US not to reduce nuclear arsenal to Moscow Treaty levels
25 March 2004, Washington
The United States will not cut its nuclear arsenal to levels designated by an arms accord it concluded two years ago with Russia because it must hedge against an uncertain future, a top administration official announced.
The Moscow Treaty signed with great fanfare by Presidents George W. Bush of the United States and Vladimir Putin of Russia in May 2002 calls on both sides to reduce their strategic nuclear warheads to between 1,700 and 2,200 by 2012.
But it refers to “operationally deployed” weapons, essentially offering both governments a loophole that allows them to move an unlimited number of warheads into storage and keep them indefinitely under lock and key.
While US officials have often praised this option, Wednesday’s remarks by Undersecretary of Energy Linton Brooks before the Senate Subcommittee on Strategic Forces represented the first official indication the Bush administration had actually decided to exercise it.
“The 2012 nuclear stockpile will be substantially reduced from current levels,” Brooks told lawmakers. “But reductions will not lower the stockpile to 1,700-2,200 total warheads.”
He said the retained warheads will be needed for routine maintenance of the arsenal, for meeting “commitments to allies,” and to address threats that may arise in the future…
(extract from www.channelnewsasia.com).
