GOP lawmakers criticize Trump's decision to withdraw from nuclear arms


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President Trump's weekend announcement that he would pull the United States out of a nuclear arms control over the control of its own party, which would also be criticized as one of the world's most dangerous weapons.

"I hope we are moving to the position of the President of the Senate," Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) Said Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union," noting that he had heard that the Trump administration was only interested in the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, but also New START.

"I think that would be a huge mistake," Corker said.

Trump told reporters Saturday night that his administration would "terminate" and "pull out" of the INF Treaty, in which President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev struck in 1987. prompting calls from some defense hawks in the United States to end US participation. Many also argue that the treaty is obsolete because it does not restrict China's proliferation.

New START Maintains missiles and heavy bombers, plus related warheads and launchers, in U.S. and Russian possession. Corker played a leading role in the Senate's ratification of an updated extension of the treaty in 2010, but its future is in doubt ahead of its expiration in early 2021.

Trump's announcement came to his national security adviser, John Bolton, traveled to Russia to meet with counterparts and discuss, among other things, treaty compliance. But Corker said Trump's announcement to pull out of the INF Treaty came as a surprise – and one he hoped for was simply presidential bluster.

"Corker said, guessing that Trump might be attempting to influence Russia's stance on nuclear arms control as well as the parties to NAFTA to affect trade policy. But Corker warned that unless the United States was ready to compete with Russia, "they're going to move ahead of us quickly."

For the past few years, the annual defense authorization bill would have been developed and would have been tested, would violate the INF Treaty. The argument is that the research is needed to counter China's aggressive moves in places such as the South China Sea, in the event that the treaty is renegotiated or declared null and void. China is not a party to the treaty.

In Russia, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov accused US officials of tying the fate of New START to that of the INF Treaty, while lawmaker Leonid Slutsky, who said the withdrawal of the treaty in the US START as well.

"It would mean a new Cold War and an arms race with 100 percent probability," Slutsky said, warning against "a collapse of the planet's entire nonproliferation and disarmament regime."

One of the most important mandates in the world of constitutional law, but one of them is not constitutionally mandated congressional role in tearing one up – leaving critical lawmakers, including one of the president's staunchest defenders on foreign policy, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Little recourse but to plead with INF Treaty instead of declaring it dead.

"It's a big, big mistake to flippantly get out of this historic agreement," Paul said on "Fox News Sunday." "I'm all about trying to sign an agreement with China, but that would be a brand new agreement. It's no reason to end the agreement we have with Russia. "

Paul encouraged Trump to make a change in the position of a negotiator and to negotiate with the experts. "But he insisted that Bolton play no part in that treaty discussion.

"John Bolton is one of the INF Treaty's advisers," said Paul. "I do not think it recognizes the important achievement of Reagan and Gorbachev on this."

Anton Troianovsky in Moscow contributed to this report.

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