Minutes after President Donald Trump announced Tuesday that John Bolton would leave his job as national security adviser, voices in the arms control community wondered if the White House now would be more likely to extend the New START nuclear-weapon treaty with Russia.
“Is there hope for the New START Treaty?” Madelyn Creedon, principal deputy administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) under President Barack Obama, asked on Twitter.
Is there hope for the New START Treaty?
“Trump fires John Bolton as national security adviser, saying he ‘disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions”
By Washington Post Staff
September 10 at 12:05 PM— madelyn creedon (@mrc5920) September 10, 2019
Creedon was far from alone in seeing an upside for New START in Bolton’s departure.
“I now realize the noise I heard earlier was a collective sigh of relief from every person on earth,” tweeted Nickolas Roth, a senior research associate for Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. “This is an opportunity for Trump to take steps to reduce the risk of nuclear catastrophe w/ Russia, North Korea, China, etc. Start by renewing New START.”
New START, signed during the Obama administration, caps deployed U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear warheads at 1,550: a limit with ramifications both for global foreign policy and for day-to-day stockpile modernization work at the NNSA. Bolton, who generally opposes any agreement that limits U.S. power in any way, had expressed skepticism that the United States would sign off on the authorized five-year extension of the treaty past its February 2021 expiration.
Trump himself has signaled he would prefer a new trilateral nuclear treaty that includes China as well as Russia and the U.S. The White House has also said that any follow-on to New START should cover tactical nuclear weapons — those intended purely for battlefield use — as well as novel nuclear weapons, such as the uncrewed, nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed submersible Russia has said it is developing.
In press conferences Tuesday not long after Trump’s noontime announcement of Bolton’s exit, neither a White House spokesperson nor Secretary of State Michael Pompeo suggested any change in the administration’s nuclear arms-control policies.
Bolton’s “priorities and policies just don’t line up with the president,” White House spokesman Hogan Gidley said.
Pompeo, too, said he often disagreed with Bolton’s policy positions. CNN and other news outlets reported this week that Trump is considering expanding Pompeo’s remit to include the national security adviser job.
Bolton was widely credited with speeding the Trump administration’s withdrawal in August from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which forbade the U.S. and Russia from deploying ground-based missiles with ranges of 310 miles to 3,100 miles or so, along with the Obama-era Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or Iran nuclear deal: a non-treaty agreement under which Iran agreed to limit its production of fissile material.
Bolton leaves his post after about a year and-a-half on the job. Just last month, he met with senior NNSA leadership in Washington, tweeting a picture of himself and NNSA Administrator Lisa Gordon-Hagerty with a mockup of the B83 nuclear gravity bomb.
.@LGHNNSA, appreciate the update on our nuclear modernization program. Ensuring the health of our deterrent is vital. Thanks to all the fine employees at #NNSA pic.twitter.com/UWeNFi7CnI
— John Bolton (@AmbJohnBolton) August 22, 2019
A veteran of previous Republican administrations, Bolton joined the Trump administration in April 2018 as its third national security adviser. Trump claimed he asked Bolton to resign on Monday night. Bolton claimed he resigned Tuesday morning, after offering the president his unsolicited resignation the previous night. As recently as Tuesday morning, reporters were told Bolton was scheduled to brief senior administration officials that afternoon.
Media reported Tuesday that Trump and Bolton reached their breaking point over the president’s approach to peace talks with the Afghan Taliban — talks the State Department spearheaded, and which Trump reportedly torpedoed at Bolton’s urging.
Generally, Bolton tended to oppose Trump’s desire to negotiate face-to-face with high-profile U.S. adversaries such as North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Trump has met with Kim, but not Rouhani.
An Iranian representative told the United Nations on Tuesday that Bolton’s departure would not lead to talks between Trump and Rouhani, according to Iranian state-run media.
