Good Allies Share Bad News, Too

The US government sat on information that Russia likely breached the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty by testing a missile ranged to menace Europe, said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). Hiding information like this from NATO partners seriously undercuts the United States’ reliability as an ally, he asserted during a speech at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 25. “It now appears the US government knew for a significant period of time” that Russia has been testing a missile in violation of the INF treaty, possibly even as US negotiators hammered out the New START agreement with Russia, he said. “It’s interesting to note that the Russians have violated every major weapons treaty they’ve ever entered into,” he added. Rubio said this fact appeared “to be swept under the rug” as the Obama Administration looked to negotiate further arms control agreements with Russia. The fact that the US has not seriously taken Russia to task “lends credence, quite frankly, that the US under this President and Administration is an unreliable partner,” he said. “We should not be entering [into] any more negotiations with the Russians on any weapons system so long as they are openly violating” standing treaties, stressed Rubio. “All you [have] to do is read the Russian media reports” to find abundant evidence that “they are habitually violating multiple different agreements,” he concluded.