Old or New, It’s a Bad START for Missile Defense
Ricky Trotman /
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held the first of two committee hearings this Tuesday on the New START Treaty between the United States and the Russian Federation. Attended by Acting Chair Ted Kauffman (D-DE), Ranking Member Dick Lugar (R-IN), and briefly by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) the three senators pressed the Honorable Rose Gottemoeller and the Honorable Edward L Warner, III, two key negotiators for the START Treaty, on a number of key issues.
In a blog post earlier this week, Steven Groves listed four questions that should be addressed at the hearings, two of which were addressed today. In response to a question relating to special deals allegedly made between the Obama Administration and the Russian Federation, Mrs. Gottemoeller stated “unequivocally” that no backroom deals were made between the United States and Russia regarding missile defense. Furthermore, Senator DeMint asked the two witnesses why the negotiating record would not be released, which would ultimately allow the senators greater access into the details of the negotiating process. Mrs. Gottemoeller responded that there was no historical precedent for releasing the records (properly challenged by Senator DeMint) and went on to state that doing so has the potential to weaken the stance of negotiators in the future. (more…)