A STRONG START

• Published in: Foreign affairs (New York, N.Y.) Vol. 95; no. 1; pp. 191 - 192
• Main Author: ANDREASEN, STEVE
• Format: Magazine Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Council on Foreign Relations 01.01.2016; Council on Foreign Relations, Inc; Council on Foreign Relations NY
• Subjects: Foreign policy; Kissinger, Henry A; Letters to the Editor; Nuclear security; Nuclear tests; Nuclear weapons; Obama, Barack; Presidents; Crimea; Iran; United States > US; Europe; Russia
• ISSN: 0015-7120; 2327-7793

Backed by this strong nonpartisan consensus-supported by two-thirds of former U.S. secretaries of state and defense and national security advisers, plus a chorus of their peers from around the world-Obama followed through on his campaign commitment once elected and made nuclear weapons the subject of a major foreign policy address in Prague in 2009, where he expressed "America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons." The 2010 New start agreement between the United States and Russia will produce modest and verifiable reductions in strategic arms, and the nuclear security summits have been an innovative approach to securing nuclear materials around the globe. [...]the Iran nuclear deal is an accomplishment directly tied to the president's Prague agenda. The United States has not moved from a nuclear triad (nuclear-capable strategic bombers, land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, and submarine-launched ballistic missiles) to a nuclear dyad, leaving the next administration with an unaffordable nuclear modernization program that would undermine conventional capabilities.