On August 1, at 17.00, the Valdai Discussion Club hosted an expert discussion, titled “The end of the INF Treaty: Will the world lose its arms control system?”
On August 2, the INF Treaty will finally cease to exist. In February, 2019, US President Donald Trump officially announced the suspension, for six months, of the INF Treaty, pending a full withdrawal in early August. Many suspect that the United States has long and purposefully moved towards breaking the treaty. In July, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on the suspension of the INF Treaty.
Breaking the INF Treaty will be the Trump administration's second step towards dismantling the international arms control system; the US has already withdrawn from the ABM Treaty. In February 2021, the START III Treaty expires. In late June, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Moscow and Washington had discussed the issue of extending or replacing START III, but it is too early to talk about specific results.
What are the risks that the INF Treaty will end? Will the agreement on strategic offensive arms suffer the same fate? What awaits the arms control system as a whole and what does Europe think about it? The participants of the expert discussion answered these and other questions.
Speakers:
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Dmitry Suslov, Deputy Director at the Centre for Comprehensive European and International Studies, National Research University Higher School of Economics;
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Evgeny Buzhinsky, Chairman of the PIR Centre Council;
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Samuel Charap, Leading Researcher at RAND Corporation (via video link).
Moderator:
- Timofei Bordachev, programme director of the Valdai Discussion Club.