00:00So why does this agreement matter and what does the lapse of this treaty mean for Washington and Moscow?
00:06So it matters, Catalina, because it was the last safeguard that we had towards where many nuclear wars in the U.S. or Russia could be deployed and could, of course, be manufactured.
00:16So it allowed the inspections. That was the important part, whereby either party had inspection rights to see where we were at in terms of what sort of an arsenal of weaponry were at the disposal of the army of that country.
00:26So everyone knew what everyone else was doing, and the knowledge and power that's involved in that is quite astronomical.
00:35While it's gone, there's no legally binding limit. So there's no verification mechanism.
00:40They can't go in and find out and check and see just how many weapons are actually there.
00:44And both countries can basically now operate on assumption, but also on suspicion.
00:49And this is where it comes into dangerous territory, because now there's no transparency there.
00:53Either country can be doing whatever they like behind closed doors, and the other one's completely oblivious, which is, of course, concerning.
00:59That doesn't mean missile launches tomorrow. Far from it.
01:01But it does raise the risk of miscalculation, which, of course, is a very dangerous thing, politically speaking, at least.
01:08It fuels a new arms race, which is potentially on the table as well.
01:11And now it forces both governments to rely heavily on deterrence instead of diplomacy.
01:16So both will try and up the ante in terms of their nuclear arms to try and make sure that they outdo the other in terms of what they've got available to them.
01:23So now the question is, what does Washington do next?
01:25And I think you have to look at where Washington is strategically placing its cards in the deck right now.
01:30And that seems to be at the door of China, which, of course, as we know, there's a Trump visit on the way in April to go to China.
01:36There is a Xi Jinping will head to the U.S. sometime in autumn as well.
01:41Well, perhaps a deal will be done there as well, because it might be the part that Russia is no longer the big player that it once was in terms of a nuclear arms race.
01:48And Washington may see that China is that new stronghold now.
01:51And they might just shift attention to there and say, we're probably better off with a nuclear deal with China instead, potentially.
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