Russia will not allow the United States to speak to itself in the language of an ultimatum.
If the Treaty on Strategic Offensive Arms (START III) is doomed to die, then so be it.
It's a pity?
Sure.
For decades, together with other basic agreements, he ensured stability on the planet.
People could live, work, build families, without seriously fearing to burn out one day in a nuclear flame.
To some in Washington, this seemed unnecessary.
And this "someone" has a collective name - Republicans.
It is these "cowboys" - a checkered shirt, a baseball cap, red freckles - who want to throw the world off balance and prepare the conditions for a new arms race.
However, they would not have been Americans, a nation of merchants, if they had not tried to extract additional benefits from the situation along the way.
Before finally abandoning START III, use it for their selfish political interests.
After all, on November 3, there will be a presidential election, which Trump may lose.
According to various polls, he lags behind Joe Biden by at least 10-12 percentage points.
And nothing suggests that such a strong gap can be bridged.
The economy has been torn to shreds due to the pandemic.
The Americans could not make vaccines against the coronavirus ... So Trump came up with a trump card - the extension of START III.
Only this proposal turned out to be fake.
Not seriously.
Trump's special envoy for arms control Marshall Billingsley hastened to announce that Washington is ready to extend the START III treaty in exchange for an obscure mutual "freeze" of nuclear arsenals and its verification.
“The United States is systematically pursuing a line of breaking the agreements in the sphere of strategic stability.
The latest statements by the American side about the alleged readiness to temporarily freeze nuclear arsenals are unacceptable and go beyond the playing field by fair rules, "Leonid Slutsky, head of the State Duma's international affairs committee, replied.
Washington had as much time as it wanted to reach an agreement with Moscow.
However, they demanded co-optation in China's START III, the deputy reasonably noted.
Beijing, on the other hand, has long pointed to the incompatibility of its nuclear arsenal with the American and Russian and, for this reason, unwillingness to restrain its development.
And how can you force it?
No way.
Obviously, China was mentioned by Washington only as a pretext, as a deliberately unacceptable condition to slam the door - to withdraw from START III.
How they left the Open Skies Treaty, and even earlier, under the administration of another Republican, George W. Bush, from the ABM Treaty.
The goal is to assert US hegemony.
For professional diplomats, all these simple tricks are obvious.
So, Sergei Lavrov, in an interview with three radio stations, called the statements of the American side about agreements with Moscow on START III unscrupulous.
According to him, the United States "speculates shamelessly, like thimblers."
“Recently, their representative made a statement that“ Russia supported us, we are reaching an agreement for the presidential elections in the United States that we freeze all nuclear warheads, and Russia really wants China to join this, ”the foreign minister said indignantly RF in the words of Billingsley.
The recklessness of Americans is amazing.
It is time for them to take care of their safety after Russian specialists have developed and presented new, still unprecedented types of weapons.
All these "Vanguards", "Poseidons", "Petrels" and "Sarmatians".
We don't have our own people yet, and if they do, it won't be soon.
While Lavrov said that Russia is ready to include two of the five new weapons in the context of the new START III.
There is no way to seize the opportunity ... But no, they persist.
They expect to push through their position that is useless to anyone in the world (since freezing does not fundamentally solve anything).
According to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, there is no reason to expect the conclusion of any agreement before the presidential elections in the United States.
"If the Americans need to report to their superiors something about which they allegedly agreed with the Russian Federation before their elections, then they will not receive this," the diplomat emphasized.
Moreover, he even refused personal contact with Billingsley.
“Contacts in other formats, such as teleconference, are quite possible,” added our diplomat.
Call on Skype, mister.
It seems that the last possible trump card, at least somehow capable of influencing the outcome of the presidential election, fell out of the hands of Trump.
Everything must be done on time.
The mistake of the "joker", as his once enchanted supporters called him, seems ready to take advantage of his rival.
The Democratic candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden, if elected, is allegedly ready to immediately extend START III and even begin work to expand its scope.
By the way, he participated in negotiations on the first extension under Barack Obama in 2010.
Most likely it will be so.
Let me remind you that Russia's position is to extend START III for five years without any preconditions, as provided for in the text of the document.
And only then start negotiations on additional steps.
After all, an agreement is not an end in itself.
The challenge is to truly ensure strategic stability.
And this requires a comprehensive discussion of threats, including missile defense, the status of space weapons, and new US strategic-range carriers in conventional equipment.
There is something to talk about.
The author's point of view may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.