By Jason Sibert.
President Joe Biden said he will confront Russia when necessary.
Of course, that statement is vague, typical of politicians. Biden also said that he will work with the authoritarian state on matters that make the world safer, like nuclear proliferation.
In remarks made earlier this month, Biden said his proposed a summit meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin could be a starting point for talks on stability and nuclear arms control. Daryl Kimball, of the Arms Control Association, advocated serious, sustained diplomacy as an answer to our problems with Russia in his story “Back from the Brink? Next Steps for Biden and Putin.”
The United States extended the North Atlantic Treaty Organization into eastern Europe in the 1990’s under President Bill Clinton, as Clinton went back on a previous agreement made by President George HW. Bush and Secretary of State Jim Bakker. Of course, Russia has showed expansionist tendencies over the years with the invasion of Georgia in 2008, of Ukraine in 2014, and in interfering in the elections of other countries. Given this type of behavior, disarmament discussions have been on the back burner, although Biden did renew the New START Treaty. In the meantime, both the U.S. and Russia are revamping their nuclear arsenals, like other nation-states.
As Melissa Dalton, acting assistant defense secretary for strategy, plans, and capabilities, recently told a House committee, “the range of Chinese and Russian nuclear modernization makes the task of making progress on further arms control all the more necessary.” New START will expire in 2026 and both sides must build a framework of arms control to keep both countries and the world safe. There are four important points in the tasks, as stated by Kimball.
First, we must reduce strategic arsenals further. A key objective of the next round of talks should be deeper, verifiable reductions in the total number of deployed strategic nuclear warheads and delivery systems. In 2013, the Barack Obama administration advocating both the U.S. and Russia downsizing their nuclear arsenals one-third below New START levels. Second, we must reduce strategic interceptors. U.S. efforts to further limit Russian nuclear weapons and bring China into the arms control process are unlikely to gain traction unless Washington agrees to seriously discuss constraints on its long-range missile defense capabilities. Fielding sufficient numbers of U.S. missile interceptors to lighten the threat of a limited ballistic attack from North Korea or Iran and agreeing to binding limits on the quantity, location, and capability of missile defense systems should not be mutually exclusive.
Third, averting an arms race on intermediate-range missiles in the absence of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty is also an important task, as the risk of a new missile race in Europe is high. Biden, in coordination with NATO, should counter Russia’s 2020 proposal for a verifiable moratorium on the deployment in Europe of missiles formerly banned by the INF Treaty. Although imperfect, the Russian proposal is a starting point. Another option would be to verifiably ban nuclear-armed ground-launched and sea-launched cruise and ballistic missiles.
Fourth, to broaden the disarmament effort, Biden and Putin could call on China, France, and the United Kingdom to report on their total nuclear weapons holdings and freeze their nuclear stockpiles as long as the United States and Russia pursue deeper verifiable reductions in their far larger arsenals. Russia’s belligerent behavior on the world stage is a problem for arms control. However, Biden stated an important point: “[t]hroughout our long history of competition, our two countries have been able to find ways to manage tensions and to keep them from escalating out of control.” Kimball stated why arms control is a necessity: “it is by no means certain that the two sides will continue to have enough good luck, responsible leadership, and managerial competence to avoid catastrophe. Once a nuclear weapon is used by accident or miscalculation or in response to nonnuclear aggression, there is no guarantee that all-out nuclear war can be averted. Sustaining progress on disarmament is not a choice but a necessity for human survival.”
Jason Sibert is the executive director of the Peace Economy Project