[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 54 Introduced in House (IH)]
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117th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 54
Reaffirming the sense of the House of Representatives that the United
States must lead the world in preventing further nuclear proliferation,
while also reducing and eventually eliminating all nuclear weapons.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
January 21, 2021
Mr. Beyer (for himself, Mr. Johnson of Georgia, Mr. Foster, Mr. Cohen,
Mr. Case, Ms. Lee of California, Mr. Langevin, Mrs. Carolyn B. Maloney
of New York, Mr. Vargas, Mr. Cicilline, Mr. Huffman, Mr. Costa, Mr.
McGovern, Ms. Pingree, Mr. Carson, and Mr. Levin of Michigan) submitted
the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on
Foreign Affairs
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Reaffirming the sense of the House of Representatives that the United
States must lead the world in preventing further nuclear proliferation,
while also reducing and eventually eliminating all nuclear weapons.
Whereas, in the 1984 State of the Union Address, President Reagan said, ``A
nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought'';
Whereas the nonproliferation of nuclear weapons has been a bedrock principle of
United States foreign policy since 1945;
Whereas the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons was ratified by
the United States in 1968, and extended indefinitely in 1995, and
depends upon the full implementation by all States Parties of three
mutually reinforcing pillars: nonproliferation, access to peaceful uses
of nuclear energy under safeguards, and disarmament;
Whereas the United States maintains a safe, secure, and effective nuclear
deterrent to provide for the national defense of the United States and
to bolster the security of the allies of the United States, while also
pursuing a number of arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation
agreements designed to end dangerous nuclear competition and the spread
of nuclear weapons-related technologies and to ensure strategic
stability, reduce nuclear risks, and protect the United States homeland
and allies of the United States;
Whereas the United States is now at risk of losing all the agreements that have
underpinned strategic stability and nuclear risk reduction;
Whereas the Treaty between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet
Socialist Republics on the Elimination of Their Intermediate-Range and
Shorter-Range Missiles (in this resolution referred to as the ``INF
Treaty'') successfully led to the total ban on the possession,
production, and flight-testing of land-based nuclear and conventional
ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and missile launchers with ranges
of 500 kilometers to 5,500 kilometers;
Whereas, as a result of the INF Treaty, the United States and the Soviet Union
destroyed a total of 2,692 short-, medium-, and intermediate-range
missiles by the treaty's implementation deadline of June 1, 1991;
Whereas the United States formally withdrew from the INF Treaty on August 2,
2019, with no plan to avert a new and destabilizing intermediate-range
missile arms race;
Whereas the Treaty on Open Skies, signed in 1992 and in effect since 2002, is a
vital instrument of confidence-building and verification for the United
States and the allies of the United States;
Whereas the Treaty on Open Skies has permitted unarmed surveillance flights over
the territories of 34 countries, including Russia, with the purpose of
enhancing mutual understanding of the military forces and activities of
concern to them;
Whereas, on May 22, 2020, the President announced his intent to withdraw from
the Treaty on Open Skies in six months due to continued concerns over
compliance with the Treaty's provisions by Russia;
Whereas this announcement, and the subsequent November 22 withdrawal from the
Treaty on Open Skies, did not comply with section 1234 of the National
Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 (Public Law 116-92; 133
Stat. 1648; 22 U.S.C. 2593a note) that requires the Secretary of Defense
and the Secretary of State to notify Congress at least 120 days before a
formal notice is sent to treaty depositories about an intent to leave
the Treaty on Open Skies, and was made despite objections expressed by
United States allies;
Whereas the Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian
Federation on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of
Strategic Offensive Arms (in this resolution referred to as the ``New
START Treaty'') entered into force on February 5, 2011, and is scheduled
to expire on February 5, 2021, unless the United States and Russia agree
to extend the Treaty by a period of up to five years;
Whereas the New START Treaty has strengthened the nuclear security and strategic
stability of the United States by reducing the number of strategic
systems in Russia's nuclear arsenal and providing the United States with
the inspection and monitoring tools necessary to confidently verify
Russian compliance with the Treaty;
Whereas maintaining legally binding, verifiable limits on Russian strategic
nuclear forces is in the national security interest of the United
States;
Whereas the Department of State has repeatedly verified that Russia is in full
compliance with the New START Treaty, including most recently in the
June 2020 report to Congress on ``Adherence to and Compliance with Arms
Control, Nonproliferation, and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments'';
Whereas the New START Treaty has not and does not restrict the nuclear
modernization programs of the United States nor limit the missile
defense efforts of the United States, and the United States continues to
assure allies of guarantees by the United States to their security;
Whereas if the New START Treaty is allowed to expire, the United States will be
faced with an unconstrained Russian nuclear arsenal for the first time
since 1972, and the United States will be discarding decades of progress
to maintain nuclear deterrence at a much lower level of strategic
nuclear arsenals, from which the United States, NATO, and other allies
have all benefitted;
Whereas a perceived retreat by the United States from arms control and
international affairs more broadly has caused allies and partners across
the globe to doubt the United States commitment to meet its own nuclear
disarmament obligations under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons, which could compromise United States efforts to
strengthen the nuclear nonproliferation system;
Whereas Congress has historically taken a bipartisan approach to arms control
initiatives, including the bipartisan vote of 71-26 in the Senate to
provide its advice and consent to the ratification of the New START
Treaty on December 22, 2010, demonstrating that Congress can be a close
partner with the executive branch in the shaping of the arms control
policies of the United States; and
Whereas there are bipartisan bills in Congress to urge an extension of the New
START Treaty, the last remaining treaty constraining the world's two
largest nuclear arsenals, and former officials who served under
Republican and Democratic administrations, military leaders, and nuclear
policy experts agree that the Treaty should be extended: Now, therefore,
be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) reaffirms that effective arms control treaties, and
other confidence-building and verification agreements, that
successfully limit and reduce nuclear weapons and curb nuclear
competition are important tools that strengthen the security of
the United States and international security;
(2) strongly supports a sustained and intensive dialogue
with Russia and China to reduce the threats posed by nuclear
weapons, and underscores that effective arms control has always
been an area of crucial and necessary dialogue, even during the
lowest points in bilateral and multilateral relations;
(3) recognizes that the United States and Russia, which
possess more than 90 percent of the world's 13,000 nuclear
weapons, have a special responsibility to reduce the nuclear
danger, and are committed to do so under the Treaty on the Non-
Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons;
(4) calls on the President to extend the New START Treaty
for five years without further delay to give the United States,
in consultation with allies, the time and space needed to
pursue a broader, more comprehensive arms control agenda with
Russia and China that addresses all types of nuclear weapons
and emerging technologies that can affect strategic stability;
and
(5) calls on the administration to consider continued
participation in the Treaty on Open Skies, which allies,
partners, and arms control experts all agree is a vital
instrument of confidence-building and verification for the
United States and its objectives for promoting international
security and strategic stability.
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