Utah senators key to preventing a nuclear chain reaction

"It's not an exaggeration to say that much of the nuclear weapons policy for the planet will be decided right here in this state," David Culp, a non-proliferation lobbyist at the Friends Committee on National Legislation, told a Utah audience.  That's because ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) will probably need Senators Orrin Hatch and Bob Bennett in order to pass; both opposed the treaty 1999. If the U.S. Senate ratifies the CTBT, China has said it would follow suit. If China ratifies the treaty banning nuclear weapons tests, so would India, and then maybe Pakistan, and so on. But the dominoes could fall in the other direction. Experts believe India is the country most likely to conduct new tests, and if it did, China, Russia and the United States might respond in kind, setting off a new nuclear arms race.