Vienna Document

The Vienna Document is an agreement between the participating states of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe which was intended to implement confidence and security building measures. Its provisions include an annual exchange of military information about forces located in Europe (defined as the Atlantic to the Urals), notifications for risk reduction including consultation about unusual military activities and hazardous incidents, prior notification of certain military activities, observation of certain military activities, exchange of annual calendars, and compliance and verification by inspection and evaluation visits. This exchange differs from the Global Exchange of Military Information in that it is limited to forces in Europe, while the Global Exchange of Military Information applies to all forces of the participating states, wherever located. The annual exchange of information was conducted concurrently with the annual exchange of information under the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty, in Vienna, Austria in December of each year. The Vienna Document has been revised periodically, and the current version is the 2011 version.

From 2014 onwards there have been fears that the Vienna Document is on the verge of becoming de facto defunct, as other arms control and security agreements continue to collapse due to the ongoing tensions in Eastern Europe. However Russia was able to use the provisions of the Document in early April of 2015 to force NATO to agree to a Russian inspection team being present at the 2015 Joint Warrior exercise off the coast of Scotland.