Gottemoeller on START 2.0

Interfax conducted an interesting interview with Assistant Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller about the ongoing START negotiations with the Russians.  The main points picked up in the New York Times and GSN were the U.S. willingness to consider deliver vehicles, in addition to just warheads, and the prospect of moving missile defense sites to Azerbaijan or Southern Russia.  While the statement for including delivery vehicles was direct:

In the presidents' instructions after London it was quite clear that the focus of negotiations will be strategic offensive armaments and that it includes delivery vehicles

The answer to the missile defense question was much more indirect:

At the time I lived in Moscow when I was a director of Carnegie Moscow, I thought that the offer was very interesting. And I think it deserved further exploration. I understood from talking to Russian counterparts that the offer is still on the table. I think, personally, that is an offer that the United States should be willing to explore.

Regardless, the major question stemming from the interview is the impact of these concessions.  In one respect, they represent a good faith effort by the United States to address Russian concerns which can help pave a constructive way forward, perhaps even by the ambitious December 5 deadline.  At the same time, the looming question is what does the U.S. get in return?  Similar to the way Obama has been criticized for apologizing to the world, some will probably argue that making these concessions up front is a weak negotiating tactic, particularly with the Russians.  The value of the concessions lies in what the U.S. might be able to get in return.  Interfax started to get at this when it asked "What does the U.S. expect from Russia" in regards to the P+1 process.  Goettemoeller responded by saying

Russia has extensive cooperation in the nuclear energy sphere with Iran. And the Bushehr reactor project has given Russia a real insight into the Iranian export community. It has many contacts that could be used in negotiations, and further more, Russia has made some interesting proposals in the past by the head of the Russian atomic energy agency Kiriyenko to use the Angarsk nuclear fuel services center as part of the solution to the Iran problem. Russia had some good ideas in the past that make use of Russian dominance of the nuclear energy industry. I hope this kind of approach will continue.

It will be interesting to see if Russia is willing and able to make substantial inroads on the Iran issue (e.g., when the Iranians likely say no to Angarsk what can the P+1 do to effectively increase pressure on them given increased Russian support?) but thorough exploration of mutually beneficial concessions could be beneficial as long as the U.S. doesn't give away too much at the bargaining table.