The United States needs to keep channels of communication with Russia on arms control and risk reduction and is trying to do that, Principal Deputy Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NSA) Frank Rose said on Wednesday.
"We also need to maintain channels of communication with regard to arms control, risk reduction, and I will tell you, we are trying to talk to the Russians," Rose said during a discussion hosted by the Brookings Institution. "But quite frankly, every time we try to engage on these issues, we are rebuffed, and the central message we hear back from the Russians is this given the situation in Ukraine, everything else revolves around that. And that's very disturbing."
Rose went on to say that throughout the Cold War and through several conflicts, the United States continued to engage in discussions on arms control and risk reduction with the Soviet Union.
"Unfortunately, that does not seem to be happening today. And that makes me very, very concerned," he added.
Rose added that the United States does not need to return to nuclear testing given the investments made in US nuclear stockpiles.
"NSA is of the opinion that, given the investments we've made in stockpile stewardship, we do not need to return to testing," he said.
The W93 nuclear warhead, which is scheduled to be deployed on US ballistic missile submarines by 2040, is the first warhead that has been designed by the United States in the past 30 years without testing, Rose added.