New START: Does it make us safer?

Peter Brookes / July 21, 2010

One of the common “sky is falling” claims of Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) supporters like Hillary Clinton and John Isaacs of the Council of a Livable World is that unless this treaty with Russia is ratified, we’ll have nothing binding to make us continue reducing our nuclear weapons arsenal.

Those claims are just plain false, and the Obama Administration should acknowledge that fact –now.

Today, the levels of strategic nuclear weapons in the U.S. and Russia are governed by the Bush-era Moscow Treaty or as its technically known, the Treaty between the Russian Federation and the United States of America on Strategic Offensive Reductions. The Moscow Treaty is still in force, is currently limiting the size of both strategic nuclear arsenals, and will remain so until the end of 2012, if New START is not ratified. (more…)