Assistant Secretary Rose Gottemoeller Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance today said New START is the first post Cold War treaty.
At the Media Availability at U.S. Strategic Command 2011 Deterrence Symposium, Ms. Gottemoeller highlighted that New START is going well: very well in its implementation so far.
“It’s been a very intense pace the inspections which only started in the first week of April. So there’s been a really steady pace of inspections in the last four months and frankly all of the concerns that were raised during the ratification debate are being assuaged now essentially by the process of implementation which is what, of course, we expected but people had to see how it went.” -Ms. Gottemoeller
She stressed that there is a long history of ups and downs in START and INF implementation. She added that as far as she’s concerned, she said it’s been a very good run so far, very pragmatic, very business-like, positive overall attitude on both sides.
“I think it paid off that we established this kind of business-like approach in Geneva during the negotiations: it’s kind of carried forward now into the implementation of the treaty. So, I like to say that New START is the first post Cold War treaty, even though structurally it’s still focused on limitations on ICBMs, SLBMs, and bombers. There are some post Cold War aspects with the way the Treaty is operating now.” -Ms. Gottemoeller
