START II

• 1. Introduction

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  On the 3rd of January 1993, START II was signed by US president George H. W. Bush and Russian president Boris Yeltsin. The treaty had a single goal: to ban a class of nuclear weapons that both nations had spent decades building. Called informally the De-MIRVing Agreement, it targeted intercontinental missiles capable of delivering multiple independent warheads against separate cities in a single launch. Nine years later, the agreement would be declared dead without ever having entered into force.

  The two presidents had first signaled their intentions on the 17th of June 1992, nearly seven months before the formal signing. That moment of shared purpose would prove difficult to sustain.

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• 2. The Logic of First Strike

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  The Soviet R-36M and the US LGM-118 Peacekeeper were each designed to carry up to 10 MIRVs, or multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles. These weapons could deliver separate warheads to distinct targets from a single rocket. In some Soviet super-heavy missile designs, a single launch could carry as many as 50 warheads.

  Assume each side held 100 missiles with five warheads each. With a 95% probability of destroying an enemy silo, 40 missiles were enough to wipe out an opponent's entire force of 100. The attacker would keep 60 missiles in reserve. The opponent would be left with roughly five missiles capable of any response.

  Each MIRV-armed missile could carry a large number of decoys alongside its live warheads. Those decoys made interception nearly impossible. A significant volley of precise warheads and decoys could annihilate an opponent's missile silos and air force bomber fleet in a single strike.

  Moscow had invested heavily in its own MIRV-capable forces. What Russia's parliament would ultimately decide about the treaty was not a question the signing ceremony could answer.

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• 3. A Treaty in Waiting

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  On the 26th of January 1996, the US Senate ratified START II by a vote of 87 to 4. That lopsided margin reflected wide agreement among American lawmakers. The situation in Moscow was very different.

  Russia's State Duma delayed ratification for years. Lawmakers postponed votes repeatedly to protest American military actions in Iraq and Kosovo. They also opposed the expansion of NATO into Eastern Europe. As the years passed, the treaty grew less relevant to both sides.

  The Duma finally voted to ratify on the 14th of April 2000, but not without conditions. Russia required that the United States preserve the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. It also required the US Senate to ratify a September 1997 addendum dealing with missile defense demarcation. Both conditions reflected deep concern about American plans for a national missile defense system.

  Opposition in Washington came from a faction of Republicans led by Jesse Helms, who opposed any limits on American anti-ballistic missile programs. The Senate never ratified the addendum, and the conditions Moscow had set remained unfulfilled. What happened next was triggered not by any vote in either parliament but by an executive decision in Washington.

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• 4. Withdrawal

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  On the 13th of June 2002, the United States withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Russia announced the following day that it would no longer consider itself bound by the provisions of START II. Both governments had now declared themselves free of any obligation under the treaty.

  George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin had already agreed in November 2001 to pursue a new framework for nuclear reductions. That framework, the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty, or SORT, was signed at a Moscow Summit on the 24th of May 2002. Both countries committed to reducing their operationally deployed strategic warheads to between 1,700 and 2,200 by 2012.

  The United States began its own unilateral process in October 2002, withdrawing from MIRVed intercontinental ballistic missiles. What each country retained when the process was complete would tell a very different story.

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• 5. After the Treaty

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  The United States completed its withdrawal from MIRVed land-based missiles by the 19th of September 2005, including the full deactivation of the Peacekeeper. As of 2011, the Minuteman III remained the only American land-based operational intercontinental ballistic missile. It was potentially capable of carrying three warheads.

  Russia still retained 54 MIRV-capable RS-20/R-36M missiles, known in NATO reporting as the SS-18 Satan, each carrying 10 warheads. It also kept 40 RS-18/UR-100N missiles, designated the SS-19 Stiletto, each carrying 6 warheads. A third type, the RS-24 Yars, was fielded in 24 missiles with 3 warheads each.

  To protect itself from small-scale ICBM attacks, the United States developed the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system. The warhead count Russia retained across those three missile types exceeded 850.

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