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President Trump Pulls Out Of Key Nuclear Arms Treaty With Russia & Here’s What It Means

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President Trump confirmed on Saturday that the United States will withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty with Russia, a landmark deal signed between the U.S. and Russia more than 30 years ago

Trump accused Moscow of having violated the agreement for years. Trump also said he didn’t know why former President Barack Obama hadn’t negotiated or withdrawn from the agreement, but that he wasn’t going to let Russia “go out and do weapons and we’re not allowed to,” CNN reports. 

“We’re the ones that have stayed in the agreement and we’ve honored the agreement,” Trump told reporters, following a campaign rally in Nevada, CNN reports. “But Russia has not, unfortunately, honored the agreement. So we’re going to terminate the agreement. We’re gonna pull out.” 

After years of negotiation, former President Ronald Reagan and former USSR President Mikhail Gorbachev signed the 1987 pact. The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty prohibits both Russia and the U.S. from possessing or producing “ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of between 500 and 5,500 kilometers, their launchers and associated support structures and support equipment,” according to the State Department. 

Critics fear that withdrawing from the agreement would lead to a renewed arms races, and that it would allow the US to do more to counter China. Just to note, China is not part of the current nuclear treaty with Russia. 

BuzzFeed News reports that Trump specifically mention China in his statement. 

“If Russia’s doing it and China’s doing it and we’re adhering to the agreement, that’s unacceptable,” Trump said. 

Trump isn’t the first U.S. president to claim that Russia is violating the treaty terms. Obama alleged that Russia had tested a ground-launched cruise missile in 2014, which violated the treaty, according to NPR. Obama didn’t withdraw the U.S. from the treaty because of concerns raised by European allies. According to the New York Times, they feared it would result in a similar Cold War-like nuclear arms race.

“This would be a very dangerous step that, I’m sure, not only will not be comprehended by the international community but will provoke serious condemnation,” Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said, according to BBC. The minister also said that if the U.S. continued to behave “clumsily and crudely” and backed out of international agreements, “then we will have no choice but to undertake retaliatory measures, including involving military technology.” 

BBC reports that Ryabkov doesn’t “want to get to this stage.” 

White House national security adviser John Bolton will be in Russia next week to further discuss the withdrawal with Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

 


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