Before you read on, a reminder that you can register free for our webinar on Tuesday 24th of February marking 4 years of war in Ukraine here.
SCND have also organised buses to our Saturday 14th March demonstration at Faslane, for which we are inviting an entirely non-obligatory donation. Book your seat on the bus here.
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At time of writing, the status of New START – the major bilateral nuclear arms control agreement between the US and Russia – is slightly unclear.
Substantial international news coverage has been dedicated to the formal expiry of this important treaty on Thursday 5th February. However, reports from Reuters and Axios, published on Thursday afternoon, suggested that that US and Russian negotiators in the UAE were close to an agreement to extend the provisions of the treaty for 6 months.
But later that day US President Trump took to social media to lambast New START as “badly negotiated” and to call for an entirely new deal. The White House Press Secretary claimed no knowledge of efforts to extend the provisions of the nuclear agreement.
Extension or none, any effort to sustain this agreement for a matter of months would be only a sticking plaster over rising nuclear tensions worldwide.
New START capped the number of deployed nuclear warheads at 1,550 for each country, as well as restricting the quantity of delivery systems such as heavy bombers, intercontinental missiles and submarine-launched missiles. Importantly, the agreement also established verification measures and information channels between the US and Russia regarding their nuclear forces.
The negligence of international leadership in urging renewal of this vital treaty has been astonishing. It is as if world leaders have entirely forgotten one of the core lessons of the 20th century Cold War: that multilateral cooperation on arms control ensures international security, not nuclear arms-racing.
New START’s expiry does not necessarily mean immediate escalation between the US and Russia. But with no mutually-agreed guardrails and verification systems for nuclear weapons, the threat assessments of these countries will increasingly rely on worst-case scenarios, and gradually heightened nuclear posturing as a result.
One consequence of this might be increased nuclear submarine activity in the North Atlantic, given the collapse of New START’s limits on submarine missile deployment. This would create a hair-trigger for international tensions on our doorstep. And yet, Scottish and UK leadership have had virtually nothing to say about this worrisome prospect.
Scotland’s geographical positioning, as well as hosting of UK nuclear weapons, places us at the locus of escalating nuclear tensions in a dangerous new era, increasingly ungoverned by arms control agreements. That also means that Scottish civic and political voices should be of special importance in loudly advocating to revitalise international cooperation on nuclear weapons and disarmament.
So join Scottish CND at Faslane on Saturday 14th March, from 1pm-3pm, to raise the salience of the nuclear threat to Scotland ahead of the national elections in May. Loud voices for peace and international security are needed now more than ever.