Russia and the United States are
signatories to the Open Skies Treaty, which allows unarmed observation
flights over the entire territory of all 34 member nations to foster
transparency about military activity and help monitor arms control and
other agreements. Senior intelligence and military officials, however,
worry that Russia is taking advantage of technological advances to
violate the spirit of the treaty.
Russia
will formally ask the Open Skies Consultative Commission, based in
Vienna, to be allowed to fly an aircraft equipped with high-tech sensors
over the United States, according to a senior congressional staffer,
who spoke on condition of anonymity because the staff member wasn't
authorized to discuss the issue publicly.
The request will put the
Obama administration in the position of having to decide whether to let
Russia use the high-powered equipment on its surveillance planes at a
time when Moscow, according to the latest State Department compliance
report, is failing to meet all its obligations under the treaty. And it
comes at one of the most tension-filled times in U.S.-Russia relations
since the end of the Cold War, with the two countries at odds over
Russian activity in Ukraine and Syria.
"The
treaty has become a critical component of Russia's intelligence
collection capability directed at the United States," Adm. Cecil D.
Haney, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, wrote in a letter
earlier this year to Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., chairman of a House
subcommittee on strategic forces.
"In addition to overflying
military installations, Russian Open Skies flights can overfly and
collect on Department of Defense and national security or national
critical infrastructure," Haney said. "The vulnerability exposed by
exploitation of this data and costs of mitigation are increasingly
difficult to characterize."
A
State Department official said Sunday that treaty nations had not yet
received notice of the Russian request, but that certification of the
Russian plane with a "digital electro-optical sensor" could not occur
until this summer because the treaty requires a 120-day advance
notification. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he
wasn't authorized to discuss the issue publicly.
The
official also said that the treaty, which was entered into force in
2002, establishes procedures for certifying digital sensors to confirm
that they are compliant with treaty requirements. The official said all
signatories to the treaty agree that "transition from film cameras to
digital sensors is required for the long-term viability of the treaty."
In
December, Rose Gottemoeller, undersecretary of state for arms control
and international security, sought to temper concerns about Russian
overflights, saying that what Moscow gains from the observation flights
is "incremental" to what they collect through other means."One of the advantages of the Open Skies Treaty is that information — imagery — that is taken is shared openly among all the treaty parties," she said at a joint hearing of the House Foreign Affairs and Armed Services committees in December. "So one of the advantages with the Open Skies Treaty is that we know exactly what the Russians are imaging, because they must share the imagery with us."
"The open skies construct was designed for a different era," Lt. Gen. Vincent Stewart, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told lawmakers when asked about the Russian overflights during a congressional hearing. "I'm very concerned about how it's applied today."
Robert Work, deputy
secretary of defense, told Congress: "We think that they're going beyond
the original intent of the treaty and we continue to look at this very,
very closely."
Steve
Rademaker, former assistant secretary of state for the bureau of arms
control and the bureau of international security and nonproliferation,
told Congress at a hearing on security cooperation in Europe in October
that Russia complies with the Open Skies Treaty, but has "adopted a
number of measures that are inconsistent with the spirt" of the accord.
The
treaty, for instance, obligates each member to make all of its
territory available for aerial observation, yet Russia has imposed
restrictions on surveillance over Moscow and Chechnya and near Abkhazia
and South Ossetia, he said. Russian restrictions also make it hard to
conduct observation in the Kaliningrad enclave, said Rademaker, who
believes Russia is "selectively implementing" the treaty "in a way that
suits its interests."