Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair

In one year, Donald Trump has managed to disarm Congress and put our Constitution on life support. The separation of powers has been breached, and our checks and balances have been compromised. Trump’s latest victims are diplomacy and disarmament, a tragedy that few Americans understand. Last week’s tragic demise of the New START Treaty is the latest marker in the decline of the United States.

I’m writing this disarmament obituary from my own experiences earning a PhD in diplomatic history at Indiana University, analyzing Soviet policy at the Central Intelligence Agency for 25 years, and serving on the U.S. delegation as an intelligence advisor at the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks in Vienna, Austria in 1972, when the SALT Treaty and the ABM Treaty were finally completed. This is a tragedy for the national security interests of the United States as well as the entire global community.

The expiration of the New START Treaty will........

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