Did Barack Obama Give the Russians British Nuclear Secrets?
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This morning I was reading an article that, even by the
standards of National Review Online, was particularly hyperbolic and
hysterical. Arthur Herman strongly dislikes Barack Obama, strongly
dislikes Russia, and especially dislikes how the former has
handled the later. Obama hasn’t just done a bad job, Herman argues, he’s
basically been treasonous in doing so. The article, Romney’s Russian Reset,
although possessed of a pleasantly alliterative title, is for the most
part perfectly standard-issue conservative agitprop, boring and
poorly-written dreck of the sort that is produced by the cartload.
Herman’s article did, however, contain one thing that was extremely interesting, an accusation against Barack Obama and the manifest failure of his Russia policy with which I was not previously familiar. I’ve bolded the important bit:
Before reading Herman’s article, though, I had never heard anything about how Obama supposedly handed over British nuclear secrets to the Russians. And when I say never, I mean never. Not once had I encountered that particular complaint, and I read quite a lot about US domestic politics and even more about US-Russian relations. Indeed, although it sounds like a cheap cliche, I literally spat out my coffee when I read Herman’s allegation that Obama had betrayed the British to the Russians: it seemed to be only marginally more credible than an allegation that Obama was secretly in league with the illuminati.
Virtually every other allegation contained within Herman’s attack on Obama was distressingly familiar, so I figured that he must have based this particular complaint on something. Pudits, even very bad ones like Herman, almost never invent things out of whole cloth: making stuff up is an exceptionally dangerous thing for a political writer to do, and there usually some basis, however flimsy or implausible, for an accusation.
Well after some intensive Google searches it turns out (shockingly) that Herman’s accusation is basically a load of nonsense, nonsense that is based off of a February 2011 Telegraph story that was itself based on information from Wikileaks:
What did the Russians gain, what “secrets” of the British nuclear program were revealed to them by Obama’s treachery and deceit? The flight characteristics of the Trident missile? Entry angles for Tridents that have been launched by submarine? Information on which Russian cities and facilities the British target? Technical details about the British submarines carrying the missiles that might aid in their detection? Nope, none of those things. Serial numbers. Even in the worst possible telling of the story, even if we take a relentlessly anti-Obama view on all of the information that we know, the Russians gained information about the number of nuclear weapons possessed by the British. In the decidedly unlikely event of a Russian-British nuclear war, the Russians wouldn’t be able to know where the United Kingdom’s missiles were coming from, they wouldn’t know where these missiles were going, and they wouldn’t be able to shoot the missiles down. They would simply know how many the British possessed (something the Brits are supposed to tell the Russians anyway, but whatever). The benefit this provides the Russians is…oh right, it doesn’t actually benefit them in any conceivable way.
Has there ever been a more spurious allegation against Barack Obama? He might have told the Russians how many missiles the British have? That’s really supposed to be some sort of damning indictment of his foreign policy acumen? It takes quite a lot to shock me these days, but I am truly appalled that National Review allowed such a sloppy and ludicrous allegation to be published. Barack Obama has done a lot of things with which reasonable people can disagree, but betraying the nuclear secrets of our close ally is not one of them.
* the treaty language was actually negotiated by professional staff at the State Department and the Russian Ministry of Foreign affairs, but whatever
Herman’s article did, however, contain one thing that was extremely interesting, an accusation against Barack Obama and the manifest failure of his Russia policy with which I was not previously familiar. I’ve bolded the important bit:
Three years later, we see what “RESET” really meant.I am, by this point in time, all too familiar with conservative complaints about “the reset” having read a great number of them. Indeed I’ve poured over so many critiques of the reset, and become so familiar with its alleged failures and faults, that I feel pretty confident in my ability to rapidly produce an attack against the reset myself. It’s not hard, you see, because basically anything the Russians do, regardless of how long they’ve been doing it or their reasons for doing so, is actually a result of the reset. Are Russian bureaucrats thieving and stealing? Blame the reset! Are the Russians selling weapons to the Syrians? Blame the reset! Is the Russian government opposed to the latest “humanitarian” intervention? Blame the reset! Whatever the Russians do, whenever they do it, wherever they do it, with or against whom they do it, it’s all a result of the reset and that damn plastic button Hillary Clinton handed Sergey Lavrov.
It meant cravenly abandoning our allies Poland and the Czech Republic on missile defense for Eastern Europe, in order to get a nuclear-arms-reduction treaty that reduced our nuclear arsenal while leaving lots of loopholes for Russia. It meant handing over nuclear secrets belonging to our ally Great Britain and offering Moscow top-secret information about our own missile-defense technologies.
Before reading Herman’s article, though, I had never heard anything about how Obama supposedly handed over British nuclear secrets to the Russians. And when I say never, I mean never. Not once had I encountered that particular complaint, and I read quite a lot about US domestic politics and even more about US-Russian relations. Indeed, although it sounds like a cheap cliche, I literally spat out my coffee when I read Herman’s allegation that Obama had betrayed the British to the Russians: it seemed to be only marginally more credible than an allegation that Obama was secretly in league with the illuminati.
Virtually every other allegation contained within Herman’s attack on Obama was distressingly familiar, so I figured that he must have based this particular complaint on something. Pudits, even very bad ones like Herman, almost never invent things out of whole cloth: making stuff up is an exceptionally dangerous thing for a political writer to do, and there usually some basis, however flimsy or implausible, for an accusation.
Well after some intensive Google searches it turns out (shockingly) that Herman’s accusation is basically a load of nonsense, nonsense that is based off of a February 2011 Telegraph story that was itself based on information from Wikileaks:
A series of classified messages sent to Washington by US negotiators show how information on Britain’s nuclear capability was crucial to securing Russia’s support for the “New START” deal.First of all, I think it’s ironic, in a sad sort of way, that someone writing for a magazine whose contributors have called for Julian Asasnge’s assassination is using Wikileaks as a reliable source. However, let’s focus on the “secret” that Obama supposedly revealed. Now it turns out that the information that was given to the Russians is arguably required not only by the new START treaty, but by the old one as well (i.e. a treaty that was in effect before Obama was even elected to the state senate in Illinois, much less became president). But let’s ignore that. Let’s imagine that the only reason that specific language about nuclear weapons transfers, the language that supposedly sold out the British, made its way into the treaty was the personal malevolence of Barack Obama. Let’s even imagine that, as he gave the order to include this language in the treaty*, Obama laughed maniacally, announced to a shocked group of assistants “perfidious Albion will never recover from the wound that I have just inflicted on her,” and then started to sing the Russian national anthem.
Although the treaty was not supposed to have any impact on Britain, the leaked cables show that Russia used the talks to demand more information about the UK’s Trident missiles, which are manufactured and maintained in the US.
Washington lobbied London in 2009 for permission to supply Moscow with detailed data about the performance of UK missiles. The UK refused, but the US agreed to hand over the serial numbers of Trident missiles it transfers to Britain.
What did the Russians gain, what “secrets” of the British nuclear program were revealed to them by Obama’s treachery and deceit? The flight characteristics of the Trident missile? Entry angles for Tridents that have been launched by submarine? Information on which Russian cities and facilities the British target? Technical details about the British submarines carrying the missiles that might aid in their detection? Nope, none of those things. Serial numbers. Even in the worst possible telling of the story, even if we take a relentlessly anti-Obama view on all of the information that we know, the Russians gained information about the number of nuclear weapons possessed by the British. In the decidedly unlikely event of a Russian-British nuclear war, the Russians wouldn’t be able to know where the United Kingdom’s missiles were coming from, they wouldn’t know where these missiles were going, and they wouldn’t be able to shoot the missiles down. They would simply know how many the British possessed (something the Brits are supposed to tell the Russians anyway, but whatever). The benefit this provides the Russians is…oh right, it doesn’t actually benefit them in any conceivable way.
Has there ever been a more spurious allegation against Barack Obama? He might have told the Russians how many missiles the British have? That’s really supposed to be some sort of damning indictment of his foreign policy acumen? It takes quite a lot to shock me these days, but I am truly appalled that National Review allowed such a sloppy and ludicrous allegation to be published. Barack Obama has done a lot of things with which reasonable people can disagree, but betraying the nuclear secrets of our close ally is not one of them.
* the treaty language was actually negotiated by professional staff at the State Department and the Russian Ministry of Foreign affairs, but whatever
