Winter is coming
How the United States destroyed international arms control
Yesterday, former Russian President Dmitri Medvedev posted this on X:
The final nuclear arms control treaty between the United States and Russia, New START, expired at midnight. Signed by President Obama and Russian President Medvedev, it entered into force in 2011. It limited each country to 1550 deployed strategic nuclear warheads and 700 deployed nuclear delivery systems, plenty to destroy human life on earth.
Last September, Russian President Putin made an offer to President Trump to extend New START for a year, to allow time to negotiate a new agreement.
A full removal of such limitations would not be a reasonable step. It would have a negative influence on the goals of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). In order to avoid a further escalation of the arms race, and to provide a level of predictability and a reservation, we believe it is justified to maintain during this current turbulent stage the status quo, and so Russia is willing to continue for one year to maintain the central quantitative limitations under that treaty after the current treaty is terminated…. We believe that stability is only possible if the United States acts in a similar manner and does not take steps that would undermine or disrupt the current balance.
On October 5th, when asked about President Putin’s offer Trump said, “It sounds like a good idea.”
On November 5th, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov said:
The constructive initiative put forward by Pres Vladimir Putin in the post New START context speaks for itself. It contains no hidden agenda and is perfectly clear for understanding. Its practical implementation would not require any special additional efforts. Therefore, we do not consider it necessary to hold in-depth discussions on this proposal. The only thing required is reciprocity from the United States. We will voluntarily adhere to the restrictions only if and precisely for as long as the other side does the same. Naturally, should the Americans have any questions, they are free to raise them with us. So far, there has been no substantive response from Washington. We have been informed through diplomatic channels that the issue is under consideration. We believe our step serves the interests of both parties and the entire international community. We are ready for any development of events while hoping for a positive outcome.
Then the “men in grey suits and black hats” arrived and persuaded Trump to do nothing and let the treaty expire.
So here we are. As of today, there are no limits on the number of nuclear weapons each nation can produce, nor any limits on the number of launch platforms at sea, in the air and on land. It’s “open season” for nuclear weapons production and deployment. A new nuclear arms race has started which will bring humanity closer to annihilation.
The United States, not Russia, has singlehandedly destroyed international arms control.
Arms control began with President John F. Kennedy who during the Cuban missile crisis saw that there were no structures in place to prevent a nuclear holocaust. He understood the importance of creating them and initiated talks with the USSR to limit nuclear weapons development. In 1963, the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty prohibited nuclear tests in the atmosphere, underwater and outer space, but allowed them to take place underground. It also established a communications hot line between the Pentagon and the Kremlin.
From November 1969 to May 1972, the US and USSR negotiated nuclear arms control agreements that included the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty during the SALT 1 talks.
The ABM Treaty was the first arms control pillar to fall when Shrub, aka George W. Bush, unilaterally withdrew from it in 2003. It limited the number of defensive missiles each side could use to shoot down each other’s offensive missiles.
The US was now free to deploy ABM interceptors in Europe, which it did in Deveselu Romania (operational in 2016) and in Redzikowo Poland (operational in 2024).
The US assumed that Russia was too weak to respond. It wasn’t. Since then, Russia has moved faster and further in ABM technology than the US.
The second arms control pillar to fall was the Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty which was signed in 1987 between President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev. It prohibited the development of medium range missiles and contained extensive verification procedures. This was a monumental achievement because it eliminated an entire class of land-based nuclear missiles that had ranges between 500-5,500 km. In 2019, President Trump unilaterally withdrew the US from the treaty.
When America walked away, Russia began developing offensive missile systems that resulted in the Burevestnik, the world’s first nuclear powered cruise missile with unlimited range, and the unmanned Poseidon nuclear submarine. (http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/78394)
Then in December 2020, President Trump scrapped the 1992 Open Skies treaty that allowed the 27 signatories to carry out surveillance of each other’s weapons arsenals, obliging them to make available all imagery collected from overflights.
Ditching arms control has weakened the US
Each time the US has walked away from an arms control agreement, its position has been weakened. Russia has forged ahead of the US in developing anti-ballistic missile air defence systems. The US Patriot air defence missile battery is for conventional missiles, not hypersonic. To date, the US doesn’t have any operational hypersonic missiles which travel at greater than 5 times the speed of sound and can’t be intercepted.
China, Russia and Iran all possess several hypersonic missiles. This analyst explains how far behind the US lags in hypersonic technology:
A deficit in conventional weapons makes the US more dangerous. If it backs itself into a corner as it seems to be doing with Iran, its only fallback is to use nuclear weapons. The same applies its ‘ally’, the zionist entity, that also lacks operational hypersonic missiles.
Why the ‘Peace President’ is all about war
During his first term and now a year into his second, Trump has played an outsized role in destroying the system of nuclear arms control. There’s no doubt he has been pressured by his neocon zionist friends and donors who want an unconstrained nuclear arms race because it’s a grift worth trillions of dollars. US private defence contractors give millions to neocon ‘think tanks’ and members of Congress, and they expect a return on their investment. It’s why Trump has pledged to spend $1.5 trillion on war defence in 2027.
Last month Trump told the New York Times: “If it [New START] expires, it expires. We’ll do a better agreement.” No negotiations have been scheduled and no counter-proposal has been made. This is despite that fact that 91% of American voters in a recent YouGov poll support either maintaining or reducing current nuclear limits. But hey, what voters think doesn’t matter. US foreign policy has become a pay for play operation. If you offer the decision makers (and the Trump family) enough dosh, they’ll consider your request.
On January 27th, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved the Doomsday Clock to 85 seconds to midnight, the closet it has ever been.
My work is free to read and share, so if you enjoyed this article, please consider sharing or even becoming a paid subscriber. I will always be grateful for your support.
Excellent work from Leah Gunn Barrett as always. You may be interested to know that the Soviets first put forth proposals for nuclear arms control in a diplomatic note prepared by then Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov and handed to his Western counterparts in Berlin on March 31, 1954. It was part of the broader question of European security and raised the question of Soviet participation in NATO. It was the first concrete proposal on the control of atomic weapons. The West, mainly the US, rejected the note altogether. The Soviets had not achieved nuclear parity at the time. Nonetheless, it is highly concerning that the current cabal of Western politicians don’t take the issue of arms control with the level of seriousness it deserves. I hope our children will have a planet to inhabit in the future.
Thank you for this excellent overview, Leah. Money is all what counts for certain people, it seems. Addiction to money should be considered a mental disorder, and one of the most dangerous.