There was much theatre and applause in Prague but as we say in the news business, lots of torque too.
Yes – U.S. President Obama and Russian President Medvedev have signed a historic accord to rid the World of a few more thousand nuclear weapons but the torque is this.
When the Russians and Americans originally started talks to replace the aging START agreement with a new arms control accord, they anticipated dealing with stored nuclear warheads not only the ones mounted on missiles.
It’s vitally important to note in the final deal stored warheads are not included. Because there are at least 8000 of them on either side and that means the new nuclear arms deal doesn’t deal with the bulk of nuclear stock piles.
They also didn’t deal with tactical warheads which number in the thousands. They are the smaller nuclear weapons both sides developed during the cold war that would possibly be used in an East West conflict in Europe to stop advancing tanks and troops. These are the weapons that are the easiest for terrorists to steal, and these are the nuclear weapons America still houses in NATO bunkers in European Countires including Spain and Turkey.
So the torque is they left much out of the nuclear agreement. Even the lead American negotiator Rose Gottemoelerr told me “Dana we just couldn’t get to the tacticals or stored weapons in this accord but they are on the table for the next round”.
What next round? Rose is right there has to be another round but just getting this accord approved is going to be tough going in the U.S. Senate.
International organizations are calling on American and Russia to sit again and bring warhead numbers including STORED WARHEADS down to a number closer to a thousand so then Countires like China and Pakistan and Israel and India will sit at future arms control talks and openly discuss lowering their nuclear stockpiles.
Israel also has to be called to that table or what will be the incentive for Countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia and Syria not to develop their own nuclear weapons?
Presidents Obama and Medvedev took a positive step but the applause should be muted until Rose Gottemoeller and her Russian counterparts are sitting again together and discussing the more critical issues in overall Strategic Arms Reduction.