strategic-culture | But
the real game changer is the Russian ability to negate America’s
ability to project power through its navy. The already deployed
air-launched Kinzhal anti-ship missile has a range of 2000
kilometers and a hyper-sonic speed that makes it nearly impossible to
intercept. The development has made America’s thirteen aircraft carrier
groups obsolete. President Putin made clear that Russia now has an
overwhelming military advantage in cruise and ballistic missiles that
are capable of penetrating U.S. defenses.
The
new reality may or may not impel policymakers in Washington to approach
Moscow and seek a new round of negotiations for arms control, but the
real shock deriving from the Putin announcement is the failure of the
intelligence community to anticipate the developments and advise their
significance. Some of the new systems were hardly secret, with
development of the Sarmat, for example, known to western governments for a number of years.
There
will no doubt be a blame game in Washington over the inability to learn
of Russia’s arms programs, but the questions that probably will not be
asked relates to the intelligence agencies themselves and their
capabilities, or lack thereof. It is no secret that organizations like
the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) have seen their basic missions
change since 2001. An organization that used to pride itself on its
ability to conduct classic espionage operations involving recruiting and
running spies suddenly heard from policymakers that those skills were
no longer in demand. Many officers who were made redundant or forced to
retire were precisely those individuals who had cut their teeth on
running operations directed against the old Soviet Union. They had the
language and cultural skills necessary to collect information on Russia.
With their departure, those capabilities also largely vanished.
