US President Barack Obama sent a landmark arms-reduction treaty with Russia to the Senate on Thursday for ratification and called for $80 billion in nuclear funding, which could help win opposition support. Defence Secretary Robert Gates said the funds, which would be spent over a decade, were needed to "rebuild and sustain America's aging nuclear stockpile."
The treaty, which must be ratified by the US Senate and Russia's parliament before it goes into force, would reduce the strategic nuclear arsenals deployed by the former Cold War foes by 30 percent within seven years. Known as the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, it is also seen as a major step toward "resetting" US-Russia relations, which were prickly under the Bush administration.
"The US is far better off with this treaty than without it," Gates, a holdover from the Bush administration, said in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal. "It strengthens the security of the US and our allies and promotes strategic stability between the world's two major nuclear powers." Gates said the treaty had the unanimous support of America's military leadership.
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