Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia on February 17, 2008, was in some ways an anticlimactic event. It was widely expected, as were the immediate reactions: recognition by the United States and a majority of European Union states, and lack of recognition...
Policy Memos by Nikolai Sokov
Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
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Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
Since the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia has regarded both Central Asia and the South Caucasus as being within its sphere of influence. It has also been constantly afraid of...
Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
Ratification of the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (SORT, or the Moscow Treaty), signed by Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush on May 24, 2002, is all but certain. Critics in both capitals have apparently been proven wrong—it turned out to be possible to break...
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Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
In August-September 2002, Russia appeared to have a short romance with the U.S. policy of preemption, which was annoucned months before and made official in the National Security Strategy issued by the White House in September 2002. A Russian pro-government Internet...
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Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
A crisis between Georgia and Russia on April 12–13, 2002, had several new, troubling features, suggesting that war between Georgia and the breakaway region of Abkhazia or, even worse, an ...
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Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
With Vladimir Putin’s presidential inauguration in May 2000, Russian policy toward the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union began to change. By the end of 2001 these changes have become significant enough to require that the United States and NATO...
Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
The November 2001 summit between Presidents George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin marked the end of the lengthy saga of the ABM Treaty. After years of intense conflict, the situation is curiously peaceful: Russia has clearly indicated that it would not initiate a major...
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Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
The new Treaty on Good-Neighborly Relations, Friendship, and Cooperation signed by Russia and China on July 16, 2001, was immediately discounted by the Bush administration as merely a reaffirmation of the long-standing positions of the two countries. Indeed, the two...
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Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
The idea that unilateral reduction of nuclear arms is preferable to the traditional but slower process of negotiated formal arms control treaties that dominated US Soviet/Russian relations for three decades is becoming increasingly popular. Closer scrutiny suggests...
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Nikolai Sokov 07-23-2012
In the summer of 2000, a long-simmering conflict within the Russian Ministry of Defense (MOD) burst into the open in a series of leaks to the media that culminated in a stormy meeting of the Collegium of the Ministry of Defense (an assembly of the top brass) on July...
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About the author
Senior Fellow
Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non‑Proliferation
