Show The Records of Negotiations For The START Treaty

From The Washington Post:

HOLMES: New START negotiations: Show us the records!


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By Kim R. Holmes, Special to The Washington Times

8:37 p.m., Wednesday, May 26, 2010

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This is no mere academic exercise. When the Reagan administration asserted that a careful reading of the negotiating record for the ABM Treaty substantiated a broader interpretation on testing than was hitherto applied, Senate Democrats led by Sam Nunn demanded full access to the negotiating record. They hoped it would disprove the administration. It didn't.



History shows how important it is to know exactly what the Russians claim when it comes to missile defense. The Soviet Union supported a narrower interpretation of the ABM Treaty, even as it was secretly violating that treaty. Today, Moscow has made it clear that it sees the New START agreement as practically limiting what we can do to defend ourselves against ballistic missiles.



We can dismiss those claims all we want. But if the Senate were to vote for ratification of the treaty without knowing what assurances - if any - were made by U.S. negotiators, it would open the door for Russia to insist that we are perpetually in violation of it. Should we attempt to deal with, say, a future Iranian missile threat by expanding missile defense capabilities in Europe, Russia could invoke these assurances and accuse us of violating the treaty.



Who cares what the Russians say? The Obama administration does. It's the leitmotif of its "reset" strategy toward Russia. Even without an arms treaty, the administration bent to Moscow's will and sacrificed missile defense sites in the Czech Republic and Poland.



If it would do that voluntarily, what would it do if Russia were to level charges of treaty violations? Every missile defense opponent would claim the effort to defend ourselves and allies endangers "the arms control process" and undermines U.S.-Russian relations.



Russia will doubtless continue to press for additional arms negotiations to formalize and expand limitations on our missile defense. At some point it will likely ask either for separate negotiations on missile defense or for a START follow-on treaty focused on U.S. missile defense systems.



We should not sacrifice our ability to defend Americans. No treaty should hinder the future development, testing and deployment of U.S. missile defenses. There can be no ambiguity or uncertainty about this. The current debate over missile defenses reflects deeper and even more troubling aspects of this treaty. For the sake of just getting a treaty, the president signed an instrument that establishes Russia as a dominant nuclear power; limits America's ability to respond to future threats; and will likely start rather than deter a future arms race.



•Kim R. Holmes, a former assistant secretary of state, is a vice president at the Heritage Foundation. Follow him on Twitter @kimsmithholmes.