No Sale on New START
“Every man has his price,” the saying goes. The Obama administration has been banking on this when it comes to Senate support for the New START arms control treaty with Russia.
Concerns over the treaty’s loopholes, counting rules, verification issues, and impact on U.S. non-nuclear and missile defense capabilities have jeopardized Senate support for New START. Recognizing that the next Senate will be an even tougher sell than this one, the administration is making a full-court press to obtain the Senate’s advice and consent to ratification during this lame-duck session. And there is an air of desperation in its approach.
One of the most serious thinkers on arms control and nuclear matters in the Senate is Republican Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona. Kyl has long been concerned that the administration’s goal of eventually eliminating nuclear weapons will in the meantime leave us with a nuclear complex that is dangerously underfunded and incapable of maintaining a reliable and effective nuclear deterrent. Because Senator Kyl speaks with authority on these matters, his opinions carry weight with fellow Republicans and many national security experts. So the administration has been seeking his support for a quick vote on New START by offering to bolster funding for modernization of the U.S. nuclear enterprise.
Earlier this year, the administration proposed a ten percent increase in funding for parts of the nuclear weapons complex, resulting in an $80 billion-plus program for nuclear modernization over the next decade. In an effort to sweeten the pot and overcome growing resistance to ratification, they recently proposed an additional $4.1 billion over the next five years.
While the administration’s nuclear modernization proposals are welcome, they can also be seen as a transparent attempt to buy votes in favor of New START. In a report to Congress released by the White House last week, the administration argues that its funding proposals “demonstrate the priority the administration’s (sic.) places on maintaining the safety, security and effectiveness of the deterrent.” Nevertheless, there is real reason to question the administration’s commitment to an adequate nuclear modernization program.
The President has been clear in his desire for a world without nuclear weapons and candid in his belief that the United States should set an example for the rest of the world as we move toward that goal. It is difficult to reconcile this vision—for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize—with a commitment to spend more than $85 billion on modernizing the infrastructure necessary to maintain the very weapons he seeks to abolish. The Nobel Awards Committee must be having second thoughts.
Certainly the nuclear complex is in critical need of modernization with or without New START. Some New START proponents and opponents believe that if the treaty fails the chances of revitalizing our nuclear infrastructure will fail with it. Gary Samore, National Security Council coordinator for arms control and nonproliferation, has argued that if New START is defeated, the opportunity “to increase funding for the U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories may evaporate.” If so, it would demonstrate that the administration really wasn’t serious about nuclear modernization in the first place and that its proposals were nothing more than a cynical attempt to buy treaty support—a view reinforced by the fact that the administration waited until New START was in jeopardy to propose another $4.1 billion dollars for the effort.
Of course, most of the promised modernization money wouldn’t be spent until years after New START, if ratified, takes effect. By then, the prospect of spending significant sums on nuclear modernization at the same time the treaty’s reductions are being implemented will be even more difficult to explain for an administration committed to global nuclear disarmament. And the administration’s most credible advocate for such spending, Secretary of Defense Gates, will likely have left the building.
To the consternation of those who thought a quick vote on New START could be assured by the promise of an infusion of cash into the nuclear weapons complex, Senator Kyl has stated that the press of other business doesn’t allow time for New START consideration during the lame-duck session. For taking a principled stand against rushing to judgment before the new Senators on whose watch the treaty would be implemented have an opportunity to review it, he has galvanized the wrath of New START proponents, even though he did not say he would oppose the treaty if and when it comes to a vote. Nevertheless, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs says the President will not be deterred in his quest to have the Senate approve New START “before the end of the year.” And President Obama himself called ratification of New START this year “a national security imperative.”
Vice President Biden, Secretary of State Clinton, and other administration officials note that the START I Treaty and its intrusive verification provisions expired almost a year ago and that each additional day without the New START treaty in force is another day without the ability to monitor adequately Russian nuclear forces. In so doing they are blaming Republicans for failing to solve a problem of the administration’s own making. It would have been preferable simply to extend START I’s verification regime while a new treaty was under negotiation, but the administration decided not to adopt this approach and to allow START I to lapse while they negotiated further weapons reductions. As a result, New START wasn’t completed until four months after START I had already expired.
While every man may have his price, it seems that some, like Senator Kyl, still have their principles. When it comes to national security, putting principles above politics is a praiseworthy stand.
David J. Trachtenberg is president and CEO of Shortwaver Consulting and a former Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy, 2001-2003.
