The country. I think we have three outstanding analysts in the field, so i hope you will give them your full attention. We just heard the National Security advisor describe how we hope to move ahead in reducing nuclear risk, and i hope we provided some optimistic some optimism to all of us that the u. S. Does not intend to engage in a threeway arms race. What i will ask each of our panelists specifically if they have additional optimism on that point. The topic of this panel is preventing a threeway arms race. For many years, of course, the focus of Nuclear Arms Control has been on bilateral competition between the United States and the soviet union, later russia. With apparent chinese intentions to build up its own nuclear arsenal, are we in a position to avoid that kind of arms race, both in the short term, the mediumterm, and the longerterm . To discuss this with us today, we have three great experts. Lynn rustin come up with the Nuclear Threat initiative. John will stone wolfstone with global zero and the center for a new american security. And someone from the program at princeton university. You can find their full biographies in your program guide. What i would like to do is get us started by asking each of them a question, letting them respond as they wish for a few minutes, and possibly a second round of questions, and then we will look for good questions from the audience. Feel free to jot down your questions as we go, and when we get there, i will ask you to raise some hands and i will pick people who look like they are ready to have the most perplexing questions. Lets start with john. Again, the primary question for each of you is how do you take what mr. Sullivan said this morning. Is it increase in any way your confidence that we will be able to avoid a Nuclear Arms Race . That will be far more expensive and in my opinion much more dangerous than the arms race we engaged in in the 1960s and 1970s. Its the approach we just heard outlined the appropriate one at this stage. Thank you, tom, and let me say thanks to the arms control association. I always get sentimental when i come here because i came to the annual meeting in 1990, and they announced they were going to have the first ever position on nonproliferation. I went up to Spurgeon Keeney and told him i wanted to apply. He said, are you cheap . I said yes, and so i got the job. It was the best i have ever had. Im thrilled to be able to come here. Im still cheap. But i appreciate the chance to come give something back. Let me start by saying i am very sympathetic to the position that jake and the others behind the scenes were in, trying to write a speech for the arms control association, in what is an extraordinarily difficult period for the United States and the world. They are putting fire after fire out. They have done a remarkable job in holding the lines together in a unified way, something that has not been done in over a generation in response to eight generational threat, due to the invasion of ukraine by russia. I will call him this week and tell him that when i wrote speeches for Senior Leadership, they were much better received for the armscontrol community than when he wrote them. I appreciate what he is trying to do. I appreciate the president , where his heart is and where his interests are, but i think there are two Critical Issues missing from my point of view on china. They are clearly trying to get people to calm down. You heard the president s remark about confidence. We heard this town hyperventilate over a balloon. We should not take invasions of american airspace lightly, but we are the strongest, richest country in the world. I think we have to act in a way that shows we are confident, that matches our capability. I think that is nuclear as well. I read a recent report about how we need to accept that china is a near competitor on Nuclear Weapons. We have 4000 Nuclear Weapons in our arsenal. China maybe has 400. We are still at a 10 to one advantage. Are they building up . It looks that way. Do we know why . Not really. We have to keep things in context. The other thing i thought was important and unfortunately missing from advisor sullivans speech is, it is fine and well to talk about Risk Reduction and management of these dangers. His job has responsibilities. It is a difficult job. But we still have to have a vision for what it is we are trying to do. What are we seeking in the long run when we tell china and russia we want to engage them on arms control and Risk Reduction . To what end . The United States, i still think, does much better, both with our allies and with the rest of the countries in the world, who are not rushing to help ukraine. We are still leading the alliance, but we still have trouble with the global south, who basically dont want to get involved. We still have to have a vision. The fact that he did not talk about a World WithoutNuclear Weapons, did not talk about Nuclear Reductions we still have too many, more than we need for our security. Talking about our commitments to Nuclear Disarmament has been a longstanding policy dating back to 1970. I think there is a missing element, and i understand why. In washington, he is fighting against people who want to match russia and china 141. I recognize it is difficult. But i still think we have to be strong with our vision, even if it is going to take a lot of work and a long time to get there. We should not give up on that. I would have been a bit more optimistic if they had broadened a little bit more. Tom thank you. Let me first note that lynn rusten was one of the inspirations for including this panel. You all of course read arms control today cover to cover every month, and her cover story in march on the future, which helps to frame the thinking on this topic. Lynn, the same general question, whether you are more optimistic on the chances of avoiding this threeway race, and also, how do you think, or do you think, that russia can be brought back into a Bilateral Dialogue . Are there on ramps . Clearly, the u. S. Is not going to meet moscows conditions, cease support for ukraine before discussions can begin. But are there other gestures, steps, or in the terminology, on ramps, that the u. S. May be able to take . Lynn thanks, tom, for having me here today. I cannot see because of the lights, but my coauthor is here. What we heard today it is useful to have that speech because there has not been a competency statement of the u. S. Policy and positions on armscontrol and Nuclear Policy since the Nuclear Posture review came out, and developments continue to proceed. So i think it was useful for them to lay out there thinking. Their thinking. I heard a work plan for the end of the first biden term. It really did not have a longterm vision. It did not even it kind of had a lot of question marks for what happens after 2026, although there is a willingness to engage in a dialogue with russia, if russia will do so. I think the administration positions are probably more fully developed in terms of what it would do in a negotiation with russia than they are with china. I thought it was significant that jake said there would be no preconditions for talks with russia on Nuclear Arms Control, because that has not been clear to me in the past at all. I think there is a debate in the administration. I dont know if this means that is settled or not, in terms of everything from whether you negotiate with prudent i understand my people would feel that way, or whether russia needed to come back into full compliance with new start. It seems like they are saying now that the door is open to a discussion about not only totally returning to compliance with new start, but more realistically talking about what comes after new start. I think so that partly answers your question. They have just lowered the barrier to entry to a dialogue with russia. I dont think russia is ready, based on prudents behavior, to have on putins behavior, to have that dialogue now. As we stated in our article, it will be in russias interest to continue to keep United States constrained in terms of its Strategic Nuclear forces, and i think that is going to be just as true at the end of the war, if not more so, then it is now. There is a reason that russia did not announce it is seceding from new start, although it is playing with fire by participating in other elements of the treaty. I think there is just a Strategic Logic that will get us there, and i cannot tell you whether it is going to be during bidens first term, after that, what we will find ourselves back at the table with russia. It will be a much harder negotiation because it wont be limited just to the systems that are currently controlled under new start. That is where the challenge will come in. The u. S. Will want to consider all nuclear warheads, including nonstrategic, nondeployed. Russia will continue to be interested in capturing toplevel strikes, concerns about missile defense. And there is kind of the new technologies and challenges that they mentioned today that are not as conducive to including in any kind of formal armscontrol, but still will be part of a mix of things that will need to be discussed. My guess is that some of this will have to be discussed in parallel in different channels. The question is, how do we actually get to that point . I do think the time will come i do not know if it is when the fighting, the hot war, stops in ukraine, but i do think it will come, because it is in the mutual interest of both countries. Tom thank you, lynn. Tong, i would like to ask you about 11 questions. I constantly recommend your writing to audiences and individuals who are interested in how beijing views u. S. Moves. I would be [no audio] i would be happy to ask you about optimism or pessimism after this speech, if you would like to say a few words about i have seven more questions, but i will let you pick which you would like to talk about. Lynn thank you tong thank you so much. It is such a privilege to be here. I am encouraged that mr. Biden expressed commitment and interest to engaging with china on armscontrol. But i have to wonder if the u. S. Policy media as a whole has an understanding of chinese thinking that is driving the chinese buildup. I think we have to look at chinas Nuclear Policy change, which is taking place currently, with efforts to diversify the forces, the growing culture change such as a potential shift to attack posters, a growing interest in developing capabilities to manage nuclear escalation, the opacity in china, the consistent opacity or even increasing opacity, about the logic, the rationale behind chinese measures, and the goal of the current campaigns of organization. We have to understand this change of Nuclear Policy against the context of china as a country that is changing. China as a country has changed dramatically in recent years. I dont think the u. S. Policy community has put enough effort into the broader context and how that affects chinas Nuclear Policy. I do think we have to understand that both fear and division and vision are driving china is nuclear buildup, and the two things are closely interconnected. The current chinese leadership appears to have convinced itself that the u. S. Has adopted a much more aggressive strategic approach and intention toward china. And they dont think this can be resolved through reasoning and persuasion. They think only by building up and demonstrating much greater strategic capability, that will change the american understanding of the balance of power, and make the United States treat china more equally and respectfully. The ambition to increasingly challenge american predominance, to erode american influence in the asiapacific, but also in other parts of the world that ambition is driven by the perceived necessity to challenge the u. S. At the capability level, because there is no way to change american thinking through reasoning. That contributes to the power mindset. So the fear and the ambition are two sides of the same coin. But i dont think the u. S. Community understands accurately about the fear part that is actually more important. In this regard, the u. S. Question about whether you need a bigger arsenal to deter china and russia simultaneously, i think take the assumption that you have to include the chinese Nuclear Weapons as additional pain points in your Nuclear Targeting strategies, but you didnt really explain why. That discussion is fueling the chinese belief that the u. S. Is thinking about a Nuclear Preemptive Strike on china. That the u. S. Is driven by the intent to maintain nuclear hegemonies him. Hegemonism. You need to explain to china why china should not also pursue that capability, right . China is not so ambitious whatever capability or policy the u. S. Thinks is necessary for american security, china wants to know why china should not do the same. I think that is the internal thinking the u. S. Needs to do. There is lack of understanding about chinas internal dynamics, the leadership, the general public. They work in increasingly closed environments that generate a very strong internal feedback loop, where the more assertive interests of the top leadership encourage the policy elite and general public to amplify the same policy. It then appears the top leadership has a mandate to pursue more assertive security policies. It is under that dynamic we see the military coming up with slogans like we need victory with strategic Nuclear Weapons. That is very new. What is driving that . It is perhaps more about the pressure on the military to appear basically loyal to the leadership. It does not necessarily mean the Rocket Program will start soon. The new slogans. But we should not assume that Chinese Nuclear policies are inherently cohesive, or coherent , because it is responding to a toplevel pressure. The u. S. Has longterm Strategic Thinking on Nuclear Weapons. More recent evidence shows that china is taking a stepbystep approach, building Nuclear Weapons, then reevaluating the environment, than making another decision, which means the u. S. Actually has opportunities to shape the next chinese movement. I hope we can look more deeply into the chinese internal dynamics. I still think there are opportunities to build a more productive nuclear relationship. Tom that is fascinating. More than once, one of your sentences made me think of a mirror image in washington about motivations and rationale. And that ought to lead to the possibility of a productive conversation, even if it starts at a much lower base than what we have built up with moscow over the years. Jon, let me go back to you. Our very good audience gave mr. Sullivan a tough question about politics, and that is the legislation to require the u. S. To pull out of new start. At least in my opinion, it sets conditions that would make any future armscontrol agreement impossible. How would im interested in how you assess whether that will go somewhere in the congress, and if it does, perhaps as a piece of the National Defense authorization act, how that affects the potential to move forward with either russia or china. Jon i got yelled at once by Vice President biden for my political opinion. He said you may be really smart, but you do not know that much about politics. Now that i am liberated, i can whether it is a democratic president or a republican president , there is generally very little desire to see Congress LegislateForeign Policy and treaty moves. I dont think it has any prospect of going anywhere. It is one of those things i know lynn will nod her head. We would immediately start to draft a statement of administration policy. Will he veto a bill if it includes limits on president ial authority over military policy as commanderinchief . I also dont think that senator cotton has as much residence in the congress as he might have had a few years ago. I think his behavior in response to the black lives matter protests, his interest in calling out the 101st airborne to quell peaceful debate, has strained his credibility. He does represent what has been a longstanding traditional view among the extreme conservatives of being opposed to any form of armscontrol in the United States, and any sort of mutual constraint limiting american policy. Could easily see a bill like this come from jesse helms as well as senator cotton. I think it does represent what President Biden and others, and we, should be worried about, which is the sense that if armscontrol breaks down, some of that is a good thing, that the United States should poor more money into its nuclear and defense industry, even though we are approaching a trillion dollars, because there is still the sense that that is how we won the cold war. We outspent the soviet union and crushed them under the wheels of our military might. In fact, it was a deliberate decision by sensible people, recognizing the danger that Nuclear Weapons pose, to get out of that cycle. They understood that Nuclear Weapons were unusable. I think the big message in the bill, and the sentiment expressed by those who say we should build up and match china or russia, is a sense somehow that this is a