Why are people who have been fighting arms control for decades suddenly so eager to advocate it?
This “thoughtful article” praised by Billingslea proposes to ban mobile ICBMs. That would eliminate 80% of Chinese and 60% of Russian ICBMs. US doesn’t have mobile ICBMs.
Oh, I see!
This “thoughtful article” praised by Billingslea proposes to ban mobile ICBMs. That would eliminate 80% of Chinese and 60% of Russian ICBMs. US doesn’t have mobile ICBMs.
Oh, I see!
Don’t get me wrong, the article raises many important issues that a future treaty would have to consider. But in comparing START and New START verfication, the article skips over the W Bush administration’s 2002 Moscow Treaty, which did not have a verification regime.
The point that New START does not cover non-deployed warheads is of course relevant, but neither did START. In fact, it was under START that the US developed its “hedge” of what was later called the “responsive stockpile” of non-deployed warheads that could be uploaded.
The article points to "the many thousands of currently unconstrained ‘tactical' nuclear warheads possessed by Russia and China.” But China doesn’t have many (it has fewer than the US) and they’re not like Russian tac nukes. And Russia has “up to 2,000” - not "many thousands."
