START FOLLOW-ON NEGOTIATIONS, GENEVA (SFO-GVA-VI):

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SUBJECT: START FOLLOW-ON NEGOTIATIONS, GENEVA (SFO-GVA-VI):
(U) TREATY TEXT AND DEFINITIONS WORKING GROUP MEETING,
OCTOBER 29, 2009, P.M. SESSION

Classified By: A/S Rose E. Gottemoeller, United States
START Negotiator. Reasons: 1.4(b) and (d).


1. (U) This is SFO-GVA-VI-041.


2. (U) Meeting Date: October 29, 2009
Time: 3:00 - 6:00 P.M
. Place: U.S. Mission, Geneva

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SUMMARY
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3. (S) The fifth Treaty Text and Definitions Working Group
(TTDWG) meeting of the session was held at the U.S. Mission
on October 29, 2009. The TTDWG discussed Articles XIV, IX,
and VIII of the U.S.-proposed Joint Draft Text (JDT). Both
sides agreed in principle to the provisions of Article XIV,
which addressed not assuming international obligations in
conflict with the treaty and the prohibition against
transferring strategic offensive arms (SOA) to third States.
However, the Russian side proposed the word "Parties" in lieu
of "States," in an attempt to expand the prohibition of not
transferring SOA to non-State entities such as the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The U.S. side said it
would study the Russian proposal.


4. (S) Both sides agreed on Article IX, National Technical
Means (NTM),with the exceptions of the sentence clarifying
that the non-interference with NTM includes activities at
test ranges and the U.S. proposal to include text addressing
unique identifiers for mobile launchers of ICBMs. Lastly,
with regard to text in Article VIII addressing the public
release of information from the Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU),the Russian Delegation expressed concern that Russian
law treated nearly all such information as classified. The
U.S. Delegation agreed to review this portion of the JDT in
order to address these concerns.


5. (S) Subject Summary: Article XIV: Prohibition Against
Transferring SOA; Article IX: National Technical Means (NTM);
and, Article VIII: Memorandum of Understanding Data.

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ARTICLE XIV: PROHIBITION
AGAINST TRANSFERRING SOA
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6. (S) Ambassador Ries opened the meeting and offered the
floor to Mr. Koshelev for a discussion on Article XIV.
(Begin comment: Article XIV of the U.S.-proposed JDT
addressed the prohibition of the Parties against assuming any
international obligations that would conflict with the treaty
and the non-transfer of SOA to third parties. End comment.)
Koshelev commented that the first sentence of Article XIV
contained two separate ideas: 1) not to undertake
obligations that would be in conflict with the treaty; and,
2) not to transfer SOA to third States. Koshelev inquired
about the United States' level of commitment to the concept
of both sides not transferring SOA to third parties.
Koshelev noted that the obligation not to transfer nuclear
weapons, was already in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
(NPT) which applied to both the United States and Russia. He


queried whether the United States desired to strengthen this
obligation. Koshelev stated that if the United States wished
to repeat the words of the same NPT article in the Strategic
Arms Reduction Treaty (START),the Russian Delegation would
acquiesce, but he considered such action redundant.


7. (S) Ries asked Koshelev whether he thought the entire
sentence was redundant or only the phrase about transferring
SOA. Koshelev replied that it was the latter. Ries made a
general comment that, in drafting the new treaty, the U.S.
approach was to examine the language of each article in START
and evaluate whether or not to carry it over. If words were
not relevant or did not affect the new treaty, they were not
included. An important consideration in this evaluation was
that phrases judged wise and important enough to be in START
suggested that they should be retained in the new treaty.
Prohibitions were good examples. The fact that a given
prohibition was not violated was good but that did not mean
that it should not be restated in the new treaty. Returning
to Article XIV, Ries noted that, in the first sentence
regarding the non-transfer of SOA, there was an important
exception which still existed. Therefore, the sentence was
still relevant. Koshelev replied that this second phrase of
the sentence did not exist in START and so it was difficult
for the Russian Delegation to understand its origin. Ries
answered that it came directly from the First Agreed
Statement of START.


8. (S) Ries continued that, with regard to the non-transfer
of SOA, Article XIV had a broader reach than the NPT
prohibition against the transfer of nuclear weapons.
Koshelev stated that he had heard these arguments from his
Ukrainian colleagues in other venues. Ukraine had SOA but
not nuclear weapons. Koshelev continued that the Ukrainians
insisted on their rights to possess these SOA because there
were no limits on them. However, Koshelev finished by saying
that if the United States desired this provision, it would go
into the new treaty.


9. (S) Koshelev requested that, in the spirit of compromise,
the United States should agree to replacing the phrase "third
States" with the phrase "third Parties" in the second
sentence. Koshelev explained that "Party" was much a
broader term than "State" and made the prohibition more
comprehensive. For example, "Party" also included
international organizations such as the United Nations.
Additionally, Koshelev stated that using the term "Parties"
would make it even clearer to the United States of Russia's
unambiguous intention never to transfer SOA to, for example,
Osama Bin Ladin. Ries remarked that these examples were
somewhat farfetched and explained that the reason for using
"States" was because of the existing pattern of cooperation
between the United States and the United Kingdom (UK). Ries
stated that the United States was not in the practice of
transferring SOA to international organizations or Parties.
Mr. Dean commented that using the term "Parties" would
establish a broad prohibition against transferring SOA to any
Party. He noted that the phrase at the end of the article
would still allow for such transfers if there was an existing
pattern of cooperation between a State and another third
State, which meant that the scope of the exception was
narrower than the prohibition (e.g., that neither Party could
rely on an existing pattern of cooperation with a third


Party, vice State, to avoid the transfer prohibition). Dean
concluded that the United States would prefer to study the
implication of the use of the word "Parties" which was a much
broader term than the word "States."


10. (S) Koshelev inquired whether the United States intended
to establish a pattern of cooperation for transferring SOA to
non-State actors. Dean replied that the United States would
have to study the implications of the Russian proposal in
view of current established practices. Koshelev conceded
that the phrase would not influence existing patterns of
cooperation and, moreover, the purpose of the article was to
safeguard those existing patterns from possible disruptions.
Ries stated that legal counsel had advised that using the
term "Parties" in lieu of "States" required further study and
noted that since "States" was used in the first and last
sentences, it seemed consistent to use it throughout the
article. Koshelev replied that this was because those
sentences addressed different issues. Specifically, the
first sentence made a generic statement prohibiting the
transfer of SOA to third States and the last sentence
addressed existing patterns of cooperation to establish for
any exceptions.


11. (S) Ries asked whether, by substituting "Parties" for
"States," Russia was trying to affirm something. Koshelev
replied that the intent of the Russian proposal was to
broaden the obligation. Adm Kuznetsov stated that the United
States had obligations under NATO in which Qs nuclear
weapons served as an umbrella to the member states.
Likewise, Russia had the same obligation under its collective
security treaty. The United States had forces in NATO as did
Russia in its collective security organization. Therefore,
the armed forces of NATO were comprised of forces from the
member nations. Since NATO provided for the collective
defense of its member states, Kuznetsov asked whether the
United States had any intention to transfer nuclear weapons
to NATO. Ries replied that by inserting this article into
the treaty, the United States was demonstrating that it was
willing to live within its restrictions that included no
existing patterns of cooperation with the one exception that
had been spelled out in START. Kuznetsov stated that the
Russian Delegation was not against any part of this article
or with the existing pattern of cooperation between the
United States and the UK. The Russian objective was to
broaden the article's applicatQ because international
organizations have their own armed forces. Ries asked
whether the Russian side intended to declare an existing
pattern of cooperation. Koshelev replied that Russia did not
have any such patterns of cooperation. Mr. Taylor summed up
the discussion by noting that the only substantive issue was
whether to use the word "Parties" or the word "States" in the
second sentence.

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ARTICLE IX: NATIONAL
TECHNICAL MEANS (NTM)
--------------


12. (S) Moving on to Article IX,, Ries stated that NTM was a
very important tool, along with inspections, for verifying
treaty compliance. This was a principle carried forward from
the U.S. experiences with START and with treaties that


predated START. The U.S. Delegation noted that some of the
language that had been drawn directly from START had been
changed in the Russian proposal. The United States
understood the Russian desire to reduce the treaty text, but
in the case of NTM, such changes may be perceived negatively.
Ries stated that it was important for both sides to show
that they continued to attribute great importance to NTM.


13. (S) Turning to paragraph 1, Ries stated that the United
States preferred using the phrase "shall use NTM" vice
"undertakes to use NTM." Koshelev asked why the U.S.
proposal used separate paragraphs. (Begin comment: In
Article IX of the U.S.-proposed JDT, the U.S. version was
separated into four separately numbered paragraphs. The
Russian proposal had one paragraph subdivided into three
sub-paragraphs. End comment.) Ries replied that the
paragraph was structured for clarity and presentation. For
example, the third paragraph had a long formulation and
combining it into one large paragraph would have been
cumbersome. Kuznetsov stated that Russia understood the
principle of the obligations under this article and intended
to continue them. Therefore, the Russian Delegation did not
object to the U.S. formulation-albeit with some exceptions.
Kuznetsov declared that the Russian approach was to treat all
ICBMs in the same manner and not to have different provisions
for mobile ICBM launchers. That principle was the basis for
the formulation of the third paragraph in the Russian
proposal. It was also the reason that discussions on this
article should be limited until the issue of mobile ICBMs was
resolved. Regarding paragraph four, Kuznetsov questioned the
relationship of unique identifiers (UID) to NTM, noting that
UIDs could not be observed by NTM. Mr. Kamenskiy echoed that
he had seen UIDs himself and could vouch that they were not
visible to NTM. Kuznetsov expanded his question to inquire
why UIDs should be included in the treaty text at all. He
acknowledged that UIDs may be related to inspections and,
therefore, may belong in the Inspection Protocol (IP). So,
even if agreement was reached regarding their utility, UIDs
should be addressed in the second tier document. Kuznetsov
summarized that, in principle, the Russian Delegation had no
other objections to the NTM article and that paragraph
labeling was unimportant. Rather, the Russian side was not
able to understand the relationship of UIDs to NTM.


14. (S) Ries stated that the United States viewed UIDs as a
critical element in the treaty for verifying compliance. An
example was verifying compliance of treaty limitations on
non-deployed mobile ICBMs. UIDs facilitated the confirmation
of Russian-provided data on the number and location of ICBMs.
This was necessary in order for the United States to
understand the number of deployed and non-deployed missile
systems to appreciate the total force that could be
generated. Kuznetsov replied that he now recognized that the
U.S proposal used separate paragraphs so that it could
address topics beyond NTM. Kuznetsov reiterated his view
that, as written, the U.S. version combined topics that were
not related. UIDs, if ultimately accepted, should go in the
treaty article on inspections or the IP. Ries replied that
this article addressed verification and that, since both NTM
and UIDs were under that category, it was logical to group
them together. Kuznetsov responded that the Russian position
was that only NTM should be addressed because this article's
purpose was to ensure that NTM operated properly. Beyond


that, he counseled waiting until the issue of mobile
launchers of ICBMs and other related items were resolved.
Kuznetsov summarized as follows: 1) Russia had no objection
to the inclusion of NTM as contained in START; and 2) UIDs
were not acceptable in this article. Kuznetsov stated that
by noon tomorrow, the Russian Delegation would provide the
U.S. Delegation a revised proposal of this article with the
areas of disagreement highlighted. Ries acknowledged that
the two sides had differing views regarding this article's
role with respect to verification. Ries then queried
Kuznetsov on paragraph three and, before she could finish her
question, Kuznetsov stated that the Russian Delegation
completely concurred with the U.S. proposal. Ries noted that
there will need to be further discussion on this article.

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ARTICLE VIII: MEMORANDUM
OF UNDERSTANDING DATA
--------------


15. (S) Ries commented that in the last meeting, the U.S.
Delegation had intended to provide the Russian Delegation a
revised JDT of Article VIII. Ries continued that the final
draft was not yet finished but that the U.S. Delegation
wanted to clarify that the U.S. position on the release of
MOU data was very similar to the START formulation with the
exception of the release of data related to nuclear warheads.
In the case of data related to nuclear warheads, only the
aggregate numbers would be released every six months. Ries
summarized that the U.S. proposal would allow for the public
release of specified data and would protect sensitive data as
well.


16. (S) Koshelev stated that the U.S. proposal contained
certain points that were not yet agreed upon by the other
working groups. However, the Russian Delegation would
consider it. Ries replied that there was a conceptual
distinction between the U.S. and Russian proposals. In the
U.S. approach, MOU data was releasable with specific
exceptions. In the Russian approach, on the other hand, MOU
data was not releasable "unless otherwise agreed." Ries
remarked that this was a strong prohibition and so the spirit
of the two versions was somewhat different. Koshelev replied
that the United States and Russia had legal procedures for
disclosing information. In accordance with Russian law, with
some exceptions, all information related to START was
classified and, therefore, could not be made public.
Koshelev noted that, with regard to the Moscow Treaty's
Bilateral Implementation Commission (BIC),Russia never
publicized the six-month reports. Koshelev commented that,
in his opinion, the United States had no obstacles to
releasing its own information to the public. However, in the
Russian case, this was not so. Ries stated that the U.S.
side would consider how to address the Russian side's
concerns.


17. (U) Documents exchanged: None.


18. (S) Participants:

U.S.

Amb Ries


Lt Col Comeau
Mr. Connell
Mr. Dean
Dr. Fraley
Mr. Sims
Mr. Taylor
Mrs. Zdravecky
Mr. Shkeyrov (Int)

RUSSIA:

Mr. Koshelev
Ms. Fuzhenkova
Col Kamenskiy
Ms. Kotkova
Adm (Ret) Kuznetsov
Ms. Melikbekian
Mr. Gauduk (Int)


19. (U) Ries sends.
GRIFFITHS