Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON -- Senior U.S. defense officials said Washington and Moscow have not yet identified the means by which they would extend key verification provisions of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, even though it would be virtually impossible to meet a December deadline for ratifying a replacement for the 1991 pact (see GSN, Oct. 6).

"We still believe we can finish the negotiations and get an agreement by Dec. 5," even if approval by the U.S. Senate and Russian parliament cannot be completed by that date, said Alexander Vershbow, assistant defense secretary for international security affairs.

"And so whether one needs to extend the old agreement or whether one can -- as is customary when you've signed new agreements -- provisionally apply them till ratification, that's I think still an open question," he told reporters this morning at a Defense Writers Group breakfast.

The 18-year-old START accord includes "an intrusive verification regime" that mandates "detailed data exchange, extensive notifications, 12 types of on-site inspection, and continuous monitoring activities designed to help verify that signatories are complying with their treaty obligations" to restrict nuclear weapons and delivery systems, according to the Federation of American Scientists.

Vershbow said provisional implementation of a new accord's verification protocols would be "preferred" over an extension of the old agreement. However, he would not speculate on how the two sides might agree to extend the existing treaty's verification provisions if a new pact has yet to be signed by the START expiration date.

Another defense official said yesterday that it appears there are no set plans yet for avoiding a gap in verification measures, but he expressed confidence that the matter could be resolved in time.

"We really haven't developed contingency plans, to my knowledge, for what do we do if we don't get a START follow-on by Dec. 5," said Michael Nacht, assistant defense secretary for global strategic affairs.

"The Russians tend to have a negotiating style where they leave a lot of things for the last minute," he said during a panel discussion at the Atlantic Council. "We are used to this."

Envoys from the two nations are expected to meet Oct. 19 in Geneva for a seventh round of negotiations aimed at concluding what is now being termed a "New START" agreement.

In July, U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed to reduce their nations' respective deployed strategic nuclear stockpiles to between 1,500 and 1,675 warheads under the forthcoming treaty, down from a 2,200-warhead cap set by the 2002 Moscow Treaty for implementation by 2012. The leaders also agreed to limit strategic delivery vehicles on each side to between 500 and 1,100.

It remains unclear how far the two sides have progressed during negotiations in sorting out how the New START accord would be verified. It appears that both Washington and Moscow value the opportunities the 1991 treaty has afforded them for gaining insight into the other's defense technology and posture, according to experts. The verification provisions have also helped build confidence between the two former Cold War adversaries, advocates say.

However, Russian officials have complained at times that the pact's on-site inspections and missile test data exchanges are overly cumbersome and expensive.

Nacht underscored the challenges facing U.S. diplomats in bridging differences with their Russian counterparts -- not only on verification issues but also on matters as crucial as deployed warheads or trivial as snacks on the negotiating table.

"Nothing is easy. The quality of the peanuts at the table is a whole problem," said Nacht, citing a three-year experience negotiating with Moscow as an Arms Control and Disarmament Agency official during the Clinton administration. "But it's our judgment that they want a deal for lots of reasons, and if the deal's right, we would like a deal. And that's a pretty good set of ingredients."

Should a new agreement be unattainable by early December, "we're going to try to work something out to extend the life of the treaty and extend the verification procedures," he said. "Obviously, it's very important for confidence-building on both sides. They have things they want to verify, too, and they can't do everything they want without cooperative measures."

Absent a ratified agreement, Washington and Moscow could potentially strike an "executive agreement" that would allow them to continue some or all of the old START verification provisions until such time as they are replaced by new protocols, according to Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association.

Or, the two sides might opt not to implement any verification procedures for a limited time period, pending a soon-to-be-ratified replacement agreement, he said.

That said, "over time, the loss of that information [would] negatively impact the respective countries' ability to understand what the other is doing," Kimball told Global Security Newswire in a brief telephone interview today.