From Politico’s National Security Daily:
The New START treaty died today, thus ending the last major U.S.-Russian arms control pact. But instead of opening the floodgates to a new arms race, the deal’s demise could create an opportunity for the U.S. to strike a more expansive agreement — and potentially loop in China.
At the least, that’s what the Trump administration is pushing for. “Rather than extend ‘NEW START,’” President DONALD TRUMP wrote on Truth Social this afternoon, “we should have our Nuclear Experts work on a new, improved, and modernized Treaty that can last long into the future.”
The administration argues the expiration of New START offers a chance for a deal that includes a rising nuclear power: China.
“The president’s been clear in the past that in order to have true arms control in the 21st century, it’s impossible to do something that doesn’t include China because of their vast and rapidly growing stockpile,” Secretary of State MARCO RUBIO said during a press briefing on Wednesday.
For its part, Beijing has made it clear that it’s not interested in signing on, arguing that its nuclear strength isn’t at the same level as the U.S. or Russia’s.
But former national security officials — including from the prior Trump administration — said during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Tuesday that the treaty’s expiration creates an opportunity for wider arms control negotiations.
“I think the New START treaty will go out with a whimper,” TIMOTHY MORRISON, deputy assistant to the president for national security in the first Trump administration, told SASC, arguing that the expiration of the agreement opened a “new chapter” to examine nuclear weapons across all armed countries.
New START had capped both the U.S. and Russia at 1,550 operationally deployed warheads, while China has 600. But by 2030, Beijing will have amassed over 1,000 nuclear warheads, according to a recent Pentagon report.
Ret. Adm. CHARLES RICHARD, former head of U.S. Strategic Command, echoed Morrison, arguing that “at a minimum, I would include Russia, China and the United States.”
Still, there may be an emerging effort by Moscow and Washington to keep a semblance of the deal alive.
Axios reported this morning that U.S. and Russian delegations in Abu Dhabi have been discussing the possibility of informally adhering to limitations outlined under the now-defunct treaty for the next few months while they hash out the details of a new agreement. Neither Trump nor Russian leader VLADIMIR PUTIN have signed off on a new deal, Axios reports.
But when asked today whether such a deal was in the works, White House press secretary KAROLINE LEAVITT said: “Not to my knowledge.”
Your host caught up with THOMAS COUNTRYMAN, former undersecretary of State for arms control, in the hours before the treaty expired. While Countryman said he’d welcome a better treaty, he was skeptical that the Trump administration would be able to pull it off.
“The more pessimistic scenario,” Countryman warned, is that in “the next few months, both Russia and the United States will begin to upload warheads onto missiles and submarines, and we will be off to a new trilateral nuclear arms race that will exceed in expense and risk what we saw during the Cold War.”