SCOOP: Biden will seek a five-year extension with Russia on New START, a critical nuclear arms treaty that expires in 15 days. Biden is also preparing to impose costs on Russia pending an intel community assessment of recent Russian actions 1/ washingtonpost.com/national-secur…
Biden is ordering DNI Avril Haines to provide a full intelligence assessment of Russia’s alleged interference in the 2020 election, use of chemical weapons against Alexei Navalny, and bounties on US soldiers in Afghanistan, and SolarWinds officials said. 2/
Following the ODNI reports, the Biden team "will use these assessments to inform our response to Russian aggression in the coming weeks,” said a senior U.S. official. 3/
Biden is ruling out a “reset” in bilateral relations with Moscow as many new US presidents have. “This will be the first post-Soviet U.S. administration that has not come into office vowing to forge a warmer relationship with Russia,” said @AngelaStent 4/
Trump tried to conclude a shorter New START extension in the final weeks but failed to reach an agreement after his nuclear envoy spent months trying to persuade China to join the accord before dropping that demand. 5/
Victoria Nuland, Biden's nominee for #3 job at State, wrote in Foreign Affairs against a 5 year (saying 1-2 yr gives leverage) Biden team says inability of Trump’s team to get a shorter renewal and the lack of time left means a 5-year extension is the only responsible option 6/
Arms control folks such as @DarylGKimball, says it provides the new president "with an early win and positive momentum, helps restore U.S. credibility on arms control issues, and creates the potential for more ambitious steps to reduce the nuclear danger" 7
My view is that this opening move by the Biden team is an exact reverse of how Trump admin dealt w/ Russia. They are being constructive on the policy front & very tough on messaging front. But outside of arms control, policy space may become more confrontational too. TBD.
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