This so-called Strategic Arms Reduction (START) follow-on treaty will be ballyhooed as an important step towards the realization of Mr. Obama's goal of a nuclear weapons-free world.
The New York Times reported that it required 150 interagency meetings, including 30 by the National Security Council, to produce the new Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) and START follow-on treaty.
CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Obama, unilateral Denuclearizer-in-Chief
Yet, a Kremlin spokesman has already served notice that Moscow will feel free to abrogate the START follow-on treaty if it believes that U.S. missile defenses in Europe are a threat to its deterrent.
Even with the deep cuts the START follow-on treaty requires in U.S. strategic nuclear delivery vehicles, it may still be possible to retain a nuclear "Triad" of long-range bombers and land- and sea-launched ballistic missiles.
CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Obama, unilateral Denuclearizer-in-Chief
This happens also to be the stated view of forty-one United States Senators who warned President Obama in writing last month not to bring forward his START follow-on treaty without such a comprehensive - and funded - modernization program.
German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said that all the 25 nations which signed up to the treaty should follow Ireland's example and ratify it.
He outlined five areas to focus on, including the need for a verifiable and legally binding fissile material cut-off treaty and a possible follow-up meeting in New York to the 2009 Security Council summit hosted by President Obama.
The "Green" quasi-religion spreading around the world will really take hold in the U.S. President Bush is not about to follow Australia and ratify the Kyoto Treaty, but America continues to throw billions of dollars at improving energy efficiency.
On the most immediate challenge, working out an arms control agreement to replace the START I treaty which expires December 5, the two presidents signed a joint understanding for a follow-on agreement to START that commits both parties to a legally binding treaty that will reduce nuclear weapons.
If the November elections follow current projections, they will doom the treaty once and for all.
It is an example other oil producers should follow and demonstrates that a post-2012 treaty is an opportunity for oil producers, not a threat as some currently perceive.
President Obama announced last Thusday that he had concluded a follow-on to the 1989 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) with Russia.
Vice President Joe Biden reportedly dismissed the prospects of such Senate opposition and felt confident that he could ram through not only a START follow-on but the previously rejected Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), all without addressing the serious problems identified by the Perry-Schlesinger Commission and now by a decisive faction in the Senate.
Instead of dealing with present threats from rogue states, President Obama has spent his time negotiating, defending, and pleading for the Start Follow-On agreement, which if ratified will replace the now-expired 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.
The proposal was to allow treaty changes so that euro-zone member countries, and any other government that chose to follow the same rules, would more tightly coordinate their budgets and government debts and be subject to near-automatic discipline if they didn't comply.
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