In the set of U.S. government documents released on Dec. 23 as part of a FOIA request by the non-governmental National Security Archive group of journalists and scholars, the one containing an unredacted transcript or “MEMCON” (notes and recollections of NSC policy staff who attended the meeting) of an April 6, 2008 conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and then U.S. President George W. Bush, along with their respective teams, sheds light on the critical issue of ballistic missile defense (BMD) systems and the danger of a nuclear war between the superpowers.
In their conversation, President Putin raised Russia’s grave concerns about the new American BMD systems being built in the Czech Republic and Poland, and other forward-based nuclear capabilities on Russia’s doorstep, and President Bush expressed clear awareness of the problem:
“President Putin: A missile launch from a submarine in Northern Europe will only take six minutes to reach Moscow.
“President Bush: I understand.
“President Putin: And we have established a set of response measures—there’s nothing good about it. Within a few minutes our entire nuclear response capability will be in the sky.
“President Bush: I know… I understand your concerns about sending the wrong messages. I don’t want to put someone in quick response moments where the whole system is to react. That creates the possibility for mistake. I agree with you on that.”
President Bush then expressed concern about the policies of the next U.S. administration, to be decided in the upcoming November 2008 elections between Barack Obama (or Hillary Clinton, who was still seeking the Democratic nomination), and John McCain:
“I’m worried about the next ones who will come to power. We need to work something out while we have an open relationship. So the next ones don’t overreact. That’s why this agreement is very important… I don’t want Russia to become a campaign issue. The relationship is too important.”
