Gates and Clinton Urge the Senate to Ratify New START Now

Today's top nuclear policy stories, with excerpts in bullet form.

Stories we're following today, Monday, November 15, 2010:

Why the Senate Should Ratify New START - Hillary Clinton and Robert Gates in The Washington Post [link]

• Before this session of Congress ends, we urge senators to approve an arms control treaty that would again allow U.S. inspectors access to Russian strategic sites and reduce the number of nuclear weapons held by both nations to a level not seen since the 1950s.
• It has broad bipartisan backing. Six former secretaries of state, five former secretaries of defense and three former national security advisers have endorsed ratification, along with seven former commanders of U.S. Strategic Command and the entire current U.S. military leadership.
• New START will advance critical national security objectives: Reducing the number of deployed nuclear weapons while retaining a safe and effective deterrent; providing direct insight into Russia's nuclear arsenal; and creating a more stable, predictable and cooperative relationship between the world's two leading nuclear powers.
• That's what the treaty will do. Here's what it will not do: It will not limit our ability to develop and deploy the most effective missile defenses to protect America's forces and territory, and to enhance the security of our allies and partners. This administration is committed to sustaining and improving our missile defense capabilities and has proposed spending nearly $10 billion in fiscal 2011 to do so.
• It will not restrict our ability to modernize our nuclear forces. On the contrary, the United States will continue to maintain a robust nuclear deterrent based on our "triad" of delivery systems: intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles and heavy bombers for nuclear armaments. To sustain and modernize these systems, the administration has proposed spending well over $100 billion during the next decade.
• Every president since the beginning of the Cold War has opted for verifiable arms control deals.
• The New START Treaty also deserves prompt ratification. Our national security depends on it.

Obama Pledges $4 Billion More for Nuke Complex in Bid to Pass START, Sources Say - Mary Beth Sheridan and Walter Pincus in The Washington Post [link]

• Administration officials went to Capitol Hill on Friday and said the White House was prepared to add $4.1 billion for nuclear facilities, according to one congressional aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the talks were private. That is on top of a $10 billion increase the administration had already promised over the next decade.
• Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said that the meeting with his staff "went well" but that he needed to scrutinize the numbers further. He said he was unsure whether there was time in the lame-duck session to pass the treaty.
• The White House declined to confirm the added $4 billion offer. But a senior official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, noted that Vice President Biden had promised senators that the administration would revise its spending plan after they complained the first increase was insufficient.
• Under the treaty, the United States and Russia would cut the number of long-range deployed nuclear weapons by up to 30 percent. Perhaps, more important, it would reinstate a system under which each country could check on each other's stockpiles.

Graham: Two START 'stumbling blocks' stand in way of his vote - Bridget Johnson in The Hill [link]

• Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said Sunday that he didn't know if the START treaty would come up for a vote in the lame-duck session, but said two "stumbling blocks" had to be removed in order to get his vote.
• "You've got two impediments," Graham said. "Modernization. Not only do we need a START Treaty; we need to modernize our nuclear force, the weapons that are left, to make sure they continue to be a deterrent. And we need to make sure that we can employ -- deploy missile defense systems that are apart from START.
• "(Sen.) Jon Kyl is working with the administration to get better modernization to make sure that missile defense is not connected to START," he said. "If you could get those two things together, I would vote for the treaty."
• Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who served under President Clinton, said on "This Week" that it was "very important" that the treaty be ratified.
• "First of all, it's a good treaty," Albright said. "But part of the problem is we remember President Reagan said trust, but verify. And what has happened is that the verification procedures have now not been in place for almost a year, so we need that treaty for that."

China, Russia Urge Iran to Show Nuclear Plans Peaceful - Reuters [link]

• The foreign ministers of China, Russia and India urged Iran on Monday to prove to the world that its nuclear ambitions are peaceful, and urged a return to talks.
• "The three foreign ministers recognize Iran's right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy," they said in a joint statement released on the Chinese foreign ministry's website (www.mfa.gov.cn) after a meeting in China's Wuhan city.
• "The only path to resolving the Iran nuclear issue is through dialogue, negotiations and other such peaceful methods."
• European Union foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton wrote to Iran's chief nuclear negotiator on Friday accepting an offer to meet in Europe early next month to discuss Tehran's nuclear program.
• Following consultations with the six world powers which she will represent -- the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany -- Ashton wrote to Saeed Jalili accepting the offer of a meeting on December 5, but suggested Switzerland or Austria as the venue.
• If talks are agreed -- they have been under discussion for nearly six months -- it would be the first time in more than a year that Iran has met to discuss its nuclear program.

 A View From The Dark Side

Old Problems With New Start - R. James Woolsey in The Wall Street Journal [link]

• Before the Senate approves New Start it should ask the administration to demonstrate its commitment to three things.
• First, the administration needs to commit to replacing and modernizing our aging nuclear weapons laboratory and industrial infrastructure as well as the bombers, submarines and ballistic missiles—and the warheads on them—that provide our ultimate guarantee of national security.
• Second, it is crucial for the Senate to require that, in the ratification instruments that would be exchanged with Russia, it be made clear that New Start in no way constrains our development and deployment of the most effective missile-defense capabilities.
• Likewise, the Senate resolution should make clear that the treaty will not limit our key new nonnuclear systems, such as very accurate long-range missiles that can hit terrorist havens. And the administration should commit publicly to deploying these systems.
• Most importantly, New Start's verification provisions will provide little or no help in detecting illegal activity at locations the Russians fail to declare, are off-limits to U.S. inspectors, or are underground or otherwise hidden from our satellites. Incredibly, inspectors will only inspect declared sites. The treaty's preamble emphasizes that its verification mechanisms are less costly than those in the original Start treaty. Is there some reason to make our means of understanding the most lethal threat to our existence a high priority for cost-cutting?
• With adequate attention to the country's strategic needs and written guarantees thereof, the administration may be able to secure Senate approval of New Start. But it will be unlikely to succeed if it denigrates or ignores legitimate Senate concerns and continues on the path it has taken so far.
• NOTES: For all of his distrust of the Russians and concern about verification, James Woolsey is urging the Senate to vote against implementing an incredibly intrusive verification regime that our military says we need.  
• Woolsey was also a member of the Strategic Posture Commission, which called for a modest follow-on to START I and didn't link a new treaty to replacing our warheads and building new production facilities.
• James Schlesinger, who lead the Republican wing of the Strategic Posture Commission, says its obligatory that we ratify New START.