Prime Minster Vladimir Putin is running for President again, confirming suspicions that the plan to put Russia’s eight year president back in the saddle has been long in the making.  Current President Dmitri Medvedev, Putin’s protégé, announced that he fully supports Putin’s candidacy and will not run for a second term, but take up the post of Prime Minister held by Putin.

Better than swapping wives, but not much.

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Nukes on a Blog, Russia, Putin, Dimitry Medvedev (all tags)

I’m still sifting through some of the nuclear headlines from the holiday break and wanted to address the hyperventilating in the blogosphere and the media about Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin’s end of the year comments on missile defense.  In a visit to Vladivostok on December 29, Putin stated:

If we don’t develop a missile defense system, a danger arises for us that with an umbrella protecting our partners from offensive weapons, they will feel completely safe….The balance will be disrupted, and then they will do whatever they want, and aggressiveness will immediately arise both in real politics and economics.

The view from the U.S. press seems to be that this means missile defense is the main issue holding up completion of the New START agreement.

Maybe we’re in too much of a “don’t freak out mood” over here at the Center, but I don’t put much stock in Putin’s remarks.  The reality is that despite Russia’s initial positive reaction to the Obama administration’s new approach to missile defense in Europe, it remains deeply concerned about U.S. missile defense plans.  Putin didn’t say anything new…

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Security Matters, Missile Defense, New START, Putin, Russia (all tags)