WASHINGTON — Two key House Republicans are urging the Obama administration to hold tough on nuclear weapons policy and punish Russia’s deepening violations of a landmark arms control treaty, now “on the verge of collapse.”
The lawmakers — Armed Services Chairman Mac Thornberry, of Texas, and Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, of California — wrote President Obama on Oct. 17 to express “urgent concern over your administration’s failure” to sanction Moscow for its intermediate-range ground-launched cruise missile program, which the US holds is in violation of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty.
“The I.N.F. Treaty is the only arms control treaty that succeeded in eliminating a class of nuclear arms,” Thornberry and Nunes wrote. “It has become apparent to us that the situation regarding Russia’s violation has worsened and Russia is now in material breach of the treaty.”
The letter comes as the New York Times reported Wednesday that American officials are concerned Russia is producing more missiles than are needed to sustain a flight-test program, sparking fears it is moving to build a deployable arsenal.
United States has also reportedly proposed a meeting of a Special Verification Commission, created as a forum to resolve compliance issues.
In the letter, lawmakers urged Obama to implement the stiff economic penalties the his State Department has promised in c Congressional hearings and the military response options recommended by the Pentagon in 2015. The security of the US and its allies “cannot wait” until the next administration, the letter reads.
The US announced its conclusion in 2014 that Russia had flight-tested a ground-launched cruise missile, in violation of the INF Treaty, and Russia has responded with its own allegations of US violations. The treaty required the Soviet Union and the US to forswear all other nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of 500 to 5,500 kilometers (300-3,400 miles).
Such missiles do not have the range needed to reach targets in the continental United States, but they would be able to threaten US allies in Europe, Asia and the Middle East, according to a Congressional Research Service report. The US is pursuing missile interceptors on land in Poland and Romania, to defend against Iranian missiles and at sea in Asia to counter North Korea. The US insists this system will have no capability against Russian long-range missiles.
Kingston Reif, director for disarmament and threat reduction policy at the Arms Control Association, said news that Russia was producing more of the noncompliant missiles than it needs for testing is “deeply concerning,” as was its continued noncompliance with the INF Treaty. Reif hailed news that the Special Verification Commission might meet, calling it “a natural place for the United States and Russia to confidentially address US compliance concerns.”
The US should publicly and privately call out Russia and pressure it to return to compliance, Reif said. If it does not, and especially if it deploys non-compliant missiles, the US ought to take steps to demonstrate its commitment to protect allies who would be threatened — short of US development of its own ground-launched cruise missiles for deployment in Europe, which would be expensive and counter-productive, he said.
“To date Washington has treated the violation more as a political problem than a military one, but that would likely change if Russia moved from testing to actual deployment of the missile,” Reif said.
Relations between the Kremlin and the White House are at a post-Cold War low, fueled by Russia’s actions in Syria, and its seizure of parts of Ukraine. Earlier this month, Russia withdrew from a 2000 treaty on the disposal of plutonium that could otherwise be used in a future arsenal — though it offered an assurance the plutonium would not be used for military purposes.
This past summer, President Obama was reportedly mulling a series of actions on US nuclear weapons policy, including a five-year extension of the 2010 New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), United Nations approval of the unratified Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and a public pledge that the United States would never use nuclear weapons unless another nation used them first—as well as the cancellation of the Long-Range Stand Off weapon program to replace aging cruise missiles.
The letter is one of several from lawmakers to President Obama hoping to sway nuclear arms policy decisions during his final days in office. Democrats have largely been applying pressure for restraint, while Republicans want to keep more flexible and robust options alive.
Beyond a specific response to the INF Treaty violations, Nunes and Thornberry called on Obama not to eliminate a leg of the nuclear triad, abandon what they see as his commitments to modernize nuclear weapons, extend New START — which the letter called “a potential source of leverage with Russia” — nor should he “implement destabilizing changes to US nuclear doctrine that guarantees our allies’ security.”
State Department spokesman John Kirby said in an emailed statement the administration is reviewing the letter and will respond through proper channels.
“However, senior U.S. officials, including Secretary Kerry, have raised U.S. concerns regarding Russia’s lack of compliance with their INF obligations with their Russian counterparts,” Kirby said. “We have made very clear our concerns about Russia’s violation, the risks it poses to European and Asian security, and our strong interest in returning Russia to compliance with the Treaty.”
Former US officials say it is increasingly likely Russia will pull out of the INF treaty, and it appears to be taking steps to do that. Moscow dislikes the treaty because it limits missiles of a certain range for the US and successor states of the Soviet Union, but Iran, China, North Korea, India and Pakistan are not subject to it, according to Stephen Rademaker, assistant secretary of state for arms control under President George W. Bush.
Rademaker, now with the Podesta Group lobbying firm, said at a Brookings panel earlier this month, the US ought not to terminate the treaty, unless Russia deploys the noncompliant missiles. The US should negotiate with Russia to renew its commitment to the treaty, Rademaker said, but its unreasonable to think Russia will live under the treaty as long as other nations deploy such missiles.
Steven Pifer, a former State Department official covering Europe and Russia for the first Bush administration, now with Brooklings, said the Obama administration has been right to move cautiously here. There is no specific military requirement for for building an American intermediate range missile, and if there was, it would be hard to find a country in Europe willing to take those missiles, he said.
Email: jgould@defensenews.com
Twitter: @ReporterJoe
