile.¹⁰

There is also the problem of path dependency. Any route to arms control likely would have to overcome pushback from those in the political, military, and private sectors who have vested interests in new deployments. The new missiles are going to be part of the U.S. Army’s Multi-Domain Task Forces, which combine several military assets to improve the U.S. ability to respond quickly to conflicts in key regions overseas and to neutralize an adversary’s anti-access and area-denial capabilities. The task force headquarters in Germany was activated in 2021, but the initial planning was for long-range missile components to remain in the United States.¹¹ The lack of an arms control dimension to the announcement regarding Germany may reflect U.S. reluctance to include the missile components of their brand-new task force in any future arms control talks.

Separate from the German-U.S. bilateral agreement, France, Germany, Italy, and Poland on July 11 signed a letter of intent committing them to joint production of their own medium-range missiles under the European Long-Range Strike Approach. This program is likely aiming at production of a European ground-launched cruise missile with a range of 1,000-2,000 kilometers.¹² The number of missiles to be produced, the specific configuration of partners and projects, and the main goals have not been announced, but Wieck argued that NATO should seek “parity” with Russia. This would imply that several hundred medium-range missiles could be built, given that Russia probably now has around 500 ground-based medium-range missiles. Wieck argued that production of large numbers would be desirable to bring down unit costs. This logic of defense economies at scale would further complicate any arms control initiative.

Beyond these political and military problems, regulating medium-range missiles is an inherently difficult problem. Any future talks would need to tackle several difficult and controversial questions. How would an agreement account for the different conventional and nuclear payloads? Should an agreement cover only ground-based missiles or also air- and sea-based shorter- and medium-range missiles? What missile ranges should be covered? What geographic area of deployment would be relevant?

Commonsense Arms Control

NATO does not need to resolve these and other difficult challenges before formally proposing that Russia engage on arms control on the subject of shorter- and medium-range missiles. Premature discussions on a NATO arms control proposal would expose competing priorities among the allies and could be seen as putting NATO unity at risk. Attempting to achieve allied consensus on the scope and shape of a future agreement even before arms control talks have been proposed to the Kremlin would be akin to throwing out the baby with the bath water. That is because arms control opponents easily could misuse such allied discussions to derail any attempt to engage Russia. In 2010-2012, when political conditions were more favorable and NATO tried to agree internally on a list of reciprocal confidence-building measures on nonstrategic nuclear weapons to discuss with Russia, opponents of such dialogue prevented any meaningful outcome by invoking NATO’s consensus principle and thus shorter-circuiting any chance for engagement.¹³

Some fuzziness on NATO’s terms of engagement could be positive if both sides want to maintain flexibility in future talks. In addition, allied discussions concerning a prospective arms control proposal could improve NATO cohesion if it helps member governments such as Germany, where arms control is seen as an integral part of a sound and sustainable security policy, to make the case for the U.S. missile deployments.

Europeans generally support arms control. A recent study found that popular support for arms control in Germany and the Netherlands had dropped substantially after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but also underscored “the continuous popularity of arms control among the European publics.”¹⁴

Arms control engagement offers an important mechanism for understanding an adversary’s motivations and redlines better, particularly at a time when direct channels of communication are scarce. Russia’s recent threats of possible nuclear use make it more important than ever that the West understand Russian signals and that the Kremlin correctly interpret NATO intentions and moves.

Deterrence will be the name of the game between NATO and Russia for the foreseeable future, but alliance members can influence the level of nuclear risks in that deterrence relationship. Discussions involving arms control could help the allies build a new consensus on what kind of deterrence relationship NATO wants to have with Russia and how best to use arms control to ensure that deterrence is more stable. For the alliance, an arms control proposal is a way to prepare the ground for when political conditions improve for nuclear risk reduction and a cooperative regulation of weapons.

For some time, the Kremlin has pursued a policy based on increasing nuclear risks, but its security calculus could change. Economic considerations, a preference to avoid risky arms races, and various international pressures could come into play once the war against Ukraine is over or possibly earlier if there is a change in the Russian political leadership.

A NATO decision to agree now on a blueprint for preventing a new, dangerous arms race would be consistent with the alliance’s 60-plus-year-old proven policy of combining defense and deterrence with pragmatic arms control proposals. The alternative of deploying new missiles without any arms control framework is simply too dangerous to contemplate.

A Phased Approach

Given Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, its dismal arms control record, and nationalist-populist leadership, any NATO arms control proposal would have to be based on at least four principles, which should be stated up front.

First, any agreement would have to be verifiable. Given the high level of distrust between NATO and Russia, allies are not going to take any Russian statements on current or future actions at face value. This hurdle is not insurmountable, even if Moscow now rejects the notion that arms control can build trust.¹⁵ Trust facilitates arms control, but it is not a necessary precondition for agreements, particularly if they do not require substantial and irreversible changes to one side’s defense posture.

Second, any agreement would need to be reciprocal. There is no political space between NATO and Russia for unilateral goodwill gestures now or in the foreseeable future. In principle, however, both sides accept reciprocity. NATO already included this principle in its 2010 strategic concept, and Moscow has a long tradition of demanding reciprocity as a necessary element of any arms control agreement.

Third, an arms control proposal needs to be sincere. Any suggestion for a dialogue would have to provide incentives for Russia to engage and must meet NATO interests. Such a proposal should address NATO concerns about Russia’s dual-capable missiles and offer a way to prevent permanent new deployments of U.S. and future European medium-range missiles that Russia sees as destabilizing.

Fourth, NATO consensus must be sought. This is important because the Kremlin is very likely to exploit and amplify different interests among the allies. At the same time, those fundamentally opposed to any talks with Russia must not be allowed to prevent progress, given that NATO continues to see arms control as a useful instrument. Allies such as Hungary that are close to Russia should not be able to unduly influence NATO policy on this issue. A practical way to meet that requirement and still make progress would be an arrangement similar to how the INF Treaty was negotiated in the 1980s: Washington would talk directly with Moscow, but would consult closely with allies in the relevant NATO bodies. The phased deployment of new medium-range missiles in Germany offers an opportunity to test the arms control waters with Russia. NATO could propose a step-by-step approach, starting with small, tangible measures to stabilize the situation followed by more ambitious steps if both sides deem implementation of previous steps successful. Such an approach would guard against Russia playing NATO along. It would provide an opportunity for the alliance to finesse its position on arms control as talks develop.

NATO could outline a three-stage arms control proposal to Russia. The first phase could last through the “episodic deployments” of U.S. missiles beginning in 2026 and would be open-ended as long as no date for the permanent deployment of the new missiles has been announced.

During this initial period, both sides would agree to a freeze on permanent deployments. This could build on Russia’s October 2020 proposal, which suggested verification measures to go with a moratorium on the deployment of medium-range missiles. There is some confusion regarding whether the Kremlin still considers this proposal valid, but NATO could seek clarification, including on any transparency or monitoring provisions.¹⁶

In return, NATO would offer to postpone the permanent deployment of ground-based medium-range missiles in Europe as long as Russia does not increase the number of its ground-based missiles deployed east of the Urals. Russia would need to be sufficiently transparent on its shorter- and medium-range missile holdings to facilitate monitoring of the freeze. In return, the alliance could propose some transparency around temporary deployments in Germany.

Even without on-site verification measures, NATO and Russia should be able to detect significant violations and movement of missiles, particularly if nuclear armed, through remote monitoring and national technical means. There is precedent for this in that the United States so far has been able to certify Russian compliance with core limits of New START even though Russia has stopped implementing the treaty’s verification provisions.

NATO also could outline a second phase involving reciprocal, limited withdrawal or disarmament of ground-based missiles. This would have to be based on faithful implementation of the first phase of an agreement over several years. A gradual reduction of the most destabilizing systems could then be combined with upper limits for sea- and air-based medium-range systems. The focus in this stage could be on those Russian 9M729 nuclear-capable medium-range systems about which NATO has been worried and tried to get eliminated for a long time.

The general goal of this phase would be to reduce or eliminate Russia’s numerical superiority of land-based missiles in Europe.¹⁷ In return, the alliance could offer temporal or quantitative limitations on the episodic deployments of SM-6s, Tomahawk cruise missiles, and Dark Eagle hypersonic weapons, which Moscow likely sees as destabilizing. In this case, some level of on-site verification probably would be required, although novel verification and remote monitoring technologies might make it possible to reduce their intrusiveness.

Putting the European Long-Range Strike Approach on hold during this second stage likely would be difficult but not without precedent. After all, Moscow and Washington agreed in 1987 to cover modern shorter- and intermediate-range systems under the INF Treaty and subsequently eliminated 1,846 Soviet and 846 U.S. missiles in these categories.

Finally, in a third phase, NATO could outline to Russia an even more ambitious agenda to be pursued if both sides have implemented previous steps successfully. Such a menu of possible steps could include options that are out of reach today, but might provide both sides with further incentives for engagement.

Thus, an agreement on the nondeployment of nuclear-armed missiles could put “the N back into INF,” as NATO’s former Deputy Secretary-General Rose Gottemoeller has argued.¹⁸ One option, to be pursued alone or in combination with other steps, could be talks on banning all intermediate-range missiles of a certain range, whether land or air based. Such a ban would be immensely stabilizing and of interest to Russia, which has been concerned about Western weapons that threaten its nuclear second-strike capabilities.

An alternative approach would be to declare certain regions “missile free,” especially in Europe. Recent research has demonstrated that it is easier to verify the absence of certain types of nuclear weapons in geographically well-defined areas than to monitor upper limits.¹⁹

Any of these proposals could be called into question because they initially would sidestep important details, but that cannot be an excuse to do nothing. For now, NATO’s main task is to demonstrate its willingness to avert a new missile arms race, provided Russia engages in serious arms control discussions. Implementation would have to wait until Russia has stopped its aggression against Ukraine and both sides are willing to consider ways to make the postwar security situation less risky. Until then, NATO should demonstrate that it can unite around using arms control to improve strategic stability. The alternative of relying only on deterrence is simply too perilous.

ENDNOTES

1. The White House, “Joint Statement From United States and Germany on Long-Range Fires Deployment in Germany,” July 10, 2024, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/07/10/joint-statement-from-united-states-and-germany-on-long-range-fires-deployment-in-germany/.

2. Daniel Brössler et al., “Raketen für den Frieden,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, July 26, 2024, https://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/scholz-biden-raketen-russland-deutschland-lux.KnYokHExRoyS398cG3zYBQ.

3. Bundeswehr, “Nachgefragt - U.S.-Mittelstreckenraketen in Deutschland I Bundeswehr,” YouTube, July 26, 2024, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKdJncyyxYY.

4. Victor Goury-Laffont, “U.S. Missiles Are Welcome in Germany, Foreign Minister Says,” Politico, July 21, 2024, https://www.politico.eu/article/us-missiles-welcome-germany-foreign-minister-annalena-baerbock/.

5. NATO, “Washington Summit Declaration,” July 10, 2024, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_227678.htm.

6. “Olaf Scholz im Interview mit t-online,” Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, July 18, 2024, https://olaf-scholz.spd.de/aktuelles/detail/news/olaf-scholz-im-interview-mit-t-online/18/07/2024.

7. Simon Kaminski, “U.S.-Mittelstreckenwaffen für Deutschland: Nötiger Schutz oder gefährliche Aufrüstung?” Augsburger Allgemeine, August 11, 2024, https://www.augsburger-allgemeine.de/politik/mittelstreckenraketen-in-deutschland-schutz-oder-aufruestung-102958227.

8. “Remarks by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan for the Arms Control Association (ACA) Annual Forum,” The White House, June 2, 2023, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2023/06/02/remarks-by-national-security-advisor-jake-sullivan-for-the-arms-control-association-aca-annual-forum/.

9. Pranay Vaddi, “Adapting the U.S. Approach to Arms Control and Nonproliferation to a 
New Era,” Arms Control Association, June 7,2024, https://www.armscontrol.org/2024AnnualMeeting/Pranay-Vaddi-remarks.

10. Mared Gwyn Jones, “Kaja Kallas: The Russia Hawk Poised to Become the EU’s Top Diplomat,” Euronews, June 26, 2024, https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2024/06/26/kaja-kallas-the-russia-hawk-poised-to-become-the-eus-top-diplomat.

11. Andrew Feickert, “The Army’s Multi-Domain Task Force (MDTF),” CRS in Focus, IF11797, July 10, 2024, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11797.

12. Timothy Wright and Douglas Barrie, “The Return of Long-Range U.S. Missiles to Europe,” International Institute for Strategic Studies, August 7, 2024, https://www.iiss.org/online-analysis/online-analysis/2024/08/the-return-of-long-range-us-missiles-to-europe/.

13. Oliver Meier and Simon Lunn, “Trapped: NATO, Russia, and the Problem of Tactical Nuclear Weapons,” Arms Control Today, Vol. 44, No. 1 (January/February 2014): 18-24.

14. Michal Onderco, Michal Smetana, and Tom W. Etienne, “Hawks in the Making? European Public Views on Nuclear Weapons Post-Ukraine,” Global Policy, Vol. 14, No. 2 (May 2023): 305-317.

15. “Russian Ambassador Doesn’t See Chance for Moscow-Washington Ties to Improve Just Yet,” Tass, August 5, 2024, https://tass.com/politics/1825583.

16. “Russia’s Putin Vows ‘Mirror Measures’ in Response to U.S. Missiles in Germany,” Associated Press, July 28, 2024.

17. Simon Lunn and Nicholas Williams, “The Challenge of Russian Dual-Capable Missiles,” European Leadership Network, July 2024, https://europeanleadershipnetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/The-challenge-of-Russian-dual-capable-missiles-2.pdf.

18. Rose Gottemoeller, “Rethinking Nuclear Arms Control,” The Washington Quarterly 43, no. 3 (January 1, 2020):139–59, 148.

19. Pavel Podvig and Javier Serrat, “Lock Them Up: Zero-Deployed Non-strategic Nuclear Weapons in Europe,” UN Institute for Disarmament Research, 2017, http://www.unidir.org/files/publications/pdfs/lock-them-up-zero-deployed-non-strategic-nuclear-weapons-in-europe-en-675.pdf.

Oliver Meier is policy and research director at the European Leadership Network.