Morning Edition · Saturday, July 25, 2026Published at 1:28 AM EDT · New York

Russia Says New START Lapsed Over Washington's Refusal to Respond

The last treaty capping US and Russian strategic nuclear arsenals expired in February, and Moscow now says no formal extension took hold.

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Russia Says New START Lapsed Over Washington's Refusal to Respond

Russia's permanent representative to the United Nations in Geneva, Gennady Gatilov, said that the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) was not extended because of Washington's position, according to RIA Novosti. The treaty, which capped each side at 1,550 deployed strategic nuclear warheads and 700 delivery systems, expired on February 5 and could only ever be extended once, leaving the two largest nuclear powers without legally binding limits.

The two sides tell different stories about why. Moscow had offered to keep observing the treaty's central limits for a year if Washington reciprocated, and Russian officials say the United States never formally responded. United States officials, by contrast, said the two governments agreed to operate in good faith and to observe the terms for at least six months while discussing a modernized agreement. What is not disputed is that no binding successor is in place.

The lapse removes a long-standing ceiling on strategic arsenals at a moment when other arms-control structures are already weakening. Without verification and caps, each side must assume the other may expand, which is the logic that drives an arms race rather than restrains one.

Part of a tracked trend

Bilateral Arms Control Unravels

The lapse of binding US-Russia nuclear limits without a successor accelerates a multipolar strategic arms race, raising a permanent, under-priced tail risk on global markets.

Veracity: Corroborated

91/100

If true, who benefits: Defense contractors in all nuclear states gain from renewed modernization budgets, and Moscow's framing shifts blame for the lapse onto Washington.
The nuance: Both sides confirm the treaty expired February 5 with no successor, but the blame is contested, and each government still says it observes the central warhead limits informally, so "no limits" overstates the current posture.

An open-source-intelligence read of how likely this story is true with its real nuance, not a judgment of any outlet. It assesses the claim, weighing independent and adversarial reporting. How we label confidence.

What this means

The end of verified nuclear limits raises the baseline of great-power risk that markets rarely price until a crisis forces them to. Defense contractors in the United States, Russia and allied states gain from renewed strategic modernization spending, funded by expanding government budgets. The wider cost is a higher permanent tail risk on global assets, because an unconstrained arsenal narrows the margin for miscalculation during confrontations like the current Gulf war.

What to watch

Whether the two governments open formal talks on a successor framework, or let the six-month good-faith understanding lapse without one, which would confirm the collapse of bilateral arms control.
Whether China is drawn into any new negotiation, since a two-power framework no longer matches a world with a third expanding arsenal.

Observations to monitor, not financial advice.

3 sources

Synthesized from: RIA Novosti · Arms Control Association · Axios