President Barack Obama said the pact was part of an effort to "reset" relations with Russia that have been badly frayed. And at home the agreement gave him the biggest foreign policy achievement of his presidency, just days after he signed the landmark health care overhaul that has been his domestic priority.
If ratified by the Senate and by replica handbags Russia's legislature, the reductions still would leave both countries, by far the world's largest nuclear powers, with immense arsenals — and the ability to easily annihilate each other. Together, the United States and Russia possess about 95 percent of the world's nuclear weapons, according to the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation.
Agreed Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, "Both parties see the ultimate goal in building a nuclear-free world."
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called zhjchv0329 the treaty an "important milestone" and said he believed it would "add a significant impetus" to a U.N. conference in May to review the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
Ratification in the Senate will require 67 votes, two-thirds of the senators, meaning Obama will need support from Republicans, something he's found hard to come by on other issues.
According to U.S. officials, the accord won't restrict moving ahead on deployment of an American missile defense system — long a touchy subject between the Replica Louis Vuitton two nations. And Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov suggested Russia reserves the right to walk away from the treaty if it sees it can no longer protect its security because of a U.S. missile-defense buildup.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, standing with Defense Secretary Robert Gates alongside Obama, said, "National security has always produced large
bipartisan majorities, and I see no reason Replica Mobile Phones why this should be any different. I believe that a vast majority of the Senate, at the end of the day, will see that this is in America's interest."
Because the earlier START treaty expired Replica Watches in December, Russia and the United States will not have an agreement for inspecting each other's arsenals until a replacement treaty comes into effect.
Gates cautioned that the treaty — and an accompanying review of nuclear posture — will require more spending to modernize America's nuclear arsenal. At the same time, the defense secretary called it an "important milestone" in consigning Cold War nightmares to the past.
