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United StatesBack to the Acronym home page. For latest statements, speeches & Acronym coverage on the US click here President Barack Obama took office against a background of increasing calls for progress on a range of urgent non-proliferation, security and disarmament challenges. With particular relevance for US nuclear policy, these include CTBT entry into force, (which requires ratification by the US Senate, as well as 8 remaining countries); fissile material negotiations in the Conference on Disarmament; and further deep cuts in existing nuclear arsenals – between them, Russia and the United States still have over 20,000 nuclear weapons. Following a joint statement on bilateral arms control with President Medvedev of Russia, Obama set out his administration’s positive approach to nuclear disarmament, in a major policy speech on 5 April 2009 in which he declared that the US would lead efforts to make progress towards a nuclear weapon-free world. He initiated and chaired a historic session of heads of state of the UN Security Council on 24 September 2009, which adopted UNSC Resolution 1887. Though criticised by some developing states for its emphasis on non-proliferation and increased obligations on non-nuclear-weapon states, Resolution 1887 opened with a commitment to “seek a safer world for all and to create the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons” and called for “for broad progress on long-stalled efforts to staunch the proliferation of nuclear weapons and ensure reductions in existing weapons stockpiles, as well as control of fissile material” Obama’s progressive rhetoric on the nuclear disarmament was a major contributor in the decision by the Norwegian Nobel Prize Committee to award him the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize. A year into Obama’s presidency, and there are concerns that the US and Russia have not yet secured the bilateral nuclear weapons reduction treaty intended as a follow-on to the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which formally expired in December 2009. With the Obama administration not yet prepared to send the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) to the US Senate for ratification, fears are growing that the delayed Nuclear Posture Review may fail to transform US nuclear doctrine, force configurations and deterrence posture as would be necessary for laying the groundwork and making progress on the “peace and security of a world free of nuclear weapons” that Obama pledged in Prague. Selected statements and speeches:
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START agreement, April 2010
Nuclear Posture Review, April 2010
US Nuclear Security Summit, 17-18 April 2010
Carnegie Nuclear Non-Proliferation Conference, April 2009Acronym Institute Executive Director Dr Rebecca Johnson was part of a plenary panel on International Expectations of the Obama Administration, chaired by Naila Bolus of the Ploughshares Fund. Transcripts, video and audio recordings of the panel are available from the CEIP website at: http://www.carnegieendowment.org/events/?fa=eventDetail&id=1301 New US AdministrationNuclear Policy
US-Russia Relations and START
Relations with Iran
Policy on North Korea
Key Documents
Disarmament Diplomacy
For an archive of material on US nuclear policy including US-Russia relations go to: www.acronym.org.uk/start. © 2010 The Acronym Institute. |