PONI Debates the Issues

By John K. Warden

Russia and the United States have reached an “agreement in principle” on a new START.

According to some reports, the major issues have been worked out and we should expect an agreement soon.  As I wrote a couple weeks ago, the major hold-up in negotiations was verification details, specifically the sharing of telemetry data.  According to Jonathan Weisman at the Wall Street Journal, that and other disagreements were worked out in the last couple weeks:

The breakthrough on a follow-on treaty to the now-lapsed Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty came two weeks ago when National Security Adviser James Jones and Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, went to Moscow to work through two issues on verification, the sharing of data on missile flight tests and inspections at missile production facilities, White House officials said.
The deal was approved in principle last week during a phone conversation between Mr. Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.
Under the agreement, the Russians will share flight-test data, something they had resisted as they develop more-modern ballistic missiles. But monitoring of a key ballistic-missile site in Russia, which ended in 2008, won't resume, according to officials familiar with the accord.

However, many are skeptical of the report.  After all, various Russian and American officials have said an agreement was “very close” and “nearing completion” for months now.  Is “agreement in principle” just another way of saying “almost there”?

After all, Weisman’s article and others quote officials on both sides saying that translating the agreement to treaty text could take months.  A Russian presidential aide said that it would be realistic to expect a signed agreement by March or April.

If in fact the major issues have been resolved, then the latest reports might mean more than “almost there.”  There has already been speculation about where the signing ceremony will take place, and a Russian lawmaker is planning on visiting the United States to begin coordinating the ratification effort.  These are signs that agreement on START is less a matter of if then when.