In response to President Trump’s recent decision to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia on Saturday, Mikhail Gorbachev called the…
In response to President Trump’s recent decision to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia on Saturday, Mikhail Gorbachev called the move “reckless and not the work of a great mind,” the New York Times reported.
In an interview with the Russian news agency, Interfax, Mr. Gorbachev called Trump’s decision a “threat to peace” and a “mistake” and added that this “very strange” move will undermine all efforts that were made by the leaders of the former Soviet Union and the United States to achieve nuclear disarmament.
“Under no circumstances should we tear up old disarmament agreements. Is it really that hard to understand that rejecting these agreements is, as the people say, not the work of a great mind.”
The INF treaty completely removed all nuclear and conventional missiles and launchers with ranges between 310 and 3,420 miles, and played a major role in ending the nuclear arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union, according to an earlier report by the Inquisitr .
Commenting on the decision to end the treaty, President Trump said that Russia had been violating the treaty for many years, and blamed the Obama administration for their lukewarm attitude toward the issue.
“I don’t know why President Obama didn’t negotiate or pull out,” Trump said.
“We’re not going to let them violate a nuclear agreement and go out and do weapons and we’re not allowed to. We’re the ones who have stayed in the agreement and we’ve honored the agreement. But Russia has not, unfortunately, honored the agreement. So we’re gonna terminate the agreement. We’re gonna pull out.”
