A New Arms Deal With Russia?

U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates testifies before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Feb. 6 during a hearing on the 2009 budget request for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Matthew Cavanaugh / EPA (Photo from MSNBC)

Gates Suggests New Arms Deal With Russia
-- Washington Post

Next President Should Engage Moscow on Warhead Reduction, Defense Secretary Says

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said yesterday that he would advise the next president to seek a new nuclear arms agreement with Russia that provides for further reductions in nuclear warheads, keeps the existing verification procedures and is easy to amend in the event threats develop.

No matter who is elected president, Gates said, "there is a willingness and an ability to make deeper reductions" below the limit of 1,700 to 2,200 deployed warheads called for in a June 2003 treaty signed by President Bush and then-President Vladimir Putin. "I am confident that . . . whoever is elected president, we will go to the bargaining table," Gates said in response to a question at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he delivered a wide-ranging speech on nuclear weapons.

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My Comment: This will not fly in an Obama Administration