DATE=4/14/2000
TYPE=BACKGROUND REPORT
TITLE=START-TWO POLITICS
NUMBER=5-46132
BYLINE=JIM RANDLE
DATELINE=PENTAGON
CONTENT=
VOICED AT: 


INTRO:  Arms control advocates in the United States 
are welcoming Friday's vote in the Russian parliament 
to ratify a long-delayed nuclear arms reduction 
treaty.  But several experts on strategic issues say 
the tangled politics of arms control mean there are 
doubts whether the START-Two treaty will ever go into 
effect.  V-O-A's Jim Randle reports from the Pentagon.

TEXT:  The lower house of Russia's parliament, the 
Duma, ratified the START-Two nuclear arms reduction 
treaty Friday, and the upper house is expected approve 
the pact soon.

The U-S Senate ratified a version of the treaty in 
1996, but Russian approval was delayed by Communist 
members of the Duma.

The START-Two treaty would cut the number of nuclear 
warheads in each sides' arsenal to between three-
thousand and three-thousand-500 over the next seven 
years.

In Washington, the president of the Arms Control 
Association, Spurgeon Keeney, says the cuts are a step 
toward a safer world, and he is delighted by the 
Russian vote.

The A-C-A is a private group that studies strategic 
issues and advocates reducing the number of nuclear 
weapons.  He says the U-S Senate will take another 
look at the treaty because the version passed by 
Russia's Duma is different than the pact long-ago 
approved by the Senate.

Mr. Keeney says it is not certain that the Senate will 
pass the modified bill because Republican majority 
opposes many arms control efforts.

            /// Keeney Act ///

      One has to remember that the Senate recently 
      refused to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban 
      Treaty, which was less controversial.

            /// End Act ///

Mr. Keeney says there are several provisions passed by 
the Russians at the same time as the START-TWO vote 
that will annoy Senate Republicans.  One says Moscow 
may back out of the arms reduction treaty if 
Washington backs out of another treaty that puts sharp 
limits on defenses against ballistic missiles.

Heritage Foundation researcher Baker Spring says 
Senate Republicans will never give up on U-S missile 
defenses, but are likely to approve the new START 
treaty.

            /// Spring Act ///

      The question is what will the Russian Government 
      do pursuant to the Duma's directions if the 
      United States does not do a whole host of things 
      that have nothing to do with START-Two ...

            /// End Act ///

Mr. Spring says the result could be an arms reduction 
treaty signed by both sides that has no impact in the 
real world.

At the height of the Cold War, the Soviet Union and 
the United States each fielded about 12-thousand 
nuclear warheads.

Arms control efforts have already cut that number in 
half, and START-Two would bring another 50 per cent 
reduction.  The two sides have held discussions on a 
proposed START-Three treaty that would cut another one 
thousand weapons on each side.  That would leave 
perhaps 25-hundred atomic weapons in each of the two 
arsenals. 

One "small" nuclear bomb was enough to flatten the 
city of Hiroshima at the end of World War Two.  Some 
newer weapons have many, many times the power of that 
early, crude, nuclear bombs. . (Signed)

NEB/JR/JP




14-Apr-2000 17:46 PM EDT (14-Apr-2000 2146 UTC)
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Source: Voice of America
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