Russia has officially responded, quite negatively, to the conditions for a new arms control agreement that were set out by U.S. arms control envoy Marshall Billingslea in a Sept. 20 interview with Russian business daily Kommersant. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov replied in an interview with the Wall Street Journal published yesterday. He told the Journal that the Trump Administration’s demands that a future treaty cover all Russia, Chinese and U.S. warheads and include more-intrusive verification is “clearly a nonstarter for us.” He also warned that Moscow is prepared to respond if the U.S. allows the New START treaty to lapse on Feb. 5, 2021 and moves to expand its nuclear arsenal. “We would be ready to counter this,” he said.
“We are not going to buy this extension of the New START at any price, especially not at the price which the U.S. wants us to pay,” he said. “I think our positions are currently very far apart.” U.S. officials had no immediate comment on Ryabkov’s comments. A U.S. official told the Journal that the administration is in the early stages of discussing possible steps to expand U.S. nuclear forces as outlined by Billingslea in the Kommersant interview.
