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Trump presented a strikingly similar case: he condemned the treaty for rendering the United States chained and overtaken by a reborn Russia and emerging China, even as it advances the idea of a day to reactivate and expand the agreement to other nuclear-weapon States.
Rand Paul: The United States must engage with Russia
Richard Burt, who was involved in negotiating the INF treaty under the Reagan government, said he "would love to believe that it's a very smart strategy to gain an advantage over the Russians "and compel them to adhere to the terms of the treaty, he seriously doubts it.
Instead, he thinks Trump's decision is an effort to lift the restrictions and assert US sovereignty unhindered – just as the administration did by withdrawing from the Paris climate pact and trade agreements.
What happens next?
History teaches that leaders only agree to reduce their stockpiles of nuclear weapons when they improve their relations with their adversaries and that they no longer fear the kind of war they once had, said one day nuclear weapons expert George Perkovich.
However, if this is the case, the opposite is also true: as the ranks of the adversaries grow and the specter of war looms, the accumulation of nuclear weapons is a natural temptation.
Trump's intention to quit the INF and his reluctance to renew another Obama-era nuclear arms control agreement are in a sense the symptoms of fierce competition among the world's great powers.
In moving away from the treaty, the president recognizes a "changed reality" both technologically and strategically, said Tuesday Bolton during a visit to Russia.
Burt, who is now managing partner of McLarty Associates, predicted that a US withdrawal of the INF treaty would prompt Russia to deploy intermediate-range missiles again and the US to respond by deploying new weapons based at sea and in the air systems, even if they do not redeploy ground-based missiles in Europe. (NATO's US allies, who may not be willing to host these missiles, have so far reacted to Trump's announcement with a mixture of praise and criticism.)
He added that the United States and Russia are now investing heavily in the modernization of strategic bombers, ground-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and new bright objects such as hypersonic sliding vehicles. and anti-satellite systems.
Read: Trump's Useless Lies About US Nuclear Weapons
"We are in a process of sleepwalking in a new nuclear arms race" without any constraints, Burt said. When he served in government in the 1980s, there was "hypersensitivity [to] and awareness of the dangers of nuclear conflict.
What does all this mean for efforts to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons?
With regard to arms control and nuclear non-proliferation agreements, Donald Trump has proved to be a real transaction breaker. At the same time, in its quest for a nuclear deal with North Korea, a better nuclear deal with Iran and an expanded INF Treaty with Russia and China, it has not yet done so. his proofs.
