US and NATO response to Russia’s security proposals. Main provisions

• The United States, together with partners in NATO, is ready to continue working on reaching an understanding with Russia. The United States is ready to consider the possibility of concluding agreements with Russia on issues of mutual concern, including security.
• The United States is ready for negotiations with Russia both in a bilateral format and within the framework of the Russia-NATO Council, as well as within the framework of the OSCE, to achieve security in Europe.
• Washington will continue to support NATO’s open door policy.
• The United States is ready to discuss mutual obligations with Russia on non-deployment of ground-based missile launchers and armed forces on the territory of Ukraine on a permanent basis for military purposes.
• The United States is ready, together with NATO, to discuss transparency mechanisms to confirm the non-deployment of Tomahawk missiles on launchers in Poland and Romania. This will be done in exchange for Russia providing guarantees for such checks on Russian launchers of our choice. On this issue, we are obliged to consult with Poland and Romania.
• The US shares a desire to set limits on the number of intercontinental ballistic missiles and bombers capable of carrying nuclear warheads. Together with these issues, restrictions on new types of launch vehicles, as well as non-strategic nuclear weapons, should be discussed. The United States is also ready for a dialogue to reduce risk and increase transparency in this area.
• Washington is ready, together with NATO and Russia, to discuss measures to increase confidence in the conduct of exercises in Europe, as well as on the regime of expanded information about ongoing exercises. The United States and allies are concerned about Russia’s large-scale military exercises launched without prior notice and with little transparency.
• The United States is ready for additional measures to prevent incidents in the air and at sea, which would not contradict international law, and to mutually reduce the potential for conflict. The United States and allies are ready to discuss the issue of risk reduction.
• The United States is ready to start a dialogue on the control of intermediate and shorter range missiles.
• A further Russian military build-up or invasion of Ukraine would lead to a build-up of US and allied defenses. The US is ready to discuss differences and explore how the parties can resolve issues related to conventional military forces.

The responses from NATO and the United States arrived in Moscow on January 26; they were handed over by the American ambassador in Moscow, John Sullivan, who arrived at the Foreign Ministry for this. Russia commented on the content of the documents the next day. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov declared journalists that the reaction of the American side allows us to talk about the possibility of starting a serious dialogue, but on the main issue – about non-expansion NATO to the East – “there is no positive reaction in the document.”

“As for the content of the document, there is a reaction there, which allows us to count on the start of a serious conversation, but on secondary issues. There is no positive reaction on the main issue in this document. The main issue is our clear position on the inadmissibility of further NATO expansion to the east,” Lavrov said.

At the same time, the minister called the US response exemplary compared to NATO’s response. “The response from NATO is so ideological, it breathes so much with the exclusivity of the North Atlantic Alliance, its special mission, its special purpose, that I was just a little ashamed of those who wrote these texts,” the minister said, calling the US response “an example of diplomatic decency.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin, in a conversation with French President Emmanuel Macron, also said that Washington and Brussels did not take into account Moscow’s fundamental concerns: the inadmissibility of the expansion of the North Atlantic Alliance to the east, the refusal to deploy strike weapons systems near Russian borders and the bloc’s return to the positions of 1997.

In addition, Putin noted, Western countries ignored the key issue of how the United States and its allies will follow the principle of the indivisibility of security, which is recorded in the documents of the OSCE and the Russia-NATO Council. It stipulates that no one should strengthen their security at the expense of the security of other countries.

Russia is studying US and NATO responses and will decide on further actions later, Putin said.