Generals Urge Senate Ratification of New START Treaty

In an op-ed in New Hampshire's Nashua Telegraph, Lt. Gen. John Castellaw, Lt. Gen. Dirk Jameson and Brig. Gen. John Adams urged Senators to put national security above political partisanship and ratify the New START treaty.

"It is still not clear if the treaty has the required 67 votes in the Senate for ratification," wrote Castellaw, Jameson and Adams, who are all members of the Consensus for American Security, an initiative supported by Ploughshares Fund.  "This is an issue we can’t afford to allow to become politicized."

The generals argue that the treaty will increase American security by implementing a strong verification regime that will allow U.S. inspectors to monitor Russia's nuclear arsenal, providing our military forces with the information necessary to plan and resource the weapons we need for the 21st century, and allowing us to "move forward to deal with further proliferation issues and tactical nuclear weapons."