The political environment in the United States is simply a dangerous one.
We've had an assassination attempt against former president and current presidential candidate Donald Trump, a senseless act of violence that killed a person at the rally and injured others. Both Trump and President Joe Biden called for calm after the shooting, a good thing. However, I don't think the toxic political environment that defines the current moment will go away, and that's too bad because a toxic domestic environment prevents us from solving problems in the international arena. After all, what's going on at home is more important to Americans than foreign affairs.
Writer Daryl Kimball allows us to remember the accomplishments of a tamer political age in his story "The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty at a Glance." The 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty required the United States and the Soviet Union to eliminate and permanently forswear all their nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of 500 to 5,500 kilometers. The treaty marked the first time the superpowers had agreed to reduce their nuclear arsenals, eliminate an entire category of nuclear weapons, and employ extensive on-site inspections for verification. As a result of the INF Treaty, the US and the Soviet Union destroyed a total of 2,692 short-, medium-, and intermediate-range missiles by the treaty's implementation deadline of June 1, 1991.
The US first alleged in its July 2014 Compliance Report that Russia violated its INF Treaty obligations to "not to possess, produce, or flight-test" a ground-launched cruise missile having a range of 500 to 5,500 kilometers or "to possess or produce launchers of such missiles." Subsequent State Department assessments in 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 repeated these accusations. In March 2017, a top U.S. official confirmed press reports that Russia had begun deploying the noncompliant missile. Russia has denied that it violates the agreement and has accused the United States of noncompliance.
In 2017, the Donald Trump administration released an integrated strategy to counter alleged Russian violations of the treaty, including the commencement of research and development on a conventional, road-mobile, intermediate-range missile system. In 2018, President Trump announced his intention to "terminate" the INF Treaty, citing Russian noncompliance and concerns about China's intermediate-range missile arsenal. Since the mid-2000s, Russia has raised the possibility of withdrawing from the INF Treaty. Moscow contends that the treaty unfairly prevents it from possessing weapons that its neighbors, such as China, are developing and fielding. Russia also has suggested that the proposed US deployment of strategic anti-ballistic missile systems in Europe might trigger a Russian withdrawal from the accord, so Moscow can deploy missiles targeting any future US anti-missile sites.
The essential arms control deals established between the US and Russia (in its Soviet and Post-Soviet forms) from the 1970's to the 1990's have broken down, a casualty of the current Cold War, which is something one can draw from Kimball's story. How did we move away from the INF Treaty and other international forms of international law to where we are now? I think history will look at both sides - the extension of NATO into Eastern Europe in the 1990's under former President Bill Clinton, Russian President Vladimir Putin's illegal invasion of Ukraine, China's belligerent behavior in the South China Sea, and other factors as being responsible.
How do we move past this dangerous period of international relations and into a new era? A conference of world powers, the Russia/China orbit, and the US orbit would be worth a try. Maybe there could be an agreement for a second and a third conference. Then, at some point in the future, perhaps we could return to the INF model.
Jason Sibert is the Lead Writer of the Peace Economy Project
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