-DR.

RAM MAHOHAR LOHIYA NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY-PUBLIC INTERNATIONAL LAW FINAL DRAFT-

DR. RAM MANOHAR LOHIYA NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY

LUCKNOW

ACADEMIC SESSION 2016-17

FINAL DRAFT ON:

START Treaties Between U.S.A. and U.S.S.R.

SUBMITTED BY: UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF:

PARIMAL BHATT Mr. Manwendra Kumar Tiwari

Roll no.: 99 Assistant Professor (Law)

SECTION B DR. RAM MANOHAR LOHIYA

B.A. LLB (Hons.), SEMESTER IV NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This draft would not have been possible without the kind support and help of
many individuals. I would like to extend my sincere thanks to all of them. I am
highly indebted to Mr. Manwendra Kumar Tiwari for his guidance and constant
supervision. I am grateful to my parents for their kind co-operation and
encouragement. Also, I am grateful to my colleagues who helped me out in its
development and all the other people who have willingly helped me out with
their abilities.

Yours sincerely,

Parimal Bhatt

Table of Contents

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT....................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION:...............................................................................................4
YEAR AND PLACE OF SIGNING OF THE TREATIES...................................5
START I.............................................................................................................5
START II...........................................................................................................5
New START.......................................................................................................5
START I................................................................................................................6
START II...............................................................................................................7
New START..........................................................................................................8
The Future.............................................................................................................9
BIBLIOGRAPHY...............................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION:
Rather than commencing with the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the nuclear age
actually began on the morning of July 16, 1945, near Alamogordo, New Mexico, with the
detonation of the worlds first nuclear weapon in the so-called Trinity Explosion. That test

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validated the design and functionality of the plutonium implosion device, nicknamed Fat
Man because of the round shape of the bomb casing. The Trinity Explosion produced a 21-
kiloton blast, the equivalent of exploding 21,000 tons of TNT. On August 9, 1945, less than
one month after the Trinity Explosion, a Fat Man implosion bomb was dropped on Nagasaki,
Japan, killing an estimated 40,000 people. This bombing, combined with the use of the Little
Boy uranium bomb against Hiroshima three days earlier, killed approximately 110,000
people and led to the end of World War II in the Pacific. 1 The explosion over Hiroshima, and
the subsequent detonation on Nagasaki, catalysed global collective action to address nuclear
arms control. Unfathomable dimensions of potential destruction transformed the concepts of
waging war and maintaining peace, and the public understood the risks.

Even as negotiations were occurring, the United States and the Soviet Union began a nuclear
arms race, with each striving to gain a military advantage over the other by building more and
more nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. This race led to a debate about the
appropriate means to deal with the nuclear arms problemi.e., arms control. Essentially,
collective arms control responses from 1925 to 1991 evolved into three types of agreements,
which focused on: (1) non-armament; (2) confidence-building measures; and (3) arms
limitations.

After 1991, the focus became arms reduction, which initially began as a bilateral measure,
but has since become multilateral due to the Soviet Unions dissolution. As the United States
and Soviet Union came to realize that their vast expenditures on nuclear weapons were not
making either side safer from the other, both parties were drawn to the negotiating table in the
late 1960s to discuss limits on strategic nuclear weapons. 2 These negotiations resulted in the
Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) Treaties, which later led to the START Treatiesthe
latest iteration of which is the New START Treaty. The relative merits of the New START
Treaty were debated at great length during the ratification process in the United States and in
the Russian Federation

1 F.G. Gosling, U.S. Dept of Energy, The Manhattan Project: Making The Atomic Bomb,
<https://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/Manhattan_Project_2010.pdf> accessed on 9th March
2017.

2 National Academy of Sciences, Nuclear Arms Control: Background and Issues. <
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11.html >.accessed on 9th March 2017.

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YEAR AND PLACE OF SIGNING OF THE TREATIES

START I
Signed: 31 July 1991
Lisbon Protocol: Signed 23 May 1992
Entered into Force: 5 December 1994
Duration: 15 years duration with option to extend for unlimited five year periods, if

all parties agree.

Expired: 5 December 2009
Parties: United States, Russian Federation, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine.

START II
Signed: 3 January 1993
Location: Moscow, Russia
Entered into Force: 14 April, 2000
Parties: United States, Russia (who officially withdrew from the treaty on 14 June

2002.)

New START
Signed: 8 April 2010
Entered into Force: 5 February 2011
Duration: 10 years duration with option to extend for no more than 5 years
Parties: United States, Russian Federation

START I
The START negotiations were successors to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks of the
1970s. In resuming strategic-arms negotiations with the Soviet Union in 1982, U.S.
Pres. Ronald Reagan renamed the talks START and proposed radical reductions, rather than
merely limitations, in each superpowers existing stocks of missiles and warheads. In 1983
the Soviet Union abandoned arms control talks in protest against the deployment of
intermediate-range missiles in western Europe. In 1985 START resumed, and the talks
culminated in July 1991 with a comprehensive strategic-arms-reduction agreement signed by
U.S. Pres. George H.W. Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. The new treaty was
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ratified without difficulty in the U.S. Senate, but in December 1991 the Soviet Union broke
up, leaving in its wake four independent republics with strategic nuclear weapons
Belarus, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Russia. In May 1992 the Lisbon Protocol was signed,
which allowed for all four to become parties to START I and for Ukraine, Belarus, and
Kazakhstan either to destroy their strategic nuclear warheads or to turn them over to Russia.
This made possible ratification by the new Russian Duma, although not before yet another
agreement had been reached with Ukraine setting the terms for the transfer of all the nuclear
warheads on its territory to Russia. All five START I parties exchanged the instruments of
ratification in Budapest on Dec. 5, 1994.

The START I treaty set limits to be reached in a first phase within three years and then a
second phase within five years. By the end of the second phase, in 1999, both the United
States and Russia would be permitted a total of 7,950 warheads on a maximum of 1,900
delivery vehicles (missiles and bombers). This limit involved reductions from established
levels of about 11,000 warheads on each side. Of the 7,950 permitted warheads, no more than
6,750 could be mounted on deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and
submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs). The treaty included demanding verification
measures, including on-site inspection, monitors at the Russian mobile ICBM factory
at Votkinsk, and access to missile telemetry, which provides details of the characteristics of
missiles being tested. By early 1997 Belarus and Kazakhstan had reached zero nuclear
warheads, and Ukraine destroyed its last ICBMs in 1999. The United States and Russia
reached the required levels for the second phase during 1997.

A third phase was to be completed by the end of 2001, when both sides were to get down to
6,000 warheads on a maximum of 1,600 delivery vehicles, with no more than 4,900 warheads
on deployed ICBMs and SLBMs. Although there had been concerns that this goal would not
be achieved because of the expense and difficulty of decommissioning weapons, both sides
enacted their cuts by 2001. The START I treaty expired on Dec. 5, 2009.3

During the negotiations on START I, one of the most controversial issues had been how to
handle limits on nuclear-armed cruise missiles, as verification would be difficult to
implement. The issue was finally handled by means of separate political declarations by

3 Lisa M. Schenck & Robert A. Youmans, From Start to Finish: A Historical Review of
Nuclear Arms Control Treaties and Starting Over with the New Start.

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which the two sides agreed to announce annually their planned cruise missile deployments,
which were not to exceed 880.

START II

Even as they agreed on the outline of START I in 1990, the United States and the Soviet
Union accepted that further reductions should be negotiated. However, real negotiations had
to wait for the elections that established the leadership of the new Russian Federation in
1992. The START II treaty was agreed on at two summit meetings between George H.W.
Bush and Russian Pres. Boris Yeltsin, the first in Washington, D.C., in June 1992 and the
second in Moscow in January 1993. Under its terms, both sides would reduce their strategic
warheads to 3,8004,250 by 2000 and to 3,0003,500 by 2003. They would also eliminate
multiple independent re-entry vehicles (MIRVs) on their ICBMsin effect eliminating two
of the more controversial missiles of the Cold War, the U.S. Peacekeeper missile and the
Russian SS-18. Later, in order to accommodate the delays in signing and ratifying START I,
the deadlines were put back to 2004 and 2007, respectively.

START II never actually came into force. The U.S. Senate did not ratify the treaty until 1996,
largely because the parallel process was moving so slowly in the Russian Duma. There the
treaty became a hostage to growing Russian irritation with Western policies in the Persian
Gulf and the Balkans and then to concerns over American attitudes toward the Anti-Ballistic
Missile (ABM) Treaty. The Russian preference would have been for far lower final levels, as
Russia lacked the resources to replace many of its aging weapons systems, but achieved at a
slower pace, because it also lacked the resources for speedy decommissioning. In 2000 the
Duma linked the fate of START II to the ABM Treaty, and in June 2002, following the United
States withdrawal from the ABM Treaty, the Duma repudiated START II.4

New START

The New START Treaty is composed of three tiers of increasing levels of detail: the Treaty
text, the Protocol to the Treaty, and the Technical Annexes. All three tiers will be legally
binding. The Treaty Text and Protocol contain the basic rights and obligations of the Treaty.
The Treaty also includes a standard withdrawal clause that states each Party has the right to

4 Id.

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withdraw from this Treaty if it decides that extraordinary events related to the subject matter
of the Treaty have jeopardized its supreme interests. Upon entry into force of the New
START Treaty, the 2002 Moscow Treaty will be terminated.5

The aggregate limits of the Treaty restrict the United States and Russia to 1,550
deployed strategic warheads each. Warheads actually deployed on ICBMs and SLBMs count
toward this limit while each deployed heavy bomber equipped for nuclear armaments
whether with gravity bombs or ALCMs counts as one warhead. The Treaty also includes an
aggregate limit of 800 deployed and non-deployed ICBM launchers, SLBM launchers, and
heavy bombers equipped for nuclear armaments. Within that limit, the number of deployed
ICBMs, SLBMs, and heavy bombers cannot exceed 700. The United States and Russia must
implement the necessary reductions to reach these limits no later than seven years after the
Treaty's entry into force. Within the aggregate limits, each State has the flexibility to
determine the structure of its strategic forces.6

The Treaty does not place any constraints on the testing, development or deployment of
current or planned U.S. missile defense programs or U.S. long-range conventional strike
capabilities.

In order to promote the objectives and implementation of the Treaty's provisions, the Parties
will establish the Bilateral Consultative Commission, which will meet no less than twice a
year in Geneva.

Protocol to the Treaty: The Protocol to the Treaty is organized into ten parts: Terms and Their
Definitions, Categories of Data Pertaining to Strategic Offensive Arms, Conversion or
Elimination Procedures, Notifications, Inspection Activities, Bilateral Consultative
Commission, Telemetric Information, Provisional Application, Agreed Statements, and Final
Provisions.7

5 New Start <https://www.state.gov/t/avc/newstart/> accessed on 15th March 2017.

6 BBC Europe, Q&A: New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (Start)

<http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-12066494> accessed on 13th March 2017.

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The Future
If the New START Treaty should expire after its ten-year duration has run its course, what
will happen next? While it is difficult to predict the future of the SALT/START process, there
are some predictable paths that might be chosen. For example, the process could take a more
multilateral approach to nuclear arms control. A new New START Treaty could seek to
include additional parties, perhaps beginning with the United Kingdom and France, and
possibly including the Peoples Republic of China, Pakistan and our country, India.

The SALT/START process has not been without flaws, or without critics. As the United
States and Russian Federation are in the second decade of the twenty-first century, one can
question whether mature nations such as these continue to need an arms control treaty to
guide their actions. One could also question the extent to which the SALT and START
Treaties contributed to keeping the peace between the nuclear superpowers over the past forty
years. Clearly other factors were at worke.g., the military might of both sides, skilled and
diligent diplomacy, each sides growing economic interests in the other, and the fact that both
sides were rational adversaries of one another. Nevertheless, if the SALT and START Treaties
made even the slightest contribution to preventing a nuclear war, then that may be reason
enough for this process to continue.

Very recently, the president elect of the United States of America, Mr. Donald Trump has
brought about some humorous developments to the New START when he said that the United
States has fallen behind in its weapons capacity and he wants America to be at the top of the
pack. This was the first time the US president made publicly known his stance on the New
START Treaty, calling it a one-sided deal. Just another bad deal that the country made,
whether it's START, whether it's the Iran deal ... We're going to start making good deals, he
stated.8

7Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on Measures For
The Further Reduction And Limitation Of Strategic Offensive Arms (New Start.). <
http://www.nti.org/learn/treaties-and-regimes/treaty-between-the-united-states-of-america-
and-the-russian-federation-on-measures-for-the-further-reduction-and-limitation-of-strategic-
offensive-arms/> accessed on 15th March 2017.

8 Andrei Akulov, President Trump Decries New START Treaty. < http://www.strategic-
culture.org/news/2017/02/27/president-trump-decries-new-start-treaty.html> accessed on 18th
March 2017.

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Essentially, nuclear arms control negotiations continue to be an activity for the superpowers.
Perhaps, limiting the response to this global problem to the superpowers, rather than
attempting global collective action, is the way of the future. In any case, the key players
continue to be responsible for crafting a response, albeit among only themselves.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Articles

F.G. Gosling, U.S. Dept of Energy, The Manhattan Project: Making The Atomic
Bomb.
National Academy of Sciences, Nuclear Arms Control: Background and Issues.
Lisa M. Schenck & Robert A. Youmans, From Start to Finish: A Historical Review of
Nuclear Arms Control Treaties and Starting Over with the New Start.

Online Resources

New Start at https://www.state.gov/t/avc/newstart/

Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on Measures
For The Further Reduction And Limitation Of Strategic Offensive Arms (New Start.).
at http://www.nti.org/learn/treaties-and-regimes/treaty-between-the-united-states-of-
america-and-the-russian-federation-on-measures-for-the-further-reduction-and-
limitation-of-strategic-offensive-arms/

Web News Articles

BBC Europe, Q&A: New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (Start)

Andrei Akulov, President Trump Decries New START Treaty at http://www.strategic-
culture.org/news/2017/02/27/president-trump-decries-new-start-treaty.html

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