New START: A Serious Difference in Interpretation

Michaela Dodge / January 25, 2011

Heritage Foundation analysts have been pointing out differences in interpretation of New START, a nuclear offensive arms control treaty with Russia, between the two sides for months. Now, a veteran arms negotiator agrees.

Joel McKean, brigadier general in the U.S. Air Force (ret.) who served as executive secretary of U.S. SALT II delegation, points out a potentially serious difference in interpretation of language in the text of the treaty. “That which was praised as a foreign policy success,” General McKean says, “has the potential now of becoming another international policy embarrassment.”

On January 14, the Russian Duma conducted a second reading of its proposed law for ratification of New START. Provisions adopted in the Russian Duma reveal that there is no meeting of the minds in the area vital to the implementation of the treaty—ballistic missile defense and conventional Prompt Global Strike. The plain difference in the interpretation of these elements in the agreement should bar the Administration from exchanging the instruments of ratification. (more…)