Recently, some media reported that the United States and Russia reached an agreement in principle to freeze their respective nuclear warhead inventories, and the United States also hopes to set an upper limit on the number of nuclear warheads. However, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Ryabkov responded on 14th that Russia could not accept the US position on freezing nuclear arsenals. What is the purpose of the United States to set a ceiling on the number of nuclear warheads? What impact will this move have on the future fate of the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty?
American intercontinental missiles are equipped with nuclear warheads.
During the Cold War, there was a nuclear arms control with a ceiling.
It is no stranger to voluntarily freeze the size of nuclear arsenals and set a ceiling. This kind of move occurred during the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. The first stage of negotiations on the limitation of offensive strategic weapons (SALT-I) between the United States and the Soviet Union contained the content of limiting the upper limit of their respective strategic weapons. For example, the United States has 1,054 intercontinental ballistic missiles (when SALT-I negotiations were concluded), and the Soviet Union has 1,398 intercontinental ballistic missiles, which are limited to 1,618. There are 600 submarine-launched ballistic missiles in the United States, limited to the upper limit of 710, while the Soviet Union has 950, and the upper limit is 950. There are 37 strategic missile nuclear submarines in the United States, and the upper limit is limited to 44, while the Soviet Union has 63. Instead, it is necessary to cut one and limit it to 62. The United States and the Soviet Union did not impose restrictions on strategic bombers. At the same time, the negotiations between the United States and the Soviet Union at this stage also restricted and restrained strategic defensive weapons, and the ABM Treaty signed during the SALT-I negotiations made some positive contributions to maintaining strategic stability between the United States and the Soviet Union.
However, SALT-I is not a disarmament agreement in a positive sense. The United States and the Soviet Union aim at limiting each other’s arms expansion, with emphasis on control and restriction. As far as the United States is concerned, the achievement of SALT-I provides space for the United States to spare time and energy to improve the quality level of strategic deterrence. For example, the existing Trident missile and B-1 bomber in the United States are all developed during the relaxation period after the conclusion of SALT-I by the United States and the Soviet Union. As far as the Soviet Union is concerned, the number of nuclear weapons in the Soviet Union in the late 1960s was basically equal to that in the United States, and the use of the salt-I relaxation period can also improve the quality of nuclear weapons for the Soviet Union and accumulate capital for future confrontation with the United States.
Russian "Jarls" road mobile intercontinental missile.
During the three years from 1977 to 1979, the United States and the Soviet Union continued to negotiate the second stage of strategic offensive arms limitation (SALT-II). The main purpose of SALT-II was to implement the temporary agreement and related temporary constraints reached in SALT-I negotiations before, and form a real strategic arms limitation treaty. The negotiation result was that the United States and the Soviet Union signed the Treaty on Strategic Offensive Arms Limitation. As can be seen from the name, the arms control agreement reached by the United States and the Soviet Union at this stage is still based on restrictions, rather than real disarmament and reduction.
For example, according to the content of the treaty, when the United States and the Soviet Union negotiated, the United States owned 2,142 strategic projection weapons, including land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, sea-based submarine-launched ballistic missiles and strategic bombers, and the Soviet Union owned 2,318, and the United States and the Soviet Union were unified and limited to 2,250. The emergence of multi-warhead technology was the focus of technical attention between the United States and the Soviet Union in that period. The land-based multi-warhead missiles and sea-based multi-warhead missiles of the United States and the Soviet Union have also been restricted. At the time of negotiation, the United States had 1,046 land-based and sea-based submarine-launched missiles capable of carrying multiple warheads, and the Soviet Union had 588 land-based and sea-based submarine-launched missiles capable of carrying multiple warheads, which was limited to 1,200 according to the treaty. The technological capabilities of the United States and the Soviet Union, including the number of nuclear weapons, reached a peak in the Cold War before and during the SALT-II negotiations. The two countries were aware of the restrictions on strategic offensive weapons, but this restriction set an upper limit. Specifically, both SALT-I and SALT-II set an upper limit on the number of strategic offensive weapons of the other side, such as multi-warhead missiles. The upper limit set by SALT-II gave the Soviet Union room to continue to develop and increase multi-warhead missiles.
Russia has accelerated the modernization of nuclear weapons in recent years. The picture shows the newly developed "sarmat" liquid intercontinental missile.
What are the considerations for the United States to set a nuclear ceiling?
There are certain historical reasons for the SALT-I and SALT-II negotiations between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. For example, the United States was mired in the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 1970s, and its domestic economy was dragged down to some extent. In order to confront the United States in the Cold War, the Soviet Union neglected the livelihood economy, and the problems of the livelihood economy emerged in the early 1970s. In 1971, the ninth five-year plan for the Soviet economy formulated at the 24th Congress of the CPSU was not completed, and the production efficiency of consumer goods for the people’s livelihood was low. The domestic economic situation of the United States and the Soviet Union is not optimistic, and the two countries need to reduce the negative impact of the arms race on the economy. In addition, the technical level of strategic weapons of the two countries has been continuously broken, and both countries have strategic intentions to restrict the development of their opponents. However, the strength of the two countries is equal, and it is difficult to reach a mutually acceptable reduction agreement in a short time. Therefore, under the circumstances that it is difficult to achieve arms reduction in a short time and the prospect is uncertain, setting an upper limit and voluntarily freezing can not only achieve some restrictions on the other side, but also leave room for the development and operation of armaments. Restricting nuclear armaments has become the main manifestation of nuclear arms control behavior in the pre-cold war period between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Salt-I and Salt-II didn’t help to reduce armaments, but to a certain extent put a brake on the strategic arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union. The confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union still drives them to expand their strategic arms capabilities. It was not until the middle and late 1980s that the nuclear arms control between the United States and the Soviet Union began to transform into real reduction.
Now the United States and Russia are discussing freezing the number of nuclear warheads, and the United States proposes to set the upper limit of nuclear warheads, which is actually similar to the consideration of the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. On the one hand, both the United States and Russia have increased their investment in the development of strategic weapons in recent years. A series of new types of strategic weapons have been put into use in Russia, and the United States is also upgrading the modernization level of its nuclear arsenal and implementing nuclear expansion. The continuous withdrawal and breach of the contract by the United States has also undermined the strategic stable relationship between the United States and Russia. The prospect of the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty is worrying. Since it is difficult to reach an effective consensus on further reductions in the future, trying to freeze and set a ceiling is a move to build minimum mutual trust and ease the tension in strategic competition between the United States and Russia.
American B-61 nuclear bomb.
In addition, the US election is approaching. If the Trump administration throws out the idea of limiting and freezing the number of nuclear weapons at this time, it does not rule out that it is a consideration to alleviate its overly radical unilateralist security policy in the past four years and improve the image of Trump’s arms control saboteur. It is less than a month before the US election. If Trump wins the re-election, the upper limit of the number of nuclear weapons between the United States and Russia envisaged by the United States will actually provide flexible space for the United States to upgrade its nuclear arsenal and adjust the number of different nuclear weapons in the future. This is quite similar to the fact that although the United States and the Soviet Union conducted nuclear arms control in the middle period before the Cold War, the number of nuclear weapons became more and more controlled, and the nuclear weapons and equipment became more and more advanced. The United States intended to set a ceiling, which was tantamount to providing development space for the US nuclear arms expansion in disguise.
With the approach of the general election, the policy ideas of the two presidential candidates in the United States have gradually become clear, and Trump and Biden have different attitudes towards arms control. Trump, as always, emphasized "withdrawing from the treaty" for nuclear arms expansion, while Biden said that if elected, he would extend the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, reconsider returning to the Iranian nuclear deal in full compliance, shrink the Trump administration’s nuclear arms expansion plans, such as developing new nuclear warheads and new nuclear vehicles, and carefully consider the role of nuclear weapons. No matter who dies in the final US election, whether Trump continues to spoil the game or Biden makes up for it, the negative impact of the Trump administration’s destruction of international social security and stable relations between major powers in the past four years will be difficult to eliminate in a short time.
(The author is a postdoctoral fellow at Tsinghua University Institute of Social Sciences, studying arms control and national security.)