It's a START

The same week as the release of a new U.S. nuclear strategy, a New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty is to be signed in Prague Thursday by the Presidents of Russia and the United States.
Well known is the treaty's acronym, START. Or, to use the term preferred by the White House, New START. (Prior posts on nuclear policy are here, here, and here.)
"New START" marks a distinction from START I, a multilateral treaty due to expire toward the end of this year. START I had been negotiated before the fall of the Soviet Union; it entered into force thereafter, with Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, and the United States exchanging instruments of ratification in Budapest on December 5, 1994.
Another reason for preferring "New START": START II proved a bit of a false start. Signed in 1993 by U.S. President George H.W. Bush and Russian President Boris Yeltsin and fully ratified by 2000, the treaty never was implemented. As explained in a Moscow Times story yesterday,

Russia withdrew from START II in 2002, the day after the United States withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

The aim of START I was to reduce levels of "strategic offensive arms" -- including nuclear warheads and intercontinental ballistic missiles -- in 3 phases. At the end, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine were to "have no strategic nuclear forces," while U.S. and Russian "strategic arsenals" were to be "reduced by 30–40 percent."

New START, announced a week ago Monday, is the result of protracted negotiations that included the Presidents' side meeting during Copenhagen, the December climate change conference. As described by former State Department official Stephen Sestanovich, now a Columbia diplomacy professor and a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations the 2 countries have detailed in New START

cuts of hundreds of strategic nuclear warheads and delivery vehicles as the main lever of their so-called 'reset.'

(photo credit; and see here) Also key, according to the White House, is a "verification regime" that "will provide the ability to monitor all aspects of the Treaty."

Promising stuff, at least through signing. But then comes the ratification. Although Sestanovich is optimistic, some predict ratification difficulties Stateside:

[T]he Russian daily Kommersant reported that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev likely won't have difficulty getting the Russian Parliament to ratify the agreement, but U.S. President Barack Obama will have a harder time achieving the two-thirds majority needed for passage by the U.S. Senate [right].

Perhaps more than one new start is in order.

On October 23

On this day in ...
... 1941, the World War II atrocity known as the Odessa massacre was under way. It had begun the day before and would last another day, and during that time Romanian forces allied with Nazi Germany would kill, by shooting, hanging, or burning, 25,000 to 34,000 Jewish persons from a part of Ukraine including Odessa and neighboring towns. At war's end a number of those responsible would be tried,convicted, and executed; others served terms of imprisonment.

(Prior October 23 posts are here and here.)

On January 14

On this day in ...

... 1972, the woman born Margrethe Alexandrine Þórhildur Ingrid (prior post) ascended the throne to become Queen Margrethe II of Denmark (left). Despite the "II," it had been quite a while since a Danish monarch bore her name. Indeed, none had been named anything other than Frederik or Christian since 1513 (for good measure, her son, the Crown Prince, is named Frederik André Henrik Christian) -- and none had been a woman since the death in 1412 of Margrethe I, regent and the current queen's namesake. (photo credit)

... 1994 (15 years ago today), in Moscow, U.S. President Bill Clinton, Russian President Boris Yeltsin, and Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk signed a Trilateral Statement and Annex. The agreement included U.S. promises to aid the latter 2 countires, as well as promises by all 3 to continue to work to reduce nuclear arsenals, in part by deactivating nuclear warheads in Ukraine (right).

On December 27

On this day in ...

... 1703 (305 years ago today), in Lisbon, England and Portugal signed a commercial treaty that guaranteed that Portugal would accept English textiles and that port, Portugal's signature wine, could enter England at tariffs lower than those imposed on wines from France. Named after the British negotiator, this Methuen Treaty "played a major part in the development of the port wine industry."

... 2004, Viktor Yushchenko (below right), the opposition leader, was declared the winner of Presidential elections in Ukraine -- elections necessitated by the annulment of balloting the previous month that was declared fraudulent. Though heralded as the "Orange Revolution," Yushchenko's election has not brough prosperity to Ukraine, where "[e]conomic growth has slowed and prices have risen." (photo credit)

Answer to Ministerial Mindbender

Solution to the puzzler above:

The author of "Containing Russia" is Yuliya Tymoshenko (right), the Prime Minister of Ukraine from January-September 2005, and now leader of its parliamentary opposition.