An Era Without Arms Control?

Jeffrey Lewis 0:01

We might be entering this really strange universe in which there's no arms control to speak of at all. You are listening to the Arms Control Wonk podcast, the leading podcast on arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation. I'm Jeffrey Lewis, the founding publisher of the Arms Control Wonk blog, and a scholar at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.

Aaron Stein 0:30

And I'm Aaron Stein, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council's Rafik Kuriri Center for the Middle East. Did you see the eclipse, Aaron? I was in my office looking out the window at people watching the eclipse. Does that count?

Jeffrey 0:45

No, no. Seeing the eclipse means staring at the eclipse. And if you were a real man, like the President of the United States, doing it with no glasses.

Aaron 0:56

That is true. I mean... Like our president, I forgot or did not know how to purchase said glasses, and so did not feel the need to go outside. But unlike our president, I valued my eyes more than watching the eclipse.

Jeffrey 1:13

I have heard people say he had the glasses on at first and then only took them off later. Catherine Dill, by the way, purchased glasses for everyone in our office. Well, that's nice.

Aaron 1:22

You have a functioning office, it sounds like. We're every man for themselves around here at the Atlantic Council. And it's August in D.C. That sounds more like the White House.

Catherine Dill 1:31

I went and stood in line at the Air and Space Museum for an hour and got free ones morning of.

Jeffrey 1:37

Wow, you are cheap. You know, I'm pretty sure we could have used the Patreon money. I think if you had said on Patreon, Hey... I'm broke, and I want to see the eclipse, and I could spend this hour editing a podcast or standing in line to get free eclipse glasses. I'm pretty sure we would have spotted you the cash.

Aaron 1:58

Yeah, we would have done that. I mean, it would have been a stretch, but we would have supported you. Hey, Jeffrey, is this where we talk about weather and wine?

Jeffrey 2:06

People have been complaining about that, so I think we'll gently skip over that and go right to today's topic, which is not North Korea, shockingly.

Aaron 2:17

Yeah, yeah, they tried. They tried to F up our pod last night with releasing some pictures online, but we're not going to let them.

Jeffrey 2:24

Well, if I, you know, I mean, maybe I should just pretend I stared directly at the eclipse and I'm blind, so I can't see all those beautiful pictures of solid-fueled missile components.

Aaron 2:33

They certainly were explicit again. It was wonk, porn, X-rated.

Jeffrey 2:36

But we're not going to talk about that. We're going to talk about Russia, Russia, Russia.

Aaron 2:40

That's right.

Jeffrey 2:40

And then it's August, which means it's almost fall, which means it's budget time here in Washington, D.C. Yeah, we have spent so much time on North Korea that we haven't really given enough attention to all of the other arms control and disarmament-related topics. And I think that's a little strange because... Things are getting really bad with Russia.

I think that, you know, we are heading toward this kind of, I mean, it's weird to call it an arms race because an arms race has a kind of a connotation of speed. I mean, this is more like a more like a stroll or a friendly arms competition.

Aaron 3:20

But things are like the snowball. You roll down the hill in the cartoon and it's just getting bigger and bigger and bigger to the point where you can't stop it.

Jeffrey 3:27

Yeah, and I think the NDAA, the National Defense Authorization Act that we're likely to get, and there are some important differences right now between the House and the Senate version that we'll talk about, but it pushes us a little bit further down this path. And I don't mean to say that this is entirely the fault of the NDAA.

It's not. This has been brewing for a long time. But there's a lot of stuff in there that I think... Unambiguously suggest that the U.S. policy is going to shift from being annoyed at Russia for not complying with treaties the way we would like to moving to not comply with the treaties ourselves. And that's going to be a really different world, and I thought it was important to discuss.

Aaron 4:17

Yeah, I mean, it consolidates policy positions on specific ways to respond to Russian violations of treaties that have been talked about. We've talked about them on the show, and we'll get into them in a second. But it starts to begin the process of actually actualizing some of those policies, and that's why we've got to talk about it.

Jeffrey 4:38

Yeah, you know, I mean – One really interesting thing to say as a kind of global level before we dig into what the NDAA actually says is when I got into this business, we had a ton of arms control agreements with the Russians that provided stability and the ability to plan out into the future. Right. So we had we had the START treaty.

We had the INF Treaty, both of which are arms control agreements that limit the number of, I guess I will say, strategic nuclear weapons. But we also had the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty, right, that limited conventional forces. And... There were a series of testing treaties, including the threshold test ban. And so there was this kind of thicket of arms control, right, that provided, I guess, stability and predictability.

And that's approximately all gone now, right? We're down to the CTBT, which the United States is not going to ratify. And, you know, I just don't feel like the older testing treaties, while they're valuable, they don't really constrain development. So testing is approximately unconstrained at this point, at least for anything anybody would want to do. The Russians gave up on the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty.

Aaron 6:07

And the Russians are violating the INF Treaty, which we'll talk about.

Jeffrey 6:11

And I think the U.S. is just kind of done with that. And I'm not sure that the New START Treaty is going to survive. And so we might be entering this really strange universe in which there's no arms control to speak of at all.

Aaron 6:28

Yeah, and the NDAA, you know, in both the House and Senate versions, addresses the INF issue and it addresses the New START issue. I mean, it begins to put programs, or at least to appropriate cash, to what to do about, and we'll start with the INF, the alleged Russian violation of the INF treaty.

Jeffrey 6:48

Yeah, so... For some time, I think there has been a brewing anger among House Republicans that the Russians are in violation of the INF Treaty and that at first the Obama administration wasn't really doing anything about it and now the Trump administration. And I think the kind thing I will say, even though I think I disagree with most of the way they've tackled this is, you know, when Congress gets upset about something and the president ignores them, Congress has very few tools available to them.

And so then Congress engages in grandstanding jackassery, which is partly Congress's fault, but it's partly also that Congress doesn't have a ton of tools. Right. So they have sanctions and they have reports. And they have overheated language. And I think the Obama administration ignored the House Republicans on this issue, which was not the wisest idea. And, you know, partisanship being what it is, here we are.

Aaron 7:52

So let's dive into it.

Jeffrey 7:53

Yeah. So there are four important provisions. Technically, there are five, but I feel like one of them is just... Introductory. And I'll mention them in the house version, and then we'll talk about them in reverse order. So the house version, the four that I care about are starting a program of record on a U.S. intermediate range missile.

Aaron 8:15

Mm-hmm.

Jeffrey 8:16

Two, telling the Russians that they are in material breach of the agreement, which is, I think, not quite as much about telling the Russians as it is about using that word material breach. Right. Number three is prohibiting the expenditure of any funds to extend the new START agreement. And the fourth is doing a study on the RS-26, which is one of the two missile systems that are said to be non-compliant with the treaty.

The Senate version doesn't have any of these except for the first, well, To a first approximation, as far as I can tell, the Senate version doesn't have anything quite like those other than starting the US INF missile, and we'll talk about that last. So you want to talk about the study of the RS-26? You're excited.

Aaron 9:12

So what I like about any study is that these studies are meant to be leaked and therefore used, as you said, one of these tools to grandstand or at least try and force policy changes. And so in an entirely self-interested way, I want the study because I'd like to read the leaked version. At least the versions of the leaked version that will come out in the New York Times or other various publications.

Jeffrey 9:38

Yeah. For listeners who do not remember our podcast, there are two missiles that are alleged to be the center of the noncompliance issue. One is a ground launch cruise missile that the Russians are developing, which is... Said to be very clearly a violation of the treaty. But the other is this missile, the RS-26, which is not a cruise missile, but a ballistic missile.

And what, as best I can tell, what has happened, and I think this is, the study wants this spelled out, because we've guessed that this is what has happened, and I've gotten some indications that I am probably right about that, but we don't have a definitive statement, and I think Congress wants it so they can put it in the public record.

The Russians took a Yars ICBM, which is a three-stage missile. They removed the third stage from that. Put one warhead on it, or a dummy warhead, and tested it once to an ICBM range and said, ha, this is an ICBM under the New START treaty.

Aaron 10:40

Right, declared it under New START as a strategic system that can fly to ICBM ranges.

Jeffrey 10:46

Right, and actually, due to the way that treaty is written, there is some possibility that it Exists in some other weird legal netherworld, but to a first approximation, the Russians say it's an ICBM. But then they packed the thing full of warheads and tested it at INF treaty range.

Aaron 11:13

Yeah. That's about half the range, if I remember correctly.

Jeffrey 11:15

Yeah. And, you know, this technically is legal, so it's only a circumvention of the INF Treaty, but it is a dick move, because that is precisely what the SS-20, which was the most important Soviet missile that the U.S. wanted, prohibited... Under the INF Treaty was, is it was a three-stage ICBM that the Soviets had taken the third stage off and packed full of warheads so that it had this much shorter range.

And the reason they did that, by the way, or at least the reason the U.S. speculated they did that, was because they wanted some strategic systems that were underneath the SALT, Arms Control Agreement, limits. So they built these INF systems, the U.S. thought, to circumvent that agreement But then we got really upset about them and we wanted them controlled.

And at the time that the U.S., at the time that the Senate agreed to the ratification of the INF Treaty, this was a known problem that the Soviets and then eventually Russians could do this at any time. And it was just a loophole that there was no good way to fix. And the expectation was that you would fix it in the forthcoming start agreement.

And the way that you would fix it was by keeping the delivery vehicle limits very low so that this would be a really costly way for the Russians to cheat. Except when we got into new start negotiations, we wanted really high delivery vehicle limits and we forgot about the loophole.

Aaron 12:48

Right. For listeners who have, again, been following the boat, we talked about this, is that we negotiated with ourselves a little bit because we wanted the high number delivery vehicles because we made the assumption that Russia couldn't Build as many as we could because of budgetary constraints, forgetting that this was how they dealt with the thing in the past.

So they exploited a loophole that was known within the New START negotiations, and now this is boomerang back around and contributing to the concerns that, in this case, they're quote-unquote circumventing the INF, wherein the other missile, the cruise missile, the claim is that they're absolutely violating it.

Jeffrey 13:26

Right. So on the one hand, it's legal, right? But on the other hand, it literally replicates the system that the INF Treaty was designed to prohibit. So it is a legal maneuver, but it is a maneuver that is very hard to swallow. And so, you know, the ground launch cruise missile, that is one serious problem. But then the RS-26, even though it's legal, I think is another serious problem.

So I get why... People are annoyed. And so I'm fine with the report. I want to read the report. I hope it leaks. I hope I'm right.

Aaron 14:08

Yeah. I hope I'm wrong. I hope they find that no such missile exists. It's only been hinted at. Nobody's ever gone on record and said it, hence the need to commission people to start the report that we hope will leak. I mean, the question is where do these reports usually lead, right?

Jeffrey 14:27

Yeah, I mean, I think this is just a case where the nature of the violation is a little hard to explain. And for those of us on the open source side, we're inferring from what the Russians have said. You know, the Russians say, oh, well, we have this system and it's based on the Yars and it's an ICBM.

But then we can see that the only way they achieved that range was by testing it with one warhead. So, you know, we can see that it looks very much like an SS-20 just with modern technology. But you know, that's hard to explain to people. And right now the way that the U S handles it is that that's all classified.

And so they just sort of say, well, the Russians say it's an ICBM and actually the NASIC report that came out ballistic and cruise missile threat sort of only hints at it. Right. It's sort of you know, the Russians say the range may be shorter, you know, like they, they, they, I think NASIC understandably doesn't want to

Aaron 15:25

Define NASIC for the listeners.

Jeffrey 15:27

Oh, my gosh. The National Air and Space Intelligence Center at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which produces a lot of... It's one of the two... Gosh, there are probably more entities that will then be pissed off. But there are two main entities that do missile intelligence. And NASIC is one of them. And they, or two main entities that specialize, right, in missile intelligence.

And they release a report every few years on missile proliferation. And that report this year contains hints about both the GLICOM, And the RS-26, but they've actually gone back and edited that report.

Aaron 16:07

I saw that.

Jeffrey 16:09

Well, I mean, other people have said, oh, that's because it was in error, and I don't actually think that's the correct analytic conclusion. NASIC, in their original report, implicitly accused the Russians of violating the INF Treaty by saying there was a ground-launched variant of the caliber that had a 2,000-kilometer range. Yeah. And I think that while that may be true...

It wasn't supposed to be in the open report. Perhaps accusing the Russians of violating the treaty. You know, it's a delicate matter. And there are places that you want to release that kind of information. And so I think they went back and they removed the ground launch reference. You know, because they didn't want to create an international incident.

I mean, I think the State Department... You know, needs to say more about the type of missile, but technically that's classified. So I guess they didn't want to get in trouble. But it hints that both of those things are the problem. And I think we would be well served by having more information in the public domain about those two systems.

Do you want to talk about the Glicum now? Well, I mean, I think that's the answer is I still think that the... Glickum, the ground-launched cruise missile... Oh, wait. Ours or theirs?

Aaron 17:27

Theirs.

Jeffrey 17:28

Yeah. I think that it's a ground-launched version of the Kalibr.

Aaron 17:34

Right. So what was interesting about that is on this pod is that we've... There was some debate about what it was, and we came to the conclusion, or at least through, is that it was probably a ground-launched version of the Kalibr. And what I took away from the NASEC report was it's a confirmation that our theories, or at least our hypothesis...

Were correct.

Jeffrey 17:53

Right. And I wonder... And the U.S. calls this missile, by the way, the SSC-8 screwdriver.

Aaron 18:00

Right. Yes, it does. You know, it's your vodka and orange juice in the morning. Well, I think it's because they screwed us. Of course it is. They used it to screw us. They did. They did. And you can get hints about the missile's capabilities from how they're using it at sea. Yeah. I mean, it's a very long-range missile.

Jeffrey 18:19

And there's no reason, I mean, to be... Fair. If you wanted to violate the INF Treaty, why not just take an existing missile that is new and has a good track record? I mean, right? Like, that's what I would do. And in fact, when we get to ours, I mean, that's one of the things the U.S. is considering looking at.

Aaron 18:42

Right. I mean, for listeners, they are using the sea-based version of this to fire from the Caspian Sea and to hit targets in Syria.

Jeffrey 18:51

Okay, so quickly, before we get to our cruise missile or our intermediate range missile, because it's not clear what it will actually be, I want to talk about those other two provisions. So one of the provisions in the House version, which is not present in the Senate version, again, as far as I can tell, Prohibits the use of any funds for FY 2018 to extend the implementation of the New START Treaty unless the president certifies that Russia has eliminated all missiles that are in violation or may be inconsistent with the INF Treaty.

So I don't think that you can't implement the treaty. It's that you cannot extend the implementation of the treaty. And so I think that is an effort to prevent The extension of the New START treaty, which was something that came up on that phone call between Trump and Putin, and Trump reportedly was not interested in that.

Aaron 19:51

Yeah, and this is one of those ones, like, I don't understand. I mean, Russia is not yet in compliance with its New START obligation, so why would you make it harder to verify that? And link it to the INF. That's what I don't understand.

Jeffrey 20:09

Yeah, I think this is a real... The Russians... Everybody has to be in compliance by February. Right. And the Russian warhead numbers are still up over the number where they need to be.

Aaron 20:26

We've talked about that before on a different... about the retirement versus new systems coming online issue.

Jeffrey 20:32

Yeah, and I think they can get underneath that limit Pretty quickly. So I'm not anticipating that they'll just lead with their chin in February. I mean, they tend to be a little bit more subtle than that. But I think they'll get just right under that limit. And then you have to ask this question of when you look at the panoply of systems they're building, I feel like they are building for a future where they are not living under those limits anymore.

So I don't understand why we want to take those limits off them. Particularly because when I look at our future force structure, I think our numbers are going to keep coming down just because we're not replacing things on a one-for-one basis.

Aaron 21:20

It almost seems like the procurement policies and planning is built upon the assumptions that arms control will stick around.

Jeffrey 21:29

Yeah, well, and that the amount of money that is available will not dramatically increase. Right. So the other provision, so, you know there is this kind of hint that new start may be endangered. The other provision is that we have to notify the Russians that they are in material breach of the agreement, which I guess I don't mind telling the Russians to go to hell.

But again, I think the trick there is that, that language material breach which is not just noncompliance. It's you know, a kind of, it's a, it's a fatal thing to say about an agreement. Right. It's killing it. Yeah. And then and then the interesting thing is starting our own intermediate range missile program. And here the House and the Senate versions are very different.

The House version, which requires the secretary of defense to start a program of record, specifies a ground launch cruise missile. Yeah, they use the word cruise. They specify it. And the Senate version, which merely requires a report from the Secretary of Defense, although it is with an eye toward establishing an R&D program, I mean, I think it's just a question of which step you require, is actually a report in which the Secretary of Defense is to compare various options, some of which are quite interesting and definitely not cruise missiles.

Aaron 22:52

Yeah, well, I mean, one of them is a ground-launched cruise missile, extended-range attackums, converting SM-3, SM-6. And what's the last one I'm forgetting?

Jeffrey 23:02

Oh, my gosh. You mean I have to actually be looking at it? Hang on. I've got it right here. So the options are they're comparing either a new start— new start's a terrible word, given that that's also the name of the treaty— a new system— Or some modification including a ground-launched version of the Tomahawk, which is what the old Griffin was, modification of Standard Missile 3 or Standard Missile 6, which is a very interesting thing that I want to come back to and talk about, a ground-launched version of the LRSO, the Long Range Standoff Cruise Missile, or an extended-range version of the ATACMS, the Army Tactical Missile System.

Two thoughts... One is a couple of years ago, we did a little study where we said, boy, the SM-3, as it gets bigger and more capable, could absolutely be construed as a violation of the INF Treaty.

Aaron 24:01

It was one of our first conversations when we first got to know each other. I was asking you questions about the possibility of SM-3 violating INF. And you said, yeah.

Jeffrey 24:10

Yeah. You know, obviously the INF Treaty is written in such a way that if you don't give it a ground attack mission, it wouldn't be a violation. But David Wright helped me model it, and it would be awesome. Missiles, I mean, yes, go ahead. Yes, it would. Well, and the Russians had expressed concern that SM-3s based in Poland could be given a land attack mission and covertly armed with nuclear warheads.

And in fact, that was the crazy disinformation campaign they launched about U.S. nuclear weapons being moved from Turkey to Romania. Was sort of consistent with this theory that we would somehow secretly install nuclear-armed INF systems at the missile defense site in Poland and Romania as a decapitation force.

Aaron 25:04

Yeah, you know, and I think that... Yeah, and I mean...

Jeffrey 25:10

So then we actually do the conspiracy theory. It's like there's this Russian disinformation campaign and people are like, oh, well, no, that's a very good idea. Yeah.

Aaron 25:21

Yeah, and I think it's important to note that, you know, Russians, at least the Russians I've talked to, think hit to kill, you know, running a missile into another missile with either a small conventional warhead or no warhead at all is stupid.

Jeffrey 25:36

Yeah, they like nuclear-armed missile defenses.

Aaron 25:39

And they like nuclear-armed missile defenses. They have nuclear-armed missile defenses. And at least expressed to me, you know, privately in one of these meetings that we have together, you know, it's like, Why would the Americans not just put a small nuclear warhead on top of SM-3? I mean, if you can get as close as you can already, why don't you just ensure that you can shoot down incoming ICBMs?

Multiple salvos of incoming ICBMs with just one interceptor.

Jeffrey 26:05

And whereas the House version specifies that it's a conventional cruise missile, the Senate version is its dual-capable system.

Aaron 26:14

Yeah, absolutely.

Jeffrey 26:16

And so, you know, I mean, if you're taking all of the politics and the partisanship out of this, they should certainly do a study, and that study should have as broad a scope as possible, because those are the best studies where you're willing to consider various options. But holy... Crap is that going to alarm the Russians? Which, you know, there's an argument that that's a good thing, but it also, I think, will make...

It will really... It forecloses the possibility of ever getting the Russians to be okay with the Aegis system sitting in Poland and Romania. They will never be okay with that.

Aaron 26:57

Yeah, and I think one of the things that, I mean... Is that it uses the common launch system. So either ground launch version, Tomahawk would use that same launch system, SM3 uses it, and I believe SM6 uses it. So they've used this wishy-washy stuff as well to muck up the INF themselves. Then you go ahead and do it with any one of those systems, then you will have validated their own complaints about the INF, which I think could, you know, You know, they could use it to kill the treaty themselves, or at least force us to kill it.

Jeffrey 27:29

I think their objections are spurious, but I do think that the report sort of sets them up nicely for both disinformation campaigns, but also the kind of tendentious whataboutism that they will use to excuse their own violations. So, yeah, I'm not... As much as I would be delighted to see the thing leaked because I would be interested, I think there's a public diplomacy downside.

I think they're clever. Yeah. You know, the other thing I don't quite understand is why it has to be a ground-launched system. You know, I mean... There is nothing that prevents the U.S. from having an intermediate-range nuclear-armed long-range standoff cruise missile.

Aaron 28:20

I mean, isn't that the point of the new LRSO with the B-21?

Jeffrey 28:23

Yes. So, you know, to kind of a first approximation, you know, you can have that capability. It just has to sit on ships or airplanes, right? And, you know, maybe, you know, I'm not, I don't know, maybe the Poles don't need a VLS launcher on a ship, but, you know, maybe the Poles do. I don't know. I do think that there are, there were, and still are, INF compliant ways to look at comparable systems that would bother the hell out of the Russians without handing them the propaganda piece they need.

Because, you know, to go back to all of this, you know, I think some people have said to me, like, well, why do you care if the Russians are violating the INF treaty? Like, what does it really matter? And You know, I think like holding aside just the kind of aggravation that comes with reaching an agreement and having someone cheat on it, you know, the Russians want this ability to be able to target countries in Europe from Russia.

And and that gives them, I think, a certain flexibility they feel in making it less likely that the Germans are going to be willing to come to the defense of, say, one of the Baltic states. So, you know, they've got this idea, I think, that they can hold countries at risk in different ways. Right. And so, like, I do think it's a threat, right?

And the big problem we have is getting the Europeans to take it seriously. And partly that's we don't do enough briefing to them. And, you know, the Obama people say they do. The House Republicans say they don't. I don't know who's telling the truth, but I certainly haven't loved how little public information the Obama administration got out.

And obviously the Trump administration has done jack taco since they got in. But I think we've got to get the Europeans to take this seriously. I'm not sure putting ourselves in the position where we look as bad as the Russians really helps our campaign where we're trying to get German political parties on side with taking a really strong approach to this.

Aaron 30:45

Right. So, I mean, if you stitch all the threads together, I mean, the House version is a little bit more explicit, but the Senate version certainly sets you down on this path. The use of the word material breach, or at least, you know, claiming noncompliance, the approach to the RS-26, weirdly hampering the ability to extend New START or verification under New START.

It begs the question about whether this is wise. I think that's what you were talking about. Is it wise that when you begin to see the horizon on what we would call arms control, on arms control agreements, against the backdrop of all these tensions, the disinformation campaigns, the meddling in our elections, the obvious Russian-U.S. tensions, Is it wise for the U.S. to begin on the pathway to build up arms to try and match them or at least try and bully them or compel them back into compliance with the INF in particular?

I'm not sure it is. Particularly with this president, and this is not a partisan issue, but the idea of Donald Trump getting the Europeans to agree to a greater, more robust thing that they don't want in Europe just strikes me as not really thinking too far into the future.

Jeffrey 32:04

Yeah, you know, there is this great essay by Michael Howard on deterrence and reassurance, and it gets misrepresented in the United States. Because in the United States, it's hard to deter the Chinese and the Russians. It's even harder to reassure our allies, right? And it's like all more power good. But in fact, Howard made a much subtler point, which is...

It's a very delicate thing to deter the Soviets while at the same time persuading your allies that you're not going to get everybody killed. Exactly. Right. It wasn't like assure them you will come to their defense. It was like assure them that this deterrence thing is not worse than just giving the Soviets what they want. And I think that's actually the spot we're in today.

You know, the Germans are not afraid that the Russians are going to roll into Germany. The Germans are afraid that they're going to get embroiled in a war defending the Baltics. And the Germans are afraid that the Russians are going to destabilize their political system. And so... Our task isn't just deterring the Russians. It's reassuring the Germans and the other countries in Europe that we can do this together, that we can reasonably provide for security in Europe in a way that is effective and isn't unduly provocative.

Then that's a more subtle thing And that's like a significantly more subtle thought than I typically see expressed by spray tan Caligula.

Aaron 34:00

Yeah, glasses-free spray tan Caligula.

Catherine 34:04

I'm pretty sure we opened up this podcast by saying nonpartisan.

Jeffrey 34:07

Well, I mean, I'll be clear. When I say nonpartisan, I'm trying. I mean not the House Republicans who have complained about this stuff. Because I actually, you know, while I don't agree with the... I don't tend to agree with the ideological outlook. Like, they were not wrong that the Russians were violating this treaty. And they were not wrong that we should do something about that.

And I think they were right to be pissed off that we didn't do as much as we might have. You know, I mean, I was frustrated that we didn't try to sanction the companies involved. And every time I would raise that issue, I'd be told, well, the Europeans, you know, aren't parties to the INF Treaty, so they won't enforce the sanctions.

And I was kind of like, you know, It's worth it to try to do hard things like it's worth it to try to show the Russians that there are costs to their action. So I, you know, I can disagree with the choices that the House Republicans made. And I certainly do. But it goes back to the point I made at the beginning, which is they also don't have a ton of power because they're not in the executive branch.

And so given the really limited tools they have. You can sort of understand... You can basically understand them throwing what look like temper tantrums, right? Yeah, and be smart about this. They don't have a lot of other choices.

Aaron 35:24

Be smart. I mean, if the linchpin of one pillar of future transatlantic NATO relations is going to be the missile defense component... Don't give the Russians, you know, even more reasons or legitimacy to their claims that the missile defense component can be retasked to be offensive and therefore violate the INF. Especially when you have concurrent to that, you know, systems that are coming online that are literally, you know, that will replicate or...

And will be able to hold targets at risk in much the same way that a ground launch component in Europe would. And so could you get around, just like they do with us, creatively work around some of the loopholes in the INF to get the same bang for your buck while keeping this in place so you keep the diplomatic pressure on them to try and come back into the treaty to gain, let's say, More buy-in from the alliance partners rather than blowing up the treaty itself when their buy-in would be required for all the retaliatory and escalatory steps.

That would be needed if all of these steps in the NDAA are to be met, or at least sort of the longer-term horizon.

Jeffrey 36:36

Because sometimes being reasonable toward the Russians is not because you expect the Russians to reciprocate, but it's because you care about third-party audiences.

Aaron 36:44

Right. The Russians are violating the treaty. That is now a pie in our algebraic equation. How do you then respond in a way that brings everybody along Rather than divide the alliance, which is what Russia wants to do in the first place.

Jeffrey 37:02

May I interrupt the flow to tell you my favorite third-party audience story? Of course. Is it about wine? Sort of. It's about food. All right, that works. So, you know, Tom Schelling was on my dissertation committee. And I loved Tom. And one of the reasons I loved Tom is that he had a kind of rascally quality. And so we were talking about rational actors, and he said, you know, I can walk into any five-star hotel in America and have a free buffet breakfast just by signing a fake room number.

And, you know, the way he said it implied that this wasn't like a mere, like, theoretical possibility, right? And I was a little bit shocked. I was like, you would not steal a breakfast. And he made the argument like, no, it's quite rational. Why would you pay for a breakfast that you can have for free if there's no enforcement mechanism?

And I was like, Tom, you would not do that. And he kind of smiled and said, well, I wouldn't because I wouldn't want my wife Alice to think I was the kind of person who did that.

Catherine 38:14

And it was totally clear that he would have done it. He was only worried about third party audience costs.

Jeffrey 38:21

Right, exactly. And I think that there is a little bit of a similar thing happening here where, you know, rationally, it's probably in our interest... To cheat in the same way the Russians are because the Russians assume we're cheating. So they, they, they don't, you know, they don't care. Like I always argue the Russians, the Russians assume we're doing what they're doing.

And, and that's a defense mechanism for them, but we have to bring the Europeans along. And, and that actually, I think does require being a little bit more realistic and, and a little bit more reasonable. Can we talk by the way About this weird future of no arms control because... Yeah, that's a good place to wrap up on a happy note.

That was dark foreboding sarcasm, folks. Yeah. So, you know, when the New START Treaty went up for ratification, there was this big debate, and one of the major objections to ratifying the treaty from Senate opponents was, why would we constrain ourselves when we were going to get all this stuff for free from the Russians, because they were going to make these reductions anyway, because they couldn't afford it.

I think that looks really short-sighted right now.

Aaron 39:43

Yeah. Because... Yeah, I mean, well, because I think you've hinted at and we've talked about it is that we're taking an approach to modernization that maybe we can't afford it.

Jeffrey 39:55

Yeah, I think we are at the point where I don't think our modernization program is executable. I don't think it's executable at the dollar levels that are anticipated. I don't think it's executable at the political will that is anticipated. And frankly, I just think the schedule is so demanding that even with all the money in the world, they might not be able to figure this out.

But Russians, by contrast, although I think, you know, as oil prices stay down, they may start to feel the bite too. I got some real questions about the systems they're bringing online, right? Because they've got this heavy ICBM under development. Right. And the whole point of having a heavy ICBM is to pack it full of warheads.

Aaron 40:41

It's real heavy.

Jeffrey 40:43

And I think most of us assumed that the retirement of the heavy liquid-fueled ICBMs is how the Russians were going to get under the new start limits. Right? They were going to retire those systems, so offload them and retire them. But, you know, if the Russians deploy a whole bunch of these heavy ICBMs over the next decade with one warhead on them, that's crazy.

You know, that's an upload capability that they're maintaining in reserve, which should scare the pants off us.

Aaron 41:15

Right.

Jeffrey 41:16

...

Aaron 41:18

Which was always their argument about us, by the way.

Jeffrey 41:20

Yep. They're binging on cruise missiles. You know, for a long time we've been saying we think that since nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missiles are not covered under any agreement, right? They're not prohibited by the INF Treaty because they're at sea. And the range is such that they're not covered by the START Treaties. We thought for a long time the Russians were putting nuclear-armed cruise missiles on attack submarines.

And now that we see the caliber, it's a dual-capable system, you know, they're putting a whole bunch of nuclear-armed cruise missiles to sea. We got the crazy underwater drone, which I think falls under the category of crazy science fiction things that they may nonetheless be trying.

Aaron 42:13

Yeah.

Jeffrey 42:14

We got the nuclear-armed ABM system around Moscow, which scares the pants off me for about six reasons.

Aaron 42:20

That's the one that really makes me twitchy. How old is that thing?

Jeffrey 42:24

Well, it's all new interceptors now, they say. So, who knows? I don't know. You think we're going to see fractional orbital bombardment fobs systems?

Aaron 42:39

That one gets Scott going really, really. He gets excited about that.

Jeffrey 42:43

And I don't know if you saw, but Sputnik just two days ago carried a whole story on how Dead Hand is still in operation.

Aaron 42:52

That's an oldie but goodie podcast, too. You can go back and take a look at it.

Jeffrey 42:57

The way that I look at all these systems is I, as democracy has faltered, we are seeing a return of certain Soviet patterns of... Behavior and thought, and I, you know, it's not like I think that the Russians are going to build all these things because they have some like super clear strategic plan, but I think it is exactly like in the Cold War where you have a really powerful defense bureaucracy that more or less gets whatever it wants, and they want to do everything.

And you've got a leadership that is excited about how that looks and wants to project strength and is a little leery about the actual weakness that they have. So I'm not sure that if we allow New Start to expire, I'm not sure that we're going to have anywhere near the number of nuclear weapons that the Russians end up with.

Aaron 44:04

Yeah, I mean the big takeaway I have about this is if what you say is correct, I don't feel like we're in that place anymore. And so the allocation of dollars no longer – I mean it would be harder to make the budgetary demands to keep in place a nuclear complex to keep up with that. When we want everything else because we've gone so heavy on the conventional side.

And so do you want to end up in a world where that sort of, I mean, I guess that sustainability and then that, what's the word I'm looking for? Shit. Predictability, where that predictability that comes from the limits within these arms control treaties all of a sudden evaporates. And I don't really think people are grappling with this.

I really don't. When I look at this NDAA, I don't think it thinks in those terms. I do not think the American bureaucracy has caught up with perhaps where the Russian bureaucracy is. And what I mean by that is these very non-creative ways to go after the INF. I mean it's essentially trying to kill arms control. On the assumption that Russia isn't making contingency plans for next-generation systems that they could rapidly upscale, is the word I'm thinking about.

Jeffrey 45:25

Yeah, it's like this. It's like it's still the unipolar moment, right? That it's still 1991 and we're rich and powerful and everyone else is poor and backwards. And, you know, if only we throw off these shackles and and. You know toss aside the globalist cucks we can build our way to invulnerability yeah I think that I think that fairly well captures the insanity of the moment and in fact I think the reality is is it the opposite which is that you know we tend to gold plate our systems we tend to have really high requirements and so we don't get as much bang for the buck or you know like whatever maybe the Russian systems really truly do suck but they're willing to build lots of them But, you know, I do think that we have overstated the Russian desire for arms control, which I think was a bit of a surprise when the New START treaty got negotiated.

And I think we were wrong. You know, the Obama administration had this idea, what they called the whole enchilada, that the arms control agreement after START was going to be an arms control agreement that went beyond strategic systems to cover everything.

Aaron 46:43

I don't think the Russians are interested in that. No. Yeah. I don't either. It doesn't seem like it fits with the way they're planning for war. It seems exactly the opposite to me.

Jeffrey 46:53

Yeah. So I actually think that we're probably entering a period where we have to think about little things we can do to enhance stability. Like, I'm still a big fan of trying to... I sound like a broken record. When we let the START treaty expire, we made no effort to preserve the notifications associated with sea-launched cruise missiles.

We had a transparency measure put in place because START didn't cover sea-launched cruise missiles. So we had a limit of 880, which was so high it wasn't even a real limit, but also a notification system. And we let that go and made no effort to preserve that. And now the Russians are under no obligation to either limit or even tell us How many sea-launched cruise missiles they have, nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missiles.

I think we might usefully try to revisit that because as much as I don't like the conventional ones, I'd really like to get a limit, a verifiable limit on the nuclear-armed ones because those are scary. And I think we could totally ban nuclear-armed missile defense interceptors.

Catherine 48:02

Yeah.

Jeffrey 48:02

They're illegal in the United States. Ted Stevens said they were stupid.

Aaron 48:08

I've always thought the way we could use that against that is the way they advertise S-400.

Jeffrey 48:12

Well, that's what I'm thinking, too, is trying to get the Russians to move off a nuclear-armed ABM system around Moscow. Because as much as we talk about the instabilities generated by defenses, I'm terrified that in a crisis, when they flip that system on and they're primed to think an attack is coming, I'm terrified about an accidental launch of that system.

Aaron 48:37

Yeah, that's why you bring up Dead Hand too.

Jeffrey 48:39

Yeah, and a nuclear weapon goes off over Moscow or wherever they end up shooting it because maybe it's an exo-atmospheric intercept. Do they know that's their own if it's a false alarm?

Aaron 48:56

You know, I want to work with them on North Korea. It really terrifies me that they can't see into North Korea and they keep screwing up the missile launches.

Jeffrey 49:04

Yeah, I'm really, I wrote a little thing for the Daily Beast about that. I am very frightened that if we try to intercept a North Korean ICBM headed toward the United States as the salvo-fired interceptors burn up over Russia, the Russians are going to think that that's an attack.

Aaron 49:20

I do too. I mean, you know, so, and then when they constantly screw up range estimates coming out of the DPRK, I mean, at one point, prompting a response from Kim Jong-un or at least one of his cronies, It always catches my eye. It's like, you guys can't see into there, and so how would you know if we salvo fire?

I just... Yeah.

Jeffrey 49:44

No, I mean, when I look at this, I just think to myself, like, the Cold War was dangerous and scary. Why do we want to do this again? Like, we really can't... Figure out some better solution than reverting to this particular outcome. Like, it sucked. I was alive, I remember it. We should not do this again. Is well, see, you know, see, a listener got upset with us because he said we talked about the two W's too much, weather and wine. Then another listener got upset with us because he always ends the podcast upset, like, but where is the happy note here? Because I can't pivot to weather and wine, I'm in a cul-de-sac. Yeah, you know, happy note? Oh yeah.

Catherine 50:26

The Slack channel is doing wonderfully right now.

Jeffrey 50:32

I think my happy note is this. It's that, you know, this is not like North Korea. Like, we don't... That's not a happy note! No, it is! We don't have to do this.

Catherine 50:46

Okay, I see where you're going. We can pick a different outcome.

Jeffrey 50:49

You know, I think with North Korea... That got set in stone sometime between 2003 and 2006. You know, and everything since then has just been playing out. You know, like, I thought we should make the effort. I thought that we should try like hell to avoid the outcome that we were going to get. I still think we should try to keep it from getting worse.

But, you know, the fundamental policy decision was made. And, you know, it was made more than a decade ago. I don't think this decision is made yet. I think that we do still have time to put in place some structures that can keep this current period of hostility, which is really hostile, from turning into an arms race.

Like, you know... Like, I don't at all want to imply that this is done. You know, it's really the opposite. I think, you know, like... I'm trying to say like, let's look at where we are now and let's look at the direction we're headed in. And let's be honest about how this might go. And, and like, if we don't like that outcome, like let's pick something else.

Yeah, that's a positive happy now. But is it happier than the Slack channel, Scott?

Catherine 52:13

Nothing is happier than the Slack channel.

Jeffrey 52:17

Not even Disneyland, the happiest place on Earth?

Catherine 52:20

You have kids. You know that that is an outright lie. Yeah. Disneyland is hell made for people over 26.

Jeffrey 52:27

Well, I know why Disney's so happy. It's because they managed to drain my bank account.

Catherine 52:32

You know what will not drain your bank account? $5 a month for a membership on the Slack channel. That's correct. For $5 a month, or if you are a student with a .edu or equivalent email address, $3 per month, you can be part of the Arms Control Wonk Slack channel, which is currently a very exciting place. We're tossing around imagery and debating North Korean missiles, and now we're going to be debating Russian missiles again.

And it's going to be lovely.

Jeffrey 53:03

It is a ton of content.

Catherine 53:06

Yeah, it's like kind of a fire hose of content at times. I take a while to sometimes catch up with everything that's going down.

Jeffrey 53:14

I can't keep up with it all. I mean, it is like the most... I mean, that's great. Like, it is exciting. I try to go through. I try to leave comments. I try to respond when people talk to me.

Catherine 53:23

But holy cow. Yeah, the trick is to sort of like sit down and stake your claim and just like hang out for a little bit and then otherwise you're going to be lost in the tons of content that's currently generated.

Jeffrey 53:36

I think of it like a really interesting cocktail party at like CFR or IISS in the 60s.

Catherine 53:45

But it's like a cocktail party that literally never ends.

Jeffrey 53:48

Yeah, you pop on down, you see who's hanging out, you talk to some really interesting people. You day drink. You day drink. I'm all about the day drinking. And you can't take it all in, but that's fine because it's an embarrassment of riches.

Catherine 54:06

It's a wonderful community of people who are awesome to hang out with. We're currently in a fundraising drive to try and raise $2,000 per month so we can buy and distribute exciting satellite imagery of contemporary arms control and verification-related events. We have not reached that goal yet, but we're getting closer every day, so it's very exciting. We also have some cool benefits if you come in at the $15 a month level, some neat desk stuff for you.

Jeffrey 54:33

Let me tell you, though, I have been loving the stickers. I'm sticking them everywhere.

Catherine 54:38

Excellent.

Jeffrey 54:38

I've given them to all my colleagues here at CNS. I got one sitting on my computer. I got one on my desk. They're incredible. So things are hopping over on the Slack channel. You have a meetup. And if you were a member of the Slack channel, you would know when and where that incredibly awesome meetup would happen.

Catherine 54:57

Correct. It's coming up soon. Head over to the Slack channel. I'm just not sure. I think this episode will come out before then. There's a chance not, but okay.

Jeffrey 55:05

Well, anyway, the point is people on the Slack channel organize meetups.

Catherine 55:09

Yeah. We're doing our first official one.

Jeffrey 55:11

Yeah. Well, hopefully I'll get out to DC pretty soon and we'll do one that way. Big shebang. Boom, boom. Hey, Aaron. Yes? Yes? Thank you for joining me. Always a pleasure. Vladimir Putin and his missiles. And thank you for listening.