WPSR: Nuclear Policy Positions & Statements

Statement on Suspension of NEW START Treaty

For over a decade, New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) has limited U.S.-Russian strategic nuclear arsenals to 1,550 deployed weapons for each country. At a time when the international arms control regime has deteriorated, New START had allowed both countries’ governments to have inspections into each other’s arsenals, a critical element of preventing dangerous misunderstandings, potential catastrophic accidents, and planning for worst-case scenarios. 

This week, Russian President Vladimir Putin suspended Russia’s implementation of New START, the last nuclear treaty that remains between Russia and the United States. While Russia did not withdraw, this does signal that intent. The treaty expires in 2026.

Russia claims that it will keep to deployed warhead limits, but has halted the critical inspection and verification process. Under New START, both countries have had access to invasive searches and inspections of their respective nuclear arsenals. Inspections and talks have stalled with the ongoing proxy war, with Russia recently pulling out of planned talks in Cairo, Egypt, citing the United States ongoing military aid to Ukraine. 

This abdication of the most important arms control treaty takes place against a backdrop of numerous global nuclear threats. The Biden administration has quietly admitted to allowing the Iran Nuclear Deal to die, as Israel makes nuclear threats against the country. China has begun to increase its ICBM capacity as the US continues to posture militarily towards the country, and North Korea continues to test long range missiles. Tensions remain sharp between India and Pakistan. The world is in the middle of a new nuclear arms race. 

The fragile state of the world’s last nuclear arms control treaties belies two truths: we must doggedly pursue diplomacy in Russia and Ukraine, keeping diplomatic channels open, and we must rebuild a mass nuclear abolition and peace movement in the United States. Nuclear war is not an option. Military escalation is not a solution. While the arms race unfolds, economic disparities and climate change worsens in Russia and the United States, as it does everywhere. It’s time for a new era of global cooperation and peace, and the U.S. should be setting the example and leading the way. The world is counting on us. Congress and the Biden Administration need to take the initiative and end the US policy of First Use, halt the incredibly costly rebuild of our land-based Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles, and pass H. Res. 77, entering the US into the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. 

As Americans, we must create the political context for this legislation to be possible. We must organize and build a mass movement to stop nuclear armageddon. We implore all Washingtonians to join the Washington Against Nuclear Weapons Coalition, and help us build that movement in our state and beyond. 

75 years later, threat of nuclear weapons remains

The 75th anniversary of the U.S. nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki recently passed. Reflecting on the wholesale slaughter that resulted from these attacks is important. However it is essential that every American and indeed every world citizen know where we are at today regarding nuclear weapons.

To say that we are pushing ever closer to nuclear catastrophe is a vast understatement. We are inching ever closer to nuclear apocalypse and the catalyst for this insanity is U.S. militarism. We need to come to terms with several realities. One is that the Trump administration has with intent and precision gutted and destroyed virtually every arms treaty that helped hold the world together these past decades. The shredding of these binding nuclear treaties has opened the door to nuclear proliferation that will put the entire planet on hair-trigger alert.

Deployment of low-yield nuclear weapons lowers the threshold for war

Current tensions with Iran, and President Donald Trump’s impulsive decision-making in a very volatile environment, create an increased risk of actual use of nuclear weapons that should be sobering to all Americans. The U.S. Defense Department confirmed on Feb. 5 that the Navy has deployed a low-yield, submarine-launched ballistic missile warhead. Bill Arkin and Hans Kristensen of the Federation of American Scientists first disclosed the deployment a week before that.

Priorities: Putting war over healthcare spells doom

“We have spent $6.4 trillion on the war on terror. Congress plans spending $1.7 trillion on our nuclear arsenal and $1.5 trillion on the F-35 “flying turkey.” Using such weapons would end civilization.

“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.” -Martin Luther King Jr.”

ICAN wins the Nobel Peace Prize! Read our Press Release. 

Video: Confronting the New Nuclear Arms Race

Featured Articles:

Read letters to the editor highlighting the united nation's historic 2017 negotiations to ban nuclear weapons:

"US Representative to the UN boycotts talks on nuclear weapons ban," Karen Farnsworth, West Seattle Blog, March 28, 2017

"Nuclear weapons: Shine light on nuke ban proposal," Susan Donaldson, The Tacoma News Tribune, April 6, 2017

"Work with the United Nations," Barbara Sardarov, The West Seattle Herald, April 17, 2017