The US Democrats received the necessary 9 votes from the Republicans
needed for ratification of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty
(START).
Scott Brown, a Republican senator from Massachusetts, had said earlier
that they would vote for the initiative. The document may be ratified
if it receives two thirds, or 67, votes. Ron Wyden from Oregon could
not vote due to health problems.
Richard Lugar (Indiana), Scott Brown (Massachussets), Robert Corker
(Tennessee), William Cochran (Mississippi), Olimpia Snowe (Maine),
John Isakson (Georgia), Judd Gregg (North Caroline) and George
Voinovich (Ohio) voted for the START. 58 Democrats and 2 independent
senators will vote for the document. Democrats Joseph Lieberman
(Connecticut) and Bernie Sanders (Vermont) voted against. The document
has a total of 69 votes.
The Democrats still need at least four more votes, from Robert Bennett
(Utah), Mark Kirk (Illinois), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and John McCane
(Arizona) for a more confident victory.
The voting on ratification is scheduled for Tuesday. If the vote is
held before Christmas it will be the third victory of the current
administration in the final session of the 111th congress.
The Republicans believe that the document will hinder US anti-missile
system expansion and its installation in Romania and Poland. This
approach does not correspond to the NATO-Russian dialogue.
An expert of the Center for Social-Political Studies, Vladimir
Yevseyev, says that it is hard to talk about the prospects for
Russian-NATO cooperation. The systems planned to be established in
Europe are under development. It is uncertain whether there will be a
missile base in Romania or a radar station in Bulgaria. Another
important issue is the altitude of missile interception.
It is also uncertain whether the two sides will cooperate, as Russia
and NATO have different attitudes towards missile threats. Russia does
not consider Iran a threat.
Yevseyev believes that there are no facts about joint anti-missile
defenses. Russia does not have an anti-missile system, except the one
in Moscow. Cooperation with NATO will allow defenses in the North
Caucasus. Russia needs information from US satellites, since it lacks
its own satellites for detection of ballistic missiles.
Russia is working on systems of intercepting ballistic missiles. It
has S-400 complexes and is developing the S-500 system. The US systems
are far advanced, they can intercept missiles at higher altitude.
Cooperation with the West would help Russia catch up with them,
Vladimir Yevseyev said.
