Trump’s Nuclear Diplomacy: Toward a New Arms Race
By Kira Webster
The New START Treaty – signed into effect in 2010 by President Obama and Russian President Medvedev in order to reduce nuclear warheads, deployed and non-deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles, and launchers – has undergone new complications as of late because President Trump has taken a different approach to keeping the peace with Russia. Our nuclear history with Moscow is anything but clean and transparent. However, the treaty got noticeably more hairy in 2007 after President Vladimir Putin discovered U.S. deployment missiles in Europe. He declared that the treaty no longer favored Russia’s interests, and proceeded to develop a new cruise missile.
In 2014, the Obama administration claimed Russia’s cruise missile was a violation of the treaty, but Putin was not willing to comply easily again. Earlier this year, the Pentagon reported that Russia had fired a missile – an even worse violation. In July 2017, the House of Representatives voted and approved if the President finds Russia in violation of the treaty fifteen months after the bill becomes law, the U.S. will no longer be bound by the treaty. While it may seem like the fair decision, a choice to abandon the treaty may endanger many countries (especially Europe), instill doubt in America’s commitments, and weaken support for other treaties. If anything, maintaining a cap on nuclear weapons and transparency obligations are more important when U.S.-Russia relations are stressed as opposed to when they’re strained.
Other countries have also noticed the tensions between the two countries. While the U.S. and Russia account for over 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons, there are now nine countries with stockpiles, and none of them are striving for any reductions. What started as a hybrid of the old START and INF Treaty (with modernized standards of inspection and weaponry), and a path towards getting rid of nuclear weapons completely, is now what diplomats around the world are calling “a new nuclear arms race.”
Both countries have acknowledged that the other has acceded to the restrictions specified in the treaty, but Russia has expressed skepticism over America reconfiguring submarines and bombers to carry conventional weapons, as well as converting missile launch sites into training facilities (a move the treaty had not established or foreseen, and requires more communication between Russia and the U.S. to come to a resolution). These new factors, in addition to the collusion allegations against Trump and the Kremlin, have muddied the waters for clear nuclear diplomacy. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis stated the Pentagon’s call for a revamp of nuclear arsenal and new development of low-yield atomic weapons was “a response to Russian expansion of their capability and the nature of their strategy and doctrine” – a theory known as “escalate to de-escalate.” Russia, in return, noted that it would take full measure to ensure its safety against America.
“Donald Trump is playing a dangerous game of nuclear poker,” read TIME magazine’s lead story on February 1, 2018. Contrasting Obama’s mission to reduce America’s nuclear weapons (and, in turn, Russia’s nuclear power), President Trump has advocated a nuclear arsenal with the capabilities to deter anyone from attacking the U.S. He has signed off $1.2 trillion to overhaul the entire nuclear weapons complex, and authorized a new nuclear warhead – the first in 34 years. He’s also funding research and development on a medium-range missile which, if tested or deployed, would violate a 30-year Cold War nuclear forces agreement. The Trump administration is also the first administration to explore situations to go nuclear when faced with “significant non-nuclear strategic attacks” (cyberattacks being an example).
The allure of nuclear weapons around the world has started to rise, and in correlation,the idea of violating treaties has become less important. Hans Kristensen, director of the nuclear-information project at the Federation of American Scientists, said, “we’re certainly in a dynamic strategic competition where all sides are arming themselves. If the dynamic is not stopped and reversed, it will almost inevitably escalate into an arms race. That is in the nature of the beast.” The stakes are much higher now than it was in the Cold War. More nations are not only watching, but are actively tempted to join in the nuclear arms race that has the potential to unfold – North Korea has already thrown its chips into the nuclear poker pile. And while the U.S. has not been the perfect role model for nuclear control, our part is needed in the diplomacy and de-escalating of nuclear taunting for a safer future.
