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“If there’s not nuclear disarmament, there will be proliferation,” said Joseph Cirincione, a nuclear analyst and president of the Ploughshares Fund, a global security foundation. “If big powers race to build up their arsenals, smaller powers will follow.” nytimes.com/2019/08/08/wor…
“Something bad is happening, and we’re on the verge of an environment where there are no limits or verification between us and Russia,” said Lynn Rusten, who was an arms-control official in the Obama administration. “We’re losing one of the key guardrails.”
“We’re talking of modernizing the whole U.S. triad, with new ICBMs, subs and bombers,” [Richard Burt] said. “That will be in excess of a trillion dollars, and doesn’t include medium-range or hypersonic missiles.”
“‘The idea that China will jump into bed with the U.S. and Russia on arms control and lock in their inferior status is crazy,’ [Jon] Wolfsthal said, especially at a time when Washington is pushing a trade war with Beijing and selling arms to Taiwan.”
“Thomas M. Countryman, former assistant secretary of state for international security and nonproliferation, said that China, with a small nuclear arsenal of about 300 warheads and a different strategic theory, had little incentive to join such talks.”
“If New START ends, the nuclear arsenals of both Moscow and Washington will be so large and so unknowable that ‘it’s almost an invitation for China to build up its arsenal,’ said Mark Fitzpatrick, an arms control expert with the International Institute for Strategic Studies.”
““As long as the big boys cling to their toys, others will want them,’ [Cirincione] added, quoting the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed ElBaradei.”
“The consequence, experts say, is likely to be a more dangerous and unstable environment, even in the near term, that could precipitate unwanted conflicts and demand vast new military spending among the world’s biggest powers, including the United States,” reports @StevenErlanger
