Jackson Vanik will pass – bipartisan support of congress and interest groups gives momentum
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- Russian Economy Impact-Nuclear Terrorism
- That escalates to global nuclear war and extinction
Russian Economy Impact-China WarEconomic decline causes a Russia-China warTrenin 2002 (Dmitri, Deputy Director of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Former Russian Officer, After Eurasia, pp 308-309) Usually, there is no shortage of dire predictions concerning Russia’s ultimate fate. In a characteristic exchange of views on the eve of the year 2000, a prominent Russian intellectual predicted Russia’s disintegration within 10 to 15 years. His European counterpart’s vision of Russia was that of Muscovy west of the Urals, with Siberia under Chinese control. The American scholar limited himself to the vision of a Sino-Russian war. If a doomsday scenario were to become a reality, this would be the result of a major economic catastrophe. If Russia became a loose confederation, its borderlands would gravitate in different directions, and governing Russia would require the art of managing these very different orientations. In other words, Russia would still join the world, but it would do so in less than one piece. ExtinctionSharavn 2001 (Alexander, Director of the Institute for Military and Political Analysis, What the Papers Say, Oct 3) Now, a few words about the third type of war. A real military threat to Russia from China has not merely been ignored; it has been denied by Russia's leaders and nearly all of the political forces. Let's see some statistic figures at first. The territory of Siberia and the Russian Far East comprises 12,765,900 square kilometers (75% of Russia's entire area), with a population of 40,553,900 people (28% of Russia's population). The territory of China is 9,597,000 square kilometers and its population is 1.265 billion (which is 29 times greater than the population of Siberia and the Russian Far East). China's economy is among the fastest-growing economies in the world. It remains socialistic in many aspects, i.e. extensive and highly expensive, demanding more and more natural resources. China's natural resources are rather limited, whereas the depths of Siberia and the Russian Far East are almost inexhaustible. Chinese propaganda has constantly been showing us skyscrapers in free trade zones in southeastern China. It should not be forgotten, however, that some 250 to 300 million people live there, i.e. at most a quarter of China's population. A billion Chinese people are still living in misery. For them, even the living standards of a backwater Russian town remain inaccessibly high. They have absolutely nothing to lose. There is every prerequisite for "the final throw to the north." The strength of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (CPLA) has been growing quicker than the Chinese economy. A decade ago the CPLA was equipped with inferior copies of Russian arms from late 1950s to the early 1960s. However, through its own efforts Russia has nearly managed to liquidate its most significant technological advantage. Thanks to our zeal, from antique MiG-21 fighters of the earliest modifications and S-75 air defense missile systems the Chinese antiaircraft defense forces have adopted Su-27 fighters and S-300 air defense missile systems. China's air defense forces have received Tor systems instead of anti-aircraft guns which could have been used during World War II. The shock air force of our "eastern brethren" will in the near future replace antique Tu-16 and Il-28 airplanes with Su-30 fighters, which are not yet available to the Russian Armed Forces! Russia may face the "wonderful" prospect of combating the Chinese army, which, if full mobilization is called, is comparable in size with Russia's entire population, which also has nuclear weapons (even tactical weapons become strategic if states have common borders) and would be absolutely insensitive to losses (even a loss of a few million of the servicemen would be acceptable for China). Such a war would be more horrible than the World War II. It would require from our state maximal tension, universal mobilization and complete accumulation of the army military hardware, up to the last tank or a plane, in a single direction (we would have to forget such "trifles" like Talebs and Basaev, but this does not guarantee success either). Massive nuclear strikes on basic military forces and cities of China would finally be the only way out, what would exhaust Russia's armament completely. We have not got another set of intercontinental ballistic missiles and submarine-based missiles, whereas the general forces would be extremely exhausted in the border combats. In the long run, even if the aggression would be stopped after the majority of the Chinese are killed, our country would be absolutely unprotected against the "Chechen" and the "Balkan" variants both, and even against the first frost of a possible nuclear winter. Russian Economy Impact-Nuclear TerrorismRussian economic decline enables nuclear terrorists to steal nuclear weapons and hire scientistsSpiece 2006 (Patrick F., JD Candidate at College of William and Mary, “NEGLIGENCE AND NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION: ELIMINATING THE CURRENT LIABILITY BARRIER TO BILATERAL U.S.-RUSSIAN NONPROLIFERATION ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS,” William & Mary Law Review, February 2006, 47 Wm and Mary L. Rev. 1427) The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks demonstrated in horrifying fashion the serious threat posed by international organizations that seek to cause mass destruction in the United States. Several confirmed cases of terrorist groups attempting to purchase or steal nuclear material have raised the chilling prospect of an unconventional attack on U.S. soil that would result in unparalleled destruction. (1) Because of the porous border and the wide variety of methods that terrorist groups could use to construct, deliver, and detonate a nuclear device in the United States, (2) supply-side controls aimed at preventing terrorists from acquiring nuclear material and the knowledge of how to construct nuclear weapons in the first place are likely to be the most effective means of preventing nuclear terrorism. (3) Unfortunately, the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s has given terrorist groups new opportunities to acquire nuclear material and know-how. (4) The end of the Cold War signaled the end of the East-West confrontation that was largely defined by an extensive nuclear arms race, (5) leaving both the United States and Russia with extensive stockpiles of nuclear weapons and the nuclear material and infrastructure to support their massive military-industrial complexes. (6) In Russia, the economic difficulty that has resulted from the end of the Soviet economic system and the transition to a more liberalized economy has left the remnant nuclear infrastructure insecure and in shambles. (7) Two problems in particular are of serious concern given their potential consequences for U.S. national security. First, there is a risk that terrorist organizations could acquire assembled warheads and weapons-grade fissile material that are currently stored in facilities with inadequately funded security systems. (8) Second, the nuclear scientists that occupied the Soviet Union's secret "nuclear cities" are unemployed, increasing the possibility that these scientists will sell their knowledge to hostile nations or terrorist groups that seek nuclear capabilities. (9) That escalates to global nuclear war and extinctionSpiece 2006 (Patrick F., JD Candidate at College of William and Mary, “NEGLIGENCE AND NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION: ELIMINATING THE CURRENT LIABILITY BARRIER TO BILATERAL U.S.-RUSSIAN NONPROLIFERATION ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS,” William & Mary Law Review, February 2006, 47 Wm and Mary L. Rev. 1427) Accordingly, there is a significant and ever-present risk that terrorists could acquire a nuclear device or fissile material from Russia as a result of the confluence of Russian economic decline and the end of stringent Soviet-era nuclear security measures. 39 Terrorist groups could acquire a nuclear weapon by a number of methods, including "steal[ing] one intact from the stockpile of a country possessing such weapons, or ... [being] sold or given one by [*1438] such a country, or [buying or stealing] one from another subnational group that had obtained it in one of these ways." 40 Equally threatening, however, is the risk that terrorists will steal or purchase fissile material and construct a nuclear device on their own. Very little material is necessary to construct a highly destructive nuclear weapon. 41 Although nuclear devices are extraordinarily complex, the technical barriers to constructing a workable weapon are not significant. 42 Moreover, the sheer number of methods that could be used to deliver a nuclear device into the United States makes it incredibly likely that terrorists could successfully employ a nuclear weapon once it was built. 43 Accordingly, supply-side controls that are aimed at preventing terrorists from acquiring nuclear material in the first place are the most effective means of countering the risk of nuclear terrorism. 44 Moreover, the end of the Cold War eliminated the rationale for maintaining a large military-industrial complex in Russia, and the nuclear cities were closed. 45 This resulted in at least 35,000 nuclear scientists becoming unemployed in an economy that was collapsing. 46 Although the economy has stabilized somewhat, there [*1439] are still at least 20,000 former scientists who are unemployed or underpaid and who are too young to retire, 47 raising the chilling prospect that these scientists will be tempted to sell their nuclear knowledge, or steal nuclear material to sell, to states or terrorist organizations with nuclear ambitions. 48 The potential consequences of the unchecked spread of nuclear knowledge and material to terrorist groups that seek to cause mass destruction in the United States are truly horrifying. A terrorist attack with a nuclear weapon would be devastating in terms of immediate human and economic losses. 49 Moreover, there would be immense political pressure in the United States to discover the perpetrators and retaliate with nuclear weapons, massively increasing the number of casualties and potentially triggering a full-scale nuclear conflict. 50 In addition to the threat posed by terrorists, leakage of nuclear knowledge and material from Russia will reduce the barriers that states with nuclear ambitions face and may trigger widespread proliferation of nuclear weapons. 51 This proliferation will increase the risk of nuclear attacks against the United States [*1440] or its allies by hostile states, 52 as well as increase the likelihood that regional conflicts will draw in the United States and escalate to the use of nuclear weapons. 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