Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov urged the United States to accept Moscow’s offer: extend the New START nuclear arms reduction treaty for one year. Washington only needs to affirm its commitment to existing warhead limits, Lavrov said.
The critical New START Treaty expires in February 2026. Russia suspended its participation in 2023, raising global concerns about strategic arms control. President Vladimir Putin initially floated Moscow’s current offer in September 2025. It aims to preserve current caps on deployed nuclear warheads and delivery systems without immediate negotiations.
Lavrov spoke on November 11, 2025. He called Russia’s readiness to observe treaty strictures a “unilateral gesture of goodwill.” The treaty limits each nation to 1,550 deployed nuclear warheads and 800 delivery systems. Washington’s agreement would not require formal talks, Lavrov clarified. It would only require a public declaration that it would not increase its quantitative levels for the proposed year. Russia’s offer notably omits reinstating mutual onsite inspections, a cornerstone of the original agreement. Moscow suspended these inspections in August 2022.
Analysts say Russia’s proposal benefits Moscow strategically at minimal immediate cost. Pavel Luzin, a military analyst at the Jamestown Foundation, noted Russia’s economic and industrial capacity would make a significant nuclear arsenal expansion challenging within a year. The United States, conversely, pursues a nuclear modernization program. Without treaty restrictions, the Pentagon could increase deployed warheads. This offers Russia a public relations advantage while urging American restraint. Moscow also cautioned it would resume nuclear testing if any other nuclear power did so first. It dismissed American claims of “suspicious underground activities” at its test sites.
Then-Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev signed the New START Treaty in Prague in 2010. It remains the last arms control agreement between the world’s two largest nuclear powers. Its future has been uncertain since Russia’s 2023 suspension. President Putin attributed the suspension to perceived NATO attempts to target Russia’s nuclear facilities. Former U.S. President Donald Trump, in July 2025, also emphasized preventing the treaty’s expiration. “When you take off nuclear restrictions, that’s a big problem,” Trump stated. A group of Nobel laureates and nuclear weapons experts issued a Declaration for the Prevention of Nuclear War in mid-2025, underscoring the broad consensus on continued strategic arms control.
Washington must now respond to Moscow’s overture. This could temporarily stabilize strategic nuclear arsenals as the international community calls for comprehensive disarmament dialogue.