Obama announced upon his arrival some $1.5 billion in new U.S. capital investment in Russia by U.S.-based mega-corporations Pepsico and Deere and Company. The Moline, Illinois-based John Deere company, which manufactures farm and mechanical equipment, announced its intention to invest $500 million to build a factory in Russia. Pepsico pledged to invest an additional billion dollars in the Russian economy over three years. Also, aircraft manufacturer Boeing announced plans to buy $700-900 million in titanium for its new airplanes from Russia.
Obama also proposed mutual disarmament with a START II treaty that, according to the White House, “commits the United States and Russia to reduce their strategic warheads to a range of 1500-1675, and their strategic delivery vehicles to a range of 500-1100. Under the expiring START and the Moscow treaties, the maximum allowable levels of warheads is 2200 and the maximum allowable level of launch vehicles is 1600.”
He has long sought disarmament treaties with Russian/Soviet governments run by KGB veterans. Today, he is seeking a treaty with a Russia run by KGB veteran Vladimir Putin. As a college student in 1983, Obama promoted nuclear disarmament with a Soviet Union in a student newspaper that was then run by former KGB chief Yuri Andropov.
Obama told the Russian newspaper Novoya Gazeta, “I believe that Americans and Russians both would benefit from fewer nuclear weapons in the world, greater control over nuclear materials around the world, a defeat of extremist elements in Afghanistan and Pakistan, an Iran that produces nuclear energy but not nuclear weapons, and a North Korea that refrains from launching missiles and exploding nuclear weapons and instead returns to the negotiating table.”
