Moscow’s legal exit from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty is a direct result of US President Donald Trump’s failure to fully understand the consequences of leaving the deal in the first place, former CIA Officer Phil Giraldi told Sputnik.
On Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a federal law to suspend Moscow’s participation in the INF treaty. The Trump administration in Feb announced that it would exit the INF, which prompted Moscow to do the same, after the sides exchanged allegations of treaty violations. The US suspension of the 1987 treaty becomes official on Aug 2.
“Trump clearly does not understand that once an agreement is broken it cannot easily be fixed… partly because you are back to square one in the negotiations,” Giraldi said. “The side that stuck with the deal, in this case Russia, will now know that the United States cannot be trusted to stand by its commitments.”
Earlier, after talks in Washington on Wednesday, Vladimir Ermakov, the director of the Department for Non-Proliferation and Arms Control at the Russian Foreign Ministry, told Sputnik that “fundamental differences” will make restarting talks on the INF difficult.
Giraldi said Putin’s decision to sign the suspension into law is yet another step towards an arms race which Washington started.
“The major consequence will be that both Moscow and Washington will rearm with the middle range nuclear capable missiles that were banned by the treaty,” Giraldi added.
The idea of the agreement, Giraldi said, was to reduce the threat level in Europe, which it did, and the American withdrawal over allegations of cheating is “unfathomable.”
The INF treaty, signed in 1987, required both parties to eliminate and permanently forswear all of their nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of 500 to 5,500 kilometers (310 to 3,417 miles).
Since 2013, the United States has been accusing Russia of violating the INF treaty by allegedly testing and deploying the 9M729 ground-launched cruise missile, claiming it has a range of more than 500 kilometers. The Russian side denies these allegations. Russia has accused the United States of several violations of the INF treaty including deployment of the Aegis Ashore MK-41 defense system which can be used to launch cruise missiles at prohibited ranges. (UNI)
