Russia Is Offering An Informal Nuclear Deal. Washington Should Take It.

Russia and America now have zero bilateral nuclear arms control agreements. This has not happened in over 50 years. Although the New START Treaty has expired, Moscow has offered to maintain the treaty’s warhead caps informally while both sides negotiate a replacement. Washington should say yes because it is in America’s interest to avoid another arms race while buying time for a new, formal deal.

Without any framework, both sides will be tempted to base their military planning around worst-case assumptions about the other’s arsenal. That dynamic of uncertainty and instability risks sparking a new arms race. New START’s caps gave each side a known ceiling for deployed warheads, reducing the need to build more weapons out of fear of the unknown. (RELATED: Canadians Rank USA Greater Threat Than China, Russia And Iran Combined)

Critics will say Russia wasn’t complying with New START, because it suspended verification and data exchanges in 2023. It is also true that America has formally accused Russia of violating nine arms control agreements since Vladimir Putin took power.

These legitimate concerns should be handled in future negotiations and agreements. But informal caps still matter because they anchor expectations, giving planners a baseline to work against. In this scenario, having no bilateral arms control agreement (informal or not) means less predictability and risks more destabilization.

As of January 2025, the U.S. already maintains 1,770 deployed warheads which are enough to survive a first strike and devastate any adversary many times over. A sufficiently sized arsenal deters sufficiently; whereas building more weapons would drain resources and generate instability for little gain.

Critically, New START’s limits do not prevent America from modernizing its nuclear triad, which is already well underway. What the treaty constrains is Russian deployment numbers in return. Racing beyond the former New START limits would signal Washington sees no value in mutual restraint, incentivizing Moscow to also increase its arsenal. (RELATED: US And Russia Barrel Toward First Nuclear Arms Race Since Cold War)

Some will argue the treaty is simply an outdated bilateral relic that fails to include China. This objection has merit as a medium-term concern given Beijing’s own ongoing nuclear buildup. However, right now it is not sufficient reason to reject Moscow’s informal offer, especially considering the gap between Beijing’s warheads and those controlled by Washington and Moscow.

Replacing New START could provide a framework for future arms control agreements needed to cover other categories, including smaller tactical weapons. So, yes, a future trilateral agreement drawing in China is worth pursuing, but it should not be a precondition for maintaining informal bilateral caps with Russia today. And any new arms race between America and Russia would lower the odds of Chinese participation in any future deal.

Washington should accept Russia’s offer to informally maintain New START’s caps, while pressing to restore inspections and data exchanges. America should then use the resulting framework as the foundation including China and closing coverage gaps New START never filled.

New START wasn’t perfect and few arms control agreements are. But the question at hand is whether the United States is better served by imperfect bilateral caps or by no limits whatsoever. Without them, both sides plan for the worst, miscalculation risk climbs, and the diplomatic foundation for something better crumbles as mutual distrust grows in an environment of greater uncertainty. Moscow has put a deal on the table. It is in Washington’s interest to take it.

John Dale Grover is a fellow with Defense Priorities. He was a part of the 2021 U.S. Presidential Management Fellowship class, working for the U.S. Treasury and State Departments. He was also a John Quincy Adams Society Strategic Leaders Fellow.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller.