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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: michael97123 who wrote (147714)	10/13/2004 8:48:47 AM
From: jttmab	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Yes, the other side of the same coin. A different coin than you refer to but a flip to the other side as well. Prior to the Bush Administration, a frequent phrase from conservatives was "An arms treaty without verification is worthless." You might recall Reagan's softer version...Trust but verify. I wouldn't say that liberals disagreed with that notion. Liberals will tend to make the statement a treaty with imperfect verification is better than no treaty. But the conservatives were very vocal about it. Bush tried to scuttle the Biological-Chemical Weapons Ban Treaty under the pretense that signatures could cheat. Verification procedures were not perfect enough for George W. Bush. The conservative base fell in line. Liberals were for it; conservatives opposed it. Then comes the Strategic Arms Agreement with Russia. Every prior Strategic Arms Agreement with the Soviet Union had a verification component. Not perfect, because no verification procedure can be perfect. But there was a hell of a lot of effort in establishing the verfication procedures. Bush signs the Strategic Arms Agreement with Russia. I dare you to find any verification component to that agreement. It's not there. The first strategic arms agreement with Russia [Soviet Union] that has no verification. What is the position of conservatives? Is an arms agreement without verification worthless? jttmab