Sergey Rogov (1948-2025)

April 2025
By Alexey Gromyko

Sergey Rogov was born in Moscow in 1948. His father was a Soviet Air Forces officer. His mother taught history at school. As a result, military history became the passion of his life. It helped him grow into one of the leading Russian and international specialists on arms control.

Rogov spent his childhood in military towns and from his earliest days was obsessed with military maps, from the campaigns of Alexander the Great to World War II. When he was six years old, his family moved to Siberia where they lived near the Belaya Long-Range Aviation Base. There, Rogov endured daily five-kilometer walks to school, including in winter when temperatures of minus 40 degrees Celsius were not unique. Such hardship only contributed to the strength of his character. Later, when his family returned to Moscow, Rogov finished school with a gold medal and went to a famous state institute of international relations in Moscow.

His life took a definite turn in 1971 when he joined the Institute for U.S. and Canadian Studies (ISKRAN) at the Russian Academy of Sciences. The head of ISKRAN was Georgy Arbatov, who was for many years a key figure in relations between the Soviet Union and the West. Arbatov was on a good footing with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrey Gromyko and the institute enjoyed special treatment: the right to send one of its researchers to the Soviet Embassy in Washington with the rank of first secretary, and to send two interns to the Soviet Mission to the United Nations.

In 1973, Rogov became one of the interns. He lived in a small, rented flat on 96th Street in Manhattan. It did not escape his attention that time and again, judging by the burned butts of expensive cigarettes, the FBI visited the flat in his absence. Even more curious, a bottle of Stolichnaya in the refrigerator also was taken into consideration by the FBI visitors, who would add water to it. One time, Rogov put a sticker on the front door: “Drink vodka but after, don’t add water.”

Professionally, it was a happy time; he stayed in New York for a year and a half, establishing many contacts, some of whom lasted for the rest of his life. In 1984, as more mature specialist, Rogov was appointed an ISKRAN representative at the Soviet Embassy in Washington. He replaced Valentin Berezhkov, who had translated for Joseph Stalin. Earlier that year, Rogov defended his doctoral thesis on the political-military alliance between the United States and Israel.

It was not a coincidence that later, in the twilight of the Soviet Union, Rogov went to Israel for meetings. One morning at 8 a.m., he knocked at the door of the Israeli Labor party headquarters. Gen. Yitzhak Rabin, with whom he had an appointment, let him in. Rogov, who wore a suit, was taken off guard by Rabin’s appearance: barefooted and in a shirt. They started a conversation that led to the issue of an Israeli-Palestinian peace treaty. The general’s face, according to Rogov’s reminiscences, turned querulous. But the Russian was well-armed and put a bottle of Moskovskaya vodka on the table. Rabin’s eyes became animated. Rogov argued that it was possible to strike a peace deal with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Rabin insisted that “with that terrorist,” he would never have anything in common. Before 9 a.m., the bottle was empty. Two years later, Rabin signed the Oslo accords.

In 1995, Rogov was elected director of ISKRAN, replacing Arbatov and remaining until 2015. From the 1970s through the 1990s, Arbatov and Rogov created a dense fabric of professional and personal contacts with U.S. experts, diplomats, and politicians. Rogov was unmatched in arranging confidential discussions, dialogues, and Track II meetings. In the course of this tireless activity, he built a reputation as a tough negotiator and a trusted friend. His counterparts included secretaries of defense Robert McNamara, Les Aspin, and William Perry; secretaries of state Henry Kissinger and Condoleezza Rice; national security advisors Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski; and senators Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar.

One recent Rogov success was staging the Russian-American Conference on Arms Control in Moscow in April 2019. He co-organized previous events in this series with the Arms Control Association, the Deep Cuts Commission, and the Nuclear Crisis Group. At the 2019 conference, Rogov was behind a public statement by U.S. and Russian experts urging the United States and Russia to resume arms control negotiations, especially on the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. Among his other achievements were the dialogue on military risk reduction in Europe, launched with the Institute of Europe in 2020, and co-moderating seminars with the Committee on International Security and Arms Control.

Once, I was standing with Sergey at the viewing point on the notorious, yet heroic Seelow Heights over the Oder River. In April 1945, a bloody battle played out there as Soviet troops approached Berlin and many thousands of them sacrificed their lives in the muddy terrain. As we looked down the plain before us, I noticed tears in Sergey’s eyes. I never asked him if it was wind. He dedicated his life to arms control and his credo was straightforward: Arms are inevitable; control is existential.