U.S.-Russia nuclear arms control pact expires after half a century

The Kremlin said Thursday it regretted the expiration of the last remaining nuclear arms pact between Russia and the United States that left no caps on the two atomic arsenals.

The Kremlin said Thursday it regretted the expiration of the last remaining nuclear arms pact between Russia and the United States that left no caps on the two largest atomic arsenals for the first time in more than a half-century.

Arms control experts say the termination of the New START Treaty could set the stage for an unconstrained nuclear arms race.

Russian President Vladimir Putin last year declared his readiness to stick to the treaty’s limits for another year if Washington followed suit, but U.S. President Donald Trump has been noncommittal about extending it. He has indicated that he wants China to be a part of a new pact — something Beijing has rebuffed.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday that Trump has made clear “in order to have true arms control in the 21st century, it’s impossible to do something that doesn’t include China because of their vast and rapidly growing stockpile.”

Putin discussed the pact’s expiration with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Wednesday, noting the U.S. failure to respond to his proposal to extend its limits and saying that Russia “will act in a balanced and responsible manner based on thorough analysis of the security situation,” Kremlin adviser Yuri Ushakov said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow views the treaty’s expiration Thursday “negatively” and regrets it. He said Russia will maintain its “responsible, thorough approach to stability when it comes to nuclear weapons,” adding that “of course, it will be guided primarily by its national interests.”

With the end of the treaty, Moscow “remains ready to take decisive military-technical measures to counter potential additional threats to the national security,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

“At the same time, our country remains open to seeking political-diplomatic ways to comprehensively stabilize the strategic situation on the basis of equal and mutually beneficial dialogue solutions, if the appropriate conditions for such cooperation are shaped,” it said in a statement issued late Wednesday.