Washington Post Endorses New START

We are happy to serve you a daily summary of the day's top nuclear policy stories each morning, with excerpts from the stories in bullet form.

Stories we're following today: July 26, 2010

The START Debate - Washington Post Editorial [link]

• The new nuclear weapons treaty with Russia under consideration by the Senate is a modest achievement for arms control.
• Ratification of the accord will ensure that inspections of Russian weapons continue; the regime established by the previous START treaty lapsed last year. It will also provide the United States some credibility as it seeks to persuade Russia and other key nations around the world to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons to Iran and other states.
• Much of [the] criticism [directed at New START], including an op-ed published on the opposite page this month by former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, has been lacking in substance.
• What's needed is some trust on both sides that the other will deliver -- funding from the Democrats, treaty ratification votes from Republicans. That's not easy in the current climate. But given where the discussion stands, ratification of START is something that could, and should, get done this year.

Lucy Walker Counts Down to Nuclear Armageddon - San Francisco Chronicle [link]

• Lucy Walker [Director of Countdown to Zero] identifies herself as "a filmmaker first, not a nuclear activist," but she has assembled a persuasive case - across partisan lines - that the world is less protected from nuclear calamity now than ever before.
• "The movie argues that there's a time lag between smart people saying, 'There's no reason this hasn't happened,' and it happening. We have opportunities right now, before a nuclear tragedy happens, to intervene.
• "I think you can put the genie back in the bottle, in fact, and maybe this is the first time in history."

Is nothing sacred? Playing politics with nuclear arms reduction - Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite in the Washington Post [link]

• Faith communities have been nearly unanimous for decades about the moral imperative to reduce the nuclear weapons arsenals of the world, and the threat they represent to world peace and even the future of life on earth.
• And now, when the United States has a chance to ratify the new START treaty… a treaty that would require the U.S. and Russia to reduce their nuclear weapons deployment, conservatives are starting to play political games to delay or even deter ratification.
• The United States Senate should ratify the START treaty immediately. Those who have legitimate concerns should be heard, but not for the sake of simply delaying or denying ratification.

Joint US Korea Exercise Focuses on Anti-Submarine Warfare, Air Defenses - Voice of America [link]

• The largest joint military exercise by the United States and South Korea in years is underway in the Sea of Japan. These war games were called in response to North Korea's sinking of the South Korean navy ship, Cheonan, an incident that killed 46 sailors in March.
• In the Command Direction Center of the aircraft carrier, U.S. Navy Commander Peter Walczak says the exercise is similar to what routinely occurs on the carrier, except for the additional component of cross-training with South Korean forces. A key component in the drill is detecting enemy submarines and defending against them.
• North Korea's threat to unleash a nuclear attack in response to the joint war games, Commander Walczak says, is not causing undue alarm for the U.S. 7th Fleet.
• The carrier's strike group is under the command of Rear Admiral Dan Cloyd. He calls the current exercise, "purely defensive in nature" and says there's no reason for North Korea to be provocative.

A View from the Dark Side

Eight Problems with the New START - Mitt Romney in the National Review Online [link]

• My criticism of the New START treaty generated both praise and disparagement. Sen. Richard Lugar’s thoughtful critique of my position deserves further discussion.
• First, New START’s preamble not only references missile defense, it accedes to Russia’s insistence that there is an interrelationship between strategic offensive weapons and missile defense.
• We should not countenance Russia’s ten-to-one tactical-nuclear-weapons advantage.
• One treaty observer, having completed a line-by-line analysis of the agreement, concluded that every single provision favors Russia or is neutral; not one favors the United States.
• Like most Americans, I believe that the world would be safer if there were no weapons of mass destruction. But I also believe that the world is safer if America is strong.