INTERNATIONAL TOOLS FOR PREVENTING DANGEROUS MILITARY ACTIVITIES AND HAZARDOUS INCIDENTS IN THE EURO-ATLANTIC AREA

Introduction. Among many risks that increase the likelihood of an unintentional conflict between Russia and the West (US and NATO), dangerous military activity is a special one. This kind of activity is likely to generate hazardous incidents where military aircraft and naval ships may be involved. At best, these incidents may cause collisions and crashes with casualties. But what is more important, at worst, it may lead to direct military engagements between the forces of Russia and NATO members. In this regard, international treaties and agreements and other normative documents play a crucial role in order to prevent it. The analysis of these documents makes it possible to assess their effectiveness and relevance. Materials and Methods. The study encompasses the sources such as international documents which set the framework for regulation of dangerous military activities and incidents prevention. In addition to the sources, a number of Russian and foreign research and analytical materials on dangerous military activities are used in this study. The methodology of the article is based neoliberal institutionalism – an IR school whose scholars evaluate effectiveness of norms and institutions on cost-benefit calculations of international actors (states). Results. The article analyzes the existing international agreements aimed at preventing collisions between air and sea vessels. Particular attention is paid to the U.S.-Russia memorandum of 2015, aimed at ensuring the safety of aircraft flights during operations in Syria. The study points to ambivalent behavior of Russia and NATO countries with respect to existing international agreements regulating dangerous military activities. On the one hand, they express little or no doubt that these agreements are ultimate it terms of preserving peace. But on the other hand, such agreements are not universal and, moreover, they could be seen as “hostages” of overall political distrust among Russia and NATO members. Therefore the power of these agreements is limited as they cannot be “put forward beyond the brackets” by the conflicting parties when they dispute on many other things. In order to overcome this logic of conflict greater rationalization and de-ideologization of the RussiaWest dialogue is needed. It may help to avoid overrated mutual expectations of the parties and prevent potential armed conflict among them. It is here that the mutual interests of Moscow as well as of Washington and Brussels are. Discussions and conclusions. The way of functioning of international and bilateral agreements which set a regulation of hazardous military activities and the prevention of incidents has been explored in the article. Current obstacles which limit effectiveness of regulations have been revealed and possible ways how to overcome them have been suggested.

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