WASHINGTON—After months of insisting that China join nuclear arms control talks with the U.S. and Russia, the Trump administration signaled Tuesday that it will seek to negotiate a separate framework agreement with Moscow and move to bring Beijing on board later.
The administration’s new negotiating strategy could open the door for an election-year arms control understanding with Moscow—and possibly a meeting between President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin as well as the temporary extension of the soon-to-expire New START nuclear weapons treaty.
“The two presidents, I presume, would like to get together,” Marshall Billingslea, the chief U.S. arms control negotiator, told reporters after two days of talks with his Russian counterpart in Vienna. “We laid down what we need to see from the Russian Federation, and it is now a question of whether they are ready to walk down that path with us.”
Echoing recent comments by national security adviser Robert O’Brien, Mr. Billingslea said that such an outcome might be possible if the two leaders settled on a politically binding agreement that affirmed the main elements the Trump administration believes should be featured in a future nuclear weapons treaty.
With New START set to lapse in February, Mr. Trump has insisted for more than a year that a follow-up arms control treaty also include China, as well as tough verification measures.