In his 36 years representing Indiana in the U.S. Senate, Richard Lugar became one of the most influential Republican voices on foreign policy and, specifically, nuclear nonproliferation. Lugar, who passed away on Sunday, made limits on nuclear arms a key part of his work both in the Senate and later through the Lugar Center. Today, that legacy is as important as ever and one that lawmakers must carry on.
Lugar’s best-known work was the Soviet Threat Reduction Act, passed in 1991 and co-sponsored by Sen. Sam Nunn, D-Ga. That legislation created the Cooperative Threat Reduction program, providing U.S. funds to deactivate nuclear warheads in the former Soviet Union.
In the aftermath of the collapse of the USSR, there was a real concern that unstable countries or rogue groups might attempt to purchase or steal nuclear weapons from post-Soviet states. The Nunn-Lugar Act successfully addressed that problem and led to the deactivation of about 7,600 warheads.
Despite that and other successes, the threat of nuclear arms persists. Now, the focus is no longer that such weapons might fall into the hands of (even more) dangerous actors but rather a brewing arms race among major world powers.
Like the deactivation of warheads after the collapse of the Soviet Union, this threat must be addressed with the seriousness and dedicated bipartisanship that characterized Lugar’s efforts decades earlier.
As the U.S. engages Vladimir Putin’s Russia and a rising China, nuclear nonproliferation must remain at the forefront of efforts from both Republicans and Democrats.
Specifically, the U.S. should not spur a new arms race with Moscow by building weapons out of compliance with the terms of the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty. While Russia is clearly a bad actor and has violated the terms of the agreement, Washington’s decision to abandon the accord’s restrictions in response threatens to spread nuclear weapons rather than establish a new agreement. As Lugar explained in 2018, that’s a move that will ultimately make the world less safe and harm the U.S.
Even more alarmingly, the U.S. seems poised to drop NEW START, the landmark nuclear arms control agreement. NEW START, signed in 2010 and backed by Lugar, is the latest version of a long-standing agreement with the Soviet Union and now Russia initially pioneered by President Ronald Reagan. NEW START is set to expire in 2021, however, the Trump administration has indicated little interest in extending it for another five years as explicitly allowed under the agreement.
To be clear, neither INF nor NEW START is perfect, but both limit the threat of nuclear arms. Lugar recognized this to be in the interest of the U.S. That is as true today as when Lugar and Nunn pushed for the Soviet Treat Reduction Act in 1991. Today, we have new challenges but a similar need for the commitment to nonproliferation and bipartisanship that Lugar championed.
