President Trump on Saturday has confirmed that he plans to pull out of a Reagan-era nuclear weapons deal with Russia.
“We’ll have to develop those weapons,” the president told reporters in Nevada after a rally. “We’re going to terminate the agreement and we’re going to pull out.”
The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) was signed in 1987 by then-President Ronald Reagan and then-General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev.
The agreement was effective 1st of June 1988.
President Trump said Russia has violated terms of the treaty that prohibit the United States of America and Russia from possessing, producing or test-flying ground-launched nuclear cruise missiles with a range of 500 to 5,500 kilometers (300 to 3,400 miles)
President Trump even challenged Ex President Barack Obama, wondering why the deal was not negotiated or withdrawn while he was in office.
The treaty helps protect the security of the United States and its European allies and the Far East, but has placed the United States in a tight corner from developing new weapons.
The United States will begin to develope nukes unless Russia and China agree not to possess or develop the weapons, Trump said. China isn’t a party to the pact.
“We’ll have to develop those weapons, unless Russia comes to us and China comes to us and they all come to us and say ‘let’s really get smart and let’s none of us develop those weapons,’ but if Russia’s doing it and if China’s doing it, and we’re adhering to the agreement, that’s unacceptable,” Trump said.
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