START Treaty: Double Success for Barack Obama

Barack Obama pocketed, on Wednesday, Dec. 22, 2010 a double victory – in foreign policy and on the American domestic scene. He got what none of his Democratic predecessors in the White House has succeeded in: making the Senate ratify an agreement signed between Moscow and Washington on nuclear disarmament.

He needed 67 votes (out of 100) and there were 71 votes on Wednesday to approve the START Treaty on Strategic Offensive Reductions, signed in April 2010 between the U.S. and Russia. In the late 1970s, Jimmy Carter was unable to pass a vote on the ratification of the SALT II Treaty; in the late 1990s, Bill Clinton failed to persuade the Senate to ratify an agreement on banning underground nuclear tests.

In the United States, treaties must be ratified by a two-thirds majority vote in the upper house of Congress.

Wednesday’s result is a big success for Obama. Even if the treaty is limited in its scope, it goes in the direction desired by a man who wants a world without nuclear weapons, a very distant goal that exceeds his mandate — something he himself recognizes. But the U.S. can hardly promote it if, as the first nuclear power in the world, they do not show a good example.

Already approved by the Russian parliament, the treaty stabilizes the nuclear arsenals of both countries to 1550 nuclear heads and 700 vectors deployed within seven years after its ratification. Massively supported by the U.S. Army, it renews the reciprocal system of inspections and procedures to prevent a nuclear accident.

But Wednesday’s vote is also important on the domestic U.S. scene. Mr. Obama has wanted to act quickly. The new Congress coming from the November 2010 legislative elections will meet in January 2011. The Republicans will be better represented in the Senate and will have an overwhelming majority in the House of Representatives.

In this political context, Obama must prove his ability to govern with the opposition. He can move forward only by forging a compromise with some Republicans. He has done this successfully on three occasions: the vote on START (with the support of a dozen of Republicans); the repeal of the gay taboo in the military; and, ten days ago, the one on fiscal policy.

Each time, the president has been able to form bipartisan majorities, something we have not seen happen in a long time on Capitol Hill. Each time, Republicans have shown their internal divisions. Basically, there are the old fashioned Republicans , center-right, who refuse to demonize Obama, and there are the radicals, under the influence of the tea party movement, who intend to systematically oppose the White House with one goal in mind: to prevent the re-election of the president in November 2012.

This president shows that he is not at all the defeated man too often presented in the aftermath of the November 2010 election. He enters the year 2011 with optimism. He will need it.