June 2026
By Alexey Arbatov

The experience of six decades of nuclear arms control since the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty has been mostly successful, except for one aspect: the inability of Washington and Moscow to transition from their bilateral negotiating format to a multilateral format in order to physically limit and reduce nuclear arsenals beyond their two states. Over time, this has become the principal obstacle to further nuclear disarmament, at least as presented in the official positions of the two nuclear superpowers.

In 2023, President Vladimir Putin suspended Russia’s participation in the last remaining major nuclear agreement, the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), except for continuing to observe its numerical ceilings. Among the official reasons Moscow cited were UK and French nuclear forces, which remain outside of strategic arms control. On the U.S. side, President Donald Trump in 2026 made China’s nuclear buildup the reason for ignoring Putin’s September 2025 proposal to abide by the numerical ceilings of New START for at least one year more.¹ This decision did away with that treaty and ended half a century of unprecedented success with bilateral strategic arms limitation and reduction.

The termination of New START is not in itself the beginning of the disintegration of nuclear arms control, but it may trigger its final demise. In future years, during the probable impasse of strategic dialogue and continuing strategic forces modernization, there may be growing pressure within Russia and the United States to abandon the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) and resume explosive nuclear tests. Such a development might finally undercut the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) after its predictably unsuccessful May 2026 review conference. New weapon systems being pursued by Russia, the United States, China, and other nuclear-armed states may endanger other treaties, including those banning deployment of nuclear arms in outer space (1967) and on the seabed (1971). The scariest consequence of this trend would be a chain reaction of nuclear arms proliferation around the world with the crumbling of the seven nuclear-weapon-free zones, involving 177 states, and the ensuing access to nuclear weapons by unstable states and terrorist organizations. The new nuclear world may degenerate to nuclear chaos.

Unfortunate Experience

If the process of nuclear arms control is restarted sometime in the future, one primary challenge will be engaging the three other NPT-designated nuclear-weapon states—China, France, and the United Kingdom—in the limitation of nuclear weapons. Trump has made clear that he wants China involved in any future strategic nuclear negotiations and Putin will certainly address the question of French and UK nuclear arsenals. Thus, the multilateral approach will be at the foreground of discussions, whatever other concerns the two superpowers have about space missile defense systems, tactical nuclear weapons, conventional precision guided systems, and nuclear-armed airborne and underwater autonomous vehicles.

In fact, this is not a new subject. Initially, the idea of five-party nuclear arms control talks was launched in February 2008 at the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva. After that, a number of official five-party meetings (called P5 because the five states involved are the permanent members of the UN Security Council) adopted many general declarations in support of strategic stability, ratification of the CTBT, negotiations on a fissile material cutoff treaty, indefinite extension of the NPT, and denuclearization of the Korean peninsula. As positive as those appeals were, the main goal has remained unattainable: The states did not move an inch toward practical limitation of their nuclear arms in the P5 format.²

The fundamental error of the P5 initiative was a formal interpretation of the central NPT Article VI, which obliges nuclear-armed states “to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament.” This provision has not necessarily implied five-party arms reduction talks; it just committed all NPT nuclear-weapon states to engage in arms limitation and reduction. In fact, besides the two nuclear superpowers, France and the UK took unilateral steps to restructure and reduce their nuclear forces in 1990s and 2000s to save on defense expenditures.³ However, there were no formal agreements to ensure the strategic transparency and predictability of those steps, a point to which Putin referred while suspending New START in 2023.⁴

The national security policies of states define the goals of their nuclear weapon programs and disarmament stances. Of the nine nuclear nations, all except Israel (and South Africa, which abandoned its clandestine nuclear program in 1989),⁵ associate international prestige and status with their nuclear deterrence posture. In a more tangible way, all of them assign their nuclear forces the task of nuclear retaliation for the purpose of deterring an enemy’s aggression with nuclear and other kinds of weapons of mass destruction. The same kind of response is envisioned by France, Russia, the UK, and the United States: to deter nuclear or conventional attacks on themselves or their allies and partners.

However, the targets of nuclear deterrence are different for five of the nuclear-weapon states. For Russia, the targets are primarily the United States and U.S. allies in Europe and the Pacific. For the United States, they are Russia, China, and North Korea. For France and the UK, they are Russia. For China, the United States and India, plus Japan and South Korea, which do not possess nuclear weapons but have the capability to initiate such programs if they choose.

None of the P5 states would agree to limit its nuclear forces just for the sake of NPT Article VI if that decision does not buttress its national security. Instead, a state would have to receive in exchange an adequate limitation of military capabilities by potential opponents, foremost their nuclear forces engaged in mutual deterrence relationship. Disregarding this reality is the actual reason for the failure of the P5 dialogue.

Conditions of Arms Control Engagement

The first condition for the success of the last half century of arms control endeavors was a state of mutual nuclear deterrence. This concept was publicly recognized in the mid-1960s by the United States due to the efforts of Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara⁶ and adopted by the Soviet leadership under Mikhail Gorbachev in the mid-1980s.⁷ The second condition was the emergence of the approximate equality (parity) of strategic forces of the two superpowers in the early 1970s.

The first condition created the material foundation of interest of the parties in limiting nuclear forces of the opponent, which created the feasibility for tradeoffs. The second provided for equal starting and ending points in negotiations because no party would be willing to legalize its inferiority or sacrifice its superiority for the sake of reaching an agreement.⁸

This analysis may explain the reasons of the past failures to organize multilateral nuclear arms limitation in the P5 forum. The United States, France, and UK are allies and not interested in limiting each other’s weapons. The same is true about Russia and China, which have not expressed concerns (at least officially) about each other’s nuclear forces since the late 1980s. Presently, Moscow and Beijing have nothing to gain from mutual arms reduction.

Russia’s strategic relations with France and the UK are those of mutual nuclear deterrence, but their nuclear forces are highly asymmetric providing Russia with unquestioned superiority. The two European states would not agree to legalize Russian superiority in an arms control treaty with Moscow, or to put themselves under a common ceiling with U.S. forces. This option would be unacceptable for the United States as well because it would legalize a Russian advantage of 15 percent in delivery vehicles and 30 percent in warheads, which would be seen as still more detrimental in view of the ongoing Chinese strategic forces buildup.

In U.S.-Chinese strategic relations, mutual nuclear deterrence is present, but strategic parity is absent with a huge U.S. superiority expected to persist at least for the next 10 years.⁹

Both China and Russia would reject putting Chinese nuclear forces under a common ceiling with the Russians. Against the background of China’s projected strategic buildup, this would imply drastic reduction of Russian forces or the stringent unilateral limitation of Chinese forces.

Reviving Arms Control

In the political domain, the most vital imperative is to prevent nuclear escalation of the Ukrainian war and facilitate the ceasefire and peaceful settlement of that conflict. Relatively less explosive, but highly desirable politically is ending the conflict in the Middle East. In the meantime, the crucial arms control priority is to sustain the CTBT and the NPT.

The end of hostilities in Ukraine would open the way to resuming at least bilateral strategic arms negotiations if leaders in Washington and Moscow genuinely recognize the value of nuclear arms control for their national security as much as their predecessors did.

Dealing with a third nuclear state through the P5 arms control process is hopeless, however nice it sounds theoretically. Instead, the United States should try harder to engage China in substantive bilateral arms control discussions. Rather than proposing agreements on “transparency” and “predictability,” Washington should make suggestions that would not legalize Chinese inferiority in the types of weapons to be subject to the accord. In addition, the United States should aim to ensure that China’s eventual strategic position is better than it would be otherwise. Due to the lack of overall parity between the two countries, an initial agreement might equally limit parts of their nuclear forces that are each other’s primary concern.

Relying on the model of the 1972 Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT I) interim agreement, which put limits on selected legs of strategic triads, the nuclear forces of Russia, France, and the UK may be limited by equal ceilings. They would not legalize the superiority of any party but may alleviate security concerns of both. A joint Anglo-French position on this issue would be a useful prerequisite and might fit a concept of European nuclear deterrent.

It seems inappropriate at this moment to get deeper into technical details of possible agreements among the nuclear-armed nations. The attitude of the main nuclear states toward strategic arms control is ambiguous, and the general political environment is highly unfavorable. Suffice it is to underline that a resumption of a U.S.-Russian strategic dialogue would make it easier to achieve the participation of other nations in nuclear arms control discussions.

Even if such talks took place, difficulties implementing the outcome of any agreement would be exacerbated by the emerging “revisionist” schools in Russia and abroad, which treat six decades of nuclear arms control as the outdated vestige of the past. Today, nuclear weapons are once again being portrayed as an effective instrument of foreign policy and even practical warfighting.¹⁰ These views may tangibly affect the moods of current political elites for whom the horrors of Hiroshima and the panic of the Cuban missile crisis are no more than just ancient legends.

ENDNOTES

1. It started with the U.S. withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 and was followed by its abandonment of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran in 2018, and abrogation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (2019) and Open Skies Treaty (2020). For its part, Russia suspended participation in New START and withdrew from the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty in 2023, retrieved its ratification of the CTBT, and refused to renew strategic arms talks in 2024.

2. That is not counting the elaboration of U.S.-Chinese strategic terms dictionary.

3. Noteworthy in the environment of unique détente during the two decades that France and the UK summarily reduced their nuclear forces from about 800 down to 510 deployed warheads. See SIPRI Yearbook 1989: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security, Oxford University Press, 1989, pp. 17-29; SIPRI Yearbook 2022: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security, Oxford University Press, 2019, pp. 369-379.

4. Vladimir Putin, “Presidential Address to Federal Assembly,” February 21, 2023.

5. Israel, like South Africa until 1989, keeps its nuclear potential in secret, although its nuclear status de-facto is well known and serves its regional influence and prestige, being at the same time a problem for nonproliferation.

6. Robert McNamara, The Essence of Security: Reflections in Office, Harper and Row (New York), pp. 51-67.

7. “Joint Soviet-United States Statement on the Summit Meeting in Geneva,” Ronald Reagan Presidential Library & Museum, November 21, 1985.

8. There were, of course, exceptions to this rule. In the SALT I interim agreement, the United States accepted Soviet advantage in the number of ballistic missiles, retaining superiority in the number of heavy bombers and MIRVed (multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle) missiles beyond the negotiated limits. In the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, the Soviet Union agreed to eliminate more than twice as many missiles and three times as many warheads as the United States because the U.S. medium-range missiles posed a strategic threat to the USSR reaching deep into its territory, while the Soviet medium-range missiles were out of reach of the U.S. territory and posed only a theater threat to U.S. NATO and Pacific allies, as well as to China.

9. Compared to the U.S. total active nuclear arsenal of 3,700 warheads, China has about 600, while the ratio in strategic warheads inventory is correspondingly 3,500 to 350. See SIPRI Yearbook 2022: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security, Oxford University Press, 2025, pp. 203-209.

10. John R. Bolton, “Putin did the world a favor by suspending Russia’s participation in New START,” The Washington Post, May 4, 2023; Sergey A. Karaganov, “An Age of Wars? Article Two. What Is to Be Done,” Russia in Global Affairs, Vol. 22, No. 2, April/June 2024, pp. 5-8.

June 2026 
By Sharon Squassoni

What is more secret than the proposed U.S.-Saudi nuclear cooperation agreement? The answer: the U.S. national security rationale for encouraging the spread of uranium enrichment and spent fuel reprocessing.

After decades of steadfastly opposing the spread of these fuel-making technologies, the United States is apparently prepared to allow two key allies—South Korea and Saudi Arabia—to enrich uranium and reprocess nuclear spent fuel. In the first case, consent for South Korea has been a decades-long process that was foreshadowed in the 2015 renegotiation of the U.S.-South Korea nuclear cooperation agreement. It took U.S. President Donald Trump what seemed like only a few minutes to short-circuit the elaborate processes developed in that agreement to forestall this risky development. However, South Korea has a vibrant nuclear energy industry and a long history of cooperation with the United States.

The exact opposite is true for Saudi Arabia. Apart from some ill-considered nuclear technology information and assistance exports in the first Trump administration, which triggered congressional investigations, there has been no U.S. nuclear cooperation with Saudi Arabia—and for good reason. Despite 20 years of talks, Saudi Arabia since 2008 has balked at taking two steps long considered minimum requirements for nuclear cooperation partners in the Middle East: forsaking uranium enrichment and reprocessing, and signing an additional protocol, which allows stronger International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards.

Not only does the draft deal not require those two things, it appears to go a step further: The United States seems to have offered to assist Saudi Arabia in acquiring fuel cycle capabilities with the promise of additional bilateral safeguards and verification at “the most proliferation-sensitive areas of potential nuclear cooperation between The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United States (enrichment, conversion, fuel fabrication, and reprocessing).”¹

In return, the Trump administration has extracted an unenforceable promise that “the United States and American companies will be the Kingdom’s civil nuclear cooperation partners of choice,”² claiming that the draft agreement “puts United States industry at the heart of The Kingdom of Saudi-Arabia’s civil nuclear development.”³ Given that Saudi Arabia has been openly courting several nuclear suitors, it appears the United States has purchased exclusivity with sensitive nuclear technology.

Why is this bad? Because such technology can be used to make fuel for peaceful nuclear energy or for nuclear weapons—and because this represents a tectonic shift in long-standing U.S. nuclear export policy.⁴

Of course, the full scope of the deal will only be revealed to Congress after the agreement is signed by the two governments and submitted for congressional review. And, as with other nuclear framework agreements, commercial contracts might not materialize. This was the case for another controversial “123 agreement” (named after Section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act) with India. Then, as now, U.S. negotiators sacrificed nonproliferation precedent and principles to misguided and unrealistic strategic aims, but in this deal, the unspoken national security aims are nothing short of remaking the Middle East. That vision depends, of course, on how the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran turns out.

A Little History

Nuclear negotiations with Saudi Arabia, on the whole, have never been “business as usual.” Over the course of 20 years, they have been upstaged by political disruption in the Middle East on several occasions, which suggests that the negotiations are anything but the routine, legalistic, framework discussions that they ought to be.

Negotiations inched forward in 2008 with a memorandum of understanding that Saudi Arabia would rely on commercial markets for fuel supply and begin to implement its IAEA comprehensive safeguards agreement. Despite, or maybe because of, the 123 agreement between the United States and the United Arab Emirates in 2009—considered a “gold standard” nuclear cooperation agreement because the UAE forswore uranium enrichment and reprocessing—Saudi negotiators balked at including similar language in a draft agreement with Washington.

In 2018, the assassination of the Saudi journalist and U.S. resident, Jamal Khashoggi, in Istanbul by agents of the Saudi government brought negotiations to a halt; after resuming under the Biden administration, they were again halted by the October 7, 2022, Hamas attack on Israel. (The Biden administration planned to connect a Saudi nuclear deal with Saudi-Israeli rapprochement.) The current holdup in submitting the nuclear deal to Congress is the war on Iran. These political disruptions, however, mask deeper issues.

Saudi leaders at times have stated their desire to pursue a full fuel cycle, from mining uranium to reprocessing the spent fuel.5 This is not typical for states just embarking on nuclear energy programs. Most states prefer to procure fuel cycle services from abroad because it is easier and cheaper to do so. Developing fuel cycle capabilities is expensive, and in the case of enrichment, technically challenging. What’s more, enrichment and reprocessing technology is restricted under the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) rules. Saudi Arabia, which does not yet have a single nuclear power plant, reportedly has domestic uranium reserves and justifies its fuel cycle ambitions on that basis. This makes no economic sense, given the vast reserves and low prices of the world’s top uranium suppliers. The United States, with more than 20 percent of all nuclear power reactors, relies securely and overwhelmingly on foreign uranium supply.

Saudi Arabia’s insistence on a full fuel cycle is worrisome for a special reason: Saudi officials have often stated that they would acquire nuclear weapons if Iran did, despite their obligation not to under the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). Possessing fuel cycle capabilities would remove the biggest stumbling block to nuclear weapons.

In November 2025, the Trump administration announced that it had completed its negotiation with Saudi Arabia on civil nuclear energy cooperation.⁶ Rather than submit the text of the agreement to Congress, it needed to first submit a report that explained why it would enter into an agreement with a country that did not adhere to the highest standards of nonproliferation.⁷ That highest standard, accepted by 144 countries, is the additional protocol to comprehensive IAEA safeguards agreements. This protocol was developed in the 1990s to strengthen inspectors’ abilities to investigate what countries were not reporting about their nuclear activities. As Iran demonstrates, it is crucial to be able to investigate undeclared activities and sites, especially when countries have fuel-making capabilities such as enrichment or reprocessing.

The executive branch’s report, submitted to Congress in November 2025, gave no clue that Saudi Arabia does not yet have an additional protocol. Instead, it cryptically states that the U.S.-Saudi agreement “contains a number of unique terms designed to advanced U.S. nonproliferation interests in the Kingdom, while addressing Saudi sovereignty concerns that inform its position on the Additional Protocol.”

Sovereignty concerns are usually invoked to explain why a country fails to sign up to new agreements. Although Saudi Arabia has publicly stated that it would adopt the additional protocol, the administration report seems to suggest that it may not. Ironically, since the additional protocol was introduced in the 1990s, Saudi concerns about nuclear weapons proliferation in the Middle East should have diminished: Iraq’s nuclear weapons program was destroyed, and Iran’s nuclear program has suffered a severe setback since the United States and Israel began attacks in June 2025.

The report to Congress argued that U.S. national security interests will be enhanced by expanding influence with Saudi Arabia, by potentially selling reactors that would bolster the U.S. domestic nuclear industry and by strengthening the kingdom’s electricity grid to support U.S. bases there. The report argues that the deal will significantly reduce the risks of nuclear weapons proliferation because it meets current U.S. nonproliferation requirements under the Atomic Energy Act—but not the additional protocol requirement, which stems from a different law.

The report states that proliferation risks also will be reduced because the United States will implement a separate, bilateral agreement with Saudi Arabia for the most sensitive types of cooperation, which it has already negotiated in parallel with the 123 agreement and will be submitted to the IAEA Board of Governors for approval. The national security arguments put forth in the November report are largely unsubstantiable and the nonproliferation claims are misleading. Congress will have a big job to do when it receives the agreement.

Potential Outcomes

There are several different levels of assistance that the United States might provide to Saudi Arabia. The minimum would be to grant consent for uranium enrichment and reprocessing without providing the technology to do so. The United States has done this for countries such as India and Japan. Saudi Arabia would either develop enrichment and reprocessing capabilities itself or buy them from another country.

The drawback to this approach could be the willingness of other countries to provide such sensitive technology. The NSG guidelines state that exports should be authorized “only when the recipient has brought into force a Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement, and an Additional Protocol based on the Model Additional Protocol or, pending this, is implementing appropriate safeguards agreements in cooperation with the IAEA, including a regional accounting and control arrangement for nuclear materials, as approved by the IAEA Board of Governors.”⁸ This requirement might help explain the need for the bilateral safeguards agreement mentioned in the November 2025 report. Other suppliers might insist that Saudi Arabia actually go through with its plan to adopt an additional protocol before supplying any technology, but the existence of an approved bilateral safeguards agreement could make that unnecessary. Overall, this approach would be unusual, but it would not create a precedent in terms of the United States supplying actual enrichment and reprocessing equipment or technology.

Other approaches would involve variations on technology transfer, ownership and operation. Given that the report refers to a bilateral safeguards agreement, it is unlikely that the two countries have agreed to allow the United States to build, own, and operate sensitive nuclear facilities on Saudi soil or on land that would be considered extraterritorial, such as the UN headquarters in New York. It is also unlikely that the United States is intending to set up a multinational facility on Saudi soil. This would leave the possibility of the United States selling enrichment and reprocessing technology or facilities to Saudi Arabia, and possibly being involved in the construction to ensure that safeguards could be incorporated into their design.

In fact, the NSG guidelines recommend that, “For a transfer of an enrichment facility, the supplier and recipient state should work together to ensure that the design and construction of the transferred facility is implemented in such a way so as to facilitate IAEA safeguards.”⁹ Congress should be aware that this is a basic minimum, rather than a special bell or whistle of the U.S.-Saudi nuclear deal. Congress should also be aware that the United States has rarely implemented bilateral safeguards agreements.¹⁰ Other variables could include U.S. financial shares in Saudi facilities or U.S. personnel assigned to help operate a facility to help monitor its production. All of these options represent a departure from past U.S. practices.

It is important to note that other U.S. laws besides the Atomic Energy Act come into play. For example, the Glenn Amendment to the Foreign Assistance Act would require cutting off a range of foreign and military assistance to countries that receive reprocessing materials, equipment or technology. Although Congress did not presume that the United States would be the supplier when the amendment was adopted, the language applies universally. There is a provision for a presidential waiver, however, upon certification that termination of assistance “would be seriously prejudicial to the achievement of United States nonproliferation objectives or otherwise jeopardize the common defense and security.”

Conflicting Messages

Paradoxically, a U.S. administration that has almost religiously opposed Iran’s uranium enrichment capabilities—to the point of invoking Christianity¹¹ in defense of the strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities—is about to extend that capability, as well as reprocessing, to a major Iranian competitor. The U.S. designation of Saudi Arabia as a major non-NATO ally in January 2026, along with this imminent nuclear deal, certainly places Saudi Arabia in the camp opposite Iran. In the context of the current war against Iran, the U.S.-Saudi nuclear dealmaking conveys messages, whether intended or not.

One positive message is that only members of the NPT in good standing can be trusted with enrichment and reprocessing. Nevertheless, this lowers the bar from the overall nonproliferation goal of not spreading such capabilities. Meanwhile, allowing Saudi Arabia to skip implementing the additional protocol will weaken Washington’s hand in negotiating with Tehran. Any deal that allows Iran a measure of enrichment capability would need to include implementation of the additional protocol. To be consistent, the United States would need to at least apply monitoring and restrictions on an enrichment facility in Saudi Arabia that are, at minimum, equal to or better than those developed under the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. The United States would also need to develop advanced monitoring for a Saudi reprocessing plant.

It is possible that the Trump administration assumed a quick surrender by Iran, with an agreement never to enrich again, and that a fuel cycle complex in Saudi Arabia could serve as a regional hub for future Middle East nuclear power plants. There have been many proposals for regional fuel cycle centers to blunt the prospects of nuclear weapons proliferation in the Middle East. Cutting a deal with Saudi Arabia before resolving Iran’s nuclear future, however, would be foolish and shortsighted.

A second possible message is that only U.S. allies can be trusted with sensitive nuclear technology, guaranteed by the United States. This is a variation on a familiar theme, echoed in the November 2025 report, that only U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements contain adequate proliferation standards. Such discrimination is unhealthy for the NPT, but more importantly, could provoke parallel actions by Russia and China with their allies. Three negative consequences would ensue. First, there could be further spread of enrichment and reprocessing technology to allies of Russia and China, an unwelcome proliferation risk. Second, a proliferation of bilateral safeguards arrangements could undercut the IAEA’s ability to monitor and enforce safeguards. Third, the cost-effectiveness of having one international agency monitor nuclear material worldwide would evaporate. In the 1950s, when nuclear power was in its infancy, bilateral safeguards would have been cumbersome. In the 2030s, a return to bilateral safeguards is ludicrous.

Other takeaways from this agreement could be more ominous. For example, has the Trump administration decided to engage in selective nuclear weapons proliferation, allowing countries such as Saudi Arabia and South Korea to develop latent nuclear weapons capabilities? Trump has publicly mused about Japan and South Korea acquiring their own nuclear weapons and is surely aware of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s 2018 comments that Saudi Arabia would develop nuclear weapons if Iran does. Equipping Saudi Arabia with a latent nuclear weapons capability could be seen as counterbalancing Iran in a longer time frame that assumes Iran cannot be kept from acquiring a nuclear arsenal forever. Such a high-risk strategy is antithetical to the entire nuclear nonproliferation regime and also risks triggering unintended consequences.

A resolution of Iran’s nuclear program could clarify the risks of such cooperation with Saudi Arabia. On the one hand, an outcome that guarantees a non-nuclear Iran could lessen proliferation concerns about Saudi Arabia, whose leaders claimed that they would acquire whatever capabilities Iran had (nuclear weapons or otherwise), and perhaps lead Saudi Arabia to back down from its fuel cycle demands. On the other hand, a resolution of the conflict with Iran that left future enrichment options open might cause Saudi Arabia to require the same.

Congressional Role

When the signed U.S.-Saudi 123 agreement is sent to Congress, members will have 90 days of continuous session in which to review the agreement and the associated nonproliferation assessment statement. This timing means that the agreement must be submitted by September 2026 to enter into force in this Congress, or risk having to be resubmitted to the next Congress. Most agreements have occasioned hearings, but the more controversial ones—with China and India—drove legislation to restrict or levy additional nonproliferation requirements. In the case of China, this caused a 13-year delay in implementation.

For close to 20 years, members of Congress have intermittently introduced legislation and resolutions to ban nuclear cooperation with Saudi Arabia. In 2018, Congress held a hearing on the implications of nuclear cooperation, triggered in part by the export of Part 810 of the Code of Federal Regulations, on nuclear technology and assistance, under the first Trump administration.¹² In 2019, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform issued a report, “Corporate and Foreign Interests Behind White House Push to Transfer U.S. Nuclear Technology to Saudi Arabia.” Prompted by concern about the earlier transfers, the congressional investigation revealed extensive and high-placed foreign and private lobbying on behalf of Saudi Arabia for nuclear technology transfers without a so-called gold standard (see Fig. 1). Several individuals involved in the lobbying effort hold senior positions in the second Trump administration, including Thomas Barrack, the ambassador to Turkey. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, holds no official position in the administration but is deeply enmeshed in negotiations with Iran and has received billions of dollars of investment from the Saudi Public Investment Fund for his private equity firm, Affinity Partners.¹³

There are many issues for Congress to explore when it receives the Saudi 123 agreement. For example, what is the quality and status of nuclear governance and the current level of corruption in Saudi Arabia? How does overturning long-standing U.S. policy on consent to enrich and reprocess as well as on actually providing technology strengthen nonproliferation? Is the Trump administration overturning this policy for all new 123 agreement negotiations? If not, why not?

Congress should inquire about the envisioned arrangements regarding information transfer, ownership, and operation of potential sensitive fuel cycle facilities as well as the IAEA’s monitoring role in bilateral safeguards. These all could significantly shape proliferation risks. In particular, it would be useful to gain insights into the details of the bilateral safeguards agreement with Saudi Arabia.

Since there is no requirement for congressional review of bilateral safeguards agreements, Congress should get some answers up front before the 123 agreement enters into force. For example, Congress should request a comprehensive briefing on U.S. experiences in implementing bilateral nuclear safeguards, including lessons learned. Are there risks or incentives to hide shortcomings in bilateral arrangements when countries are partners rather than adversaries, as in the case of Argentina and Brazil? Depending on the arrangements (e.g., Saudi operators with U.S. monitors; U.S. owned, operated, and monitored; or some other version of partnership), both Saudi Arabia and the United States could have incentives to collude in order to hide inconsistencies. Would a dispute over or anomaly in safeguards implementation under the bilateral agreement affect Saudi Arabia’s NPT status or just the bilateral relationship? Will the IAEA’s monitoring role at sensitive nuclear sites be akin to its role at European Atomic Energy Community-monitored sites?

More generally, how will the Trump administration guard against pressure arising from a context of trillion-dollar Saudi investments in the U.S. economy? What are the arrangements for guaranteeing that Saudi Arabia relies exclusively on U.S. technology and safeguards? More importantly, can the U.S. government guarantee that Saudi Arabia would not ban U.S. personnel from sensitive sites in the event of a political rupture? What mechanisms are available and feasible to prevent the kingdom from nationalizing the facility? Lastly, Congress should ask the administration for a detailed assessment of the impact of this agreement on Iran’s nuclear future, and on other nuclear programs in the Middle East, in an effort to uncover what the real national security aims of this agreement might be.

The Road Ahead

The leitmotif of the Trump administration on nuclear energy is more, faster, and fewer regulations, at home and abroad. At the 2026 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference in New York in May, the U.S. delegate declared that Trump is “unleashing the ingenuity and strength of the American nuclear industry for the benefit of the world.”¹⁴ If there is little restraint in what gets sold, however, the costs—nuclear weapons proliferation—may vastly outweigh the benefits.

In the case of Saudi Arabia, the one speed bump to this fast-and-furious approach to nuclear cooperation is the war against Iran. Timing is everything, and trying to negotiate away enrichment and reprocessing for Iran while bestowing it upon Saudi Arabia may require too much sleight of hand for even the Trump administration. While the outcome of the Iran war still hangs in the balance, it would be foolish to move ahead with a deal that could tip the scales so drastically.

Even if the United States successfully untethers Iran from its nuclear program, setting up a full fuel cycle in Saudi Arabia runs the risk of creating a shadow Iran. Nuclear energy is not widely spread in the Middle East now, and predictions of quick deployments are vastly exaggerated. If ever there was a time to pause and assess the implications, it is now. Nuclear cooperation agreements should be earned, not given away as geopolitical door prizes.

ENDNOTES

1. Kelsey Davenport, “Is Trump Jeopardizing Nonproliferation Efforts to Get A Nuclear Cooperation Deal with Saudi Arabia? A Report To Congress Suggests He Is.” Arms Control Association issue brief, Vol. 18, Issue 2, February 19, 2026.

2. “Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Solidifies Economic and Defense Partnership with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” The White House, November 18, 2025.

3. Davenport, 2026.

4. Sharon Squassoni, “Nuclear Mirage: U.S. Nuclear Cooperation with Saudi Arabia,” Arms Control Today, Vol. 53, No. 10 (December 2023).

5. Luke Caggiano, “Saudi Arabia Aiming For Complete Nuclear Fuel Cycle,” Arms Control Today, Vol. 53, No. 2 (March 2023).

6. White House fact sheet, November 18, 2025.

7. Davenport, 2026.

8. Nuclear Suppliers Group, “Guidelines for Nuclear Transfers,” NSG Part I Guidelines, July 2023.

9. Ibid.

10. Bilateral safeguards agreements predated the NPT. The United States had only exported five nuclear power reactors before then, and three of them were safeguarded by EURATOM. The other two—Breznau-1 in Switzerland and Tarapur in India—were subject to bilateral safeguards inspections, the former until 1978 and the latter until 1983.

11. Greg Jaffe and Elizabeth Dias, “Hegseth Invokes Divine Purpose to Justify Military Might,” The New York Times, March 20, 2026.

12. Hearing Before the Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, “Implications of a U.S.-Saudi Arabia Nuclear Cooperation Agreement for the Middle East,” Serial No. 115-122, March 21, 2018.

13. Rob Copeland and Maureen Farrell, “Jared Kushner Solicits Funds for his Firm While Working as Mideast Envoy, The New York Times, March 13, 2026.

14. John Zadrozny, “Statement by the United States to the NPT Review Conference,” May 4, 2026.

June 2026

The steady buildup of Soviet/Russian and U.S. nuclear arsenals after World War II —by 1985 the two superpowers amassed roughly 63,600 such weapons between them—was so alarming that, over decades, international leaders created a web of treaties, norms and organizations to stem proliferation and encourage disarmament. Central to that network is the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and its process of holding review conferences every five years to examine how the NPT is holding up and what can be done to strengthen it in the future. Expectations for the 11th NPT Review Conference, held April 29-May 22 in New York, were never very high. The old international order is breaking down. China has firmly planted itself as a rising power pursuing an expanded nuclear arsenal. Moscow and Washington seem less likely to accept limits on weapons or even talk about them. Arms Control Today asked five veteran international diplomats to offer spot analyses on why the 2026 review conference failed, whether the landmark treaty still has value and what must be done going forward to address nuclear weapons risks.

NPT is ‘Battered and Bruised’
By Paul Meyer

NPT Diplomacy Needs More Emphasis
By María Antonieta Jáquez

NPT Conference Shows Path Forward
By Gustavo Zlauvinen

NPT Outcome Masks Depth of Disagreements
By Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova

Conference Fails Due to Politics, Not NPT
By Adam Scheinman
 

NPT is ‘Battered and Bruised’
By Paul Meyer

The nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) has emerged from its 11th Review Conference battered and bruised. It may even be a case of “three strikes and you’re out” as the conference once again failed to agree on an outcome document.

The internal contradiction evident among its members, whereby the treaty’s Article VI obligation to nuclear disarmament clashes with the perceived security benefits of nuclear arms on the part of the five nuclear-weapon states and their allies, was much in evidence. The latter grouping was largely successful in diluting or deleting more binding commitments proposed by the majority of the states-parties.

Notably, calls for the nuclear-weapon states to adopt no-first-use policies, which were included in initial drafts of the review conference outcome document, were deleted. So were calls on Russia and the United States to abide by the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty limits and references to the need to maintain or declare moratoriums on the production of fissile material.

Other significant proposals were watered down to the point of irrelevance. A conference “decision” that nuclear-weapon states should present national reports was reduced to a conference “welcome” of the “voluntary commitment” of the nuclear-weapon states to do so. Similarly, the “right” of non-nuclear-weapon states to receive legally binding negative security assurances was reduced to acknowledging the “interest” of these states in obtaining such assurances.

Egregious backsliding on prior obligations was also manifested. For instance, U.S. and Polish delegates contested the 2010 Review Conference text affirming the “catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons.” They argued that while a nuclear war might generate such results, a mere detonation of a nuclear weapon would not, or that the reaffirmation of this text would undermine nuclear deterrence.

Backbiting among China, Russia, and the United States did not contribute to an atmosphere of common purpose. The U.S. accusation that China had violated the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) with a low-yield nuclear test that the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization International Monitoring System was unable to detect impugned the authority of the treaty at the same time as the U.S. refusal to ratify the agreement (along with eight others) meant that supplementary verification provisions, such as on-site inspections, were not operable.

Reflective of the NPT’s performance deficits is the fact that the CTBT has yet to enter into force 30 years after its conclusion, even though it was the top priority for states-parties at the 1995 Review and Extension Conference, which resulted in the treaty’s indefinite extension. Many non-nuclear-weapon states may well feel buyers’ remorse for agreeing to this step, given that it has provided them scant leverage over the conduct of the nuclear-weapon states.

Current events are eroding the nonproliferation norm; the frayed authority of the NPT as displayed at this review conference will not help stem this deterioration.

NPT Diplomacy Needs More Emphasis
By María Antonieta Jáquez

Review conferences of the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) attract comments that tend to equal their outcomes, or lack of them, to the success or failure of the treaty itself. We must value the review conferences for what they are.

The NPT was built as a contract. States that did not have nuclear weapons committed not to opt for them. They expected the right to enjoy the benefits of the peaceful uses of nuclear energy, and that those states possessing nuclear weapons would disarm in return. This is how the “grand bargain” is understood by most of the states-parties.

Article VIII of the treaty requires a conference every five years to examine the implementation of this contract. Review conferences are not amendment conferences, nor meetings to reconstitute the whole regime. The review clause responded to the fact that more provisions in the letter of the treaty apply exclusively to non-nuclear-weapon states than those that apply to nuclear-weapon states. Additionally, the treaty-recognized nuclear-weapon states coincide with the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, each with the so-called right to veto. Non-nuclear-weapon states must comply with obligations under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) verification rules; otherwise, they can be subject to questions or even sanctions. So, the review conferences function as forums in which to assess whether nuclear-weapon states are fulfilling their part of the contract, particularly about nuclear disarmament.

This is why there is a high expectation that an agreed outcome by a review conference, accepted either unanimously or without a vote, would lock in progress in that area by the nuclear-weapon states. Now, we are facing the reality that compromises are less likely because of reinterpretations of the contract and of principles and standards.

However, the lack of an agreed review conference outcome does not represent the automatic demise of the NPT. Its states-parties, especially the non-nuclear-weapon states, will continue complying with the treaty. States-parties are constantly reiterating their commitment to the NPT, and this is not likely to change any time soon.

As a new review cycle starts, diplomacy and dialogue should be pursued with more emphasis. Lack of cooperation among the nuclear-weapon states and the fragmentation in their positions regarding past obligations and commitments brought uncertainty and a higher trust deficit to an already polarized environment. The division goes beyond the possession of nuclear weapons and is really about those believing that these weapons are the basis of international security, and the majority that does not think so. This must be addressed, with the understanding that the NPT is not aimed at justifying the existence and use of nuclear weapons, and that the security concerns of all non-nuclear-weapon states must be considered, not despite the geopolitical juncture, but because of the current conditions.

NPT Conference Shows Path Forward
By Gustavo Zlauvinen

The 11th nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference ended its work May 22 without adopting a final document. Most delegations, in their concluding remarks, expressed regret for that circumstance. Some even considered that not achieving consensus on a final document in three consecutive “failed” review conferences constitutes a serious blow to the treaty. However, one must not confuse failing to adopt a final document with failing to review the treaty’s obligations, and identify a way forward.

A final document was adopted by consensus in only four review conferences (1975, 1985, 2000, and 2010), whereas it was not achieved in seven cases (1980, 1990, 1995, 2005, 2015, 2022, and now 2026). This rather negative tally did not impede the treaty from continuing to pursue its goals and objectives, even during times of highly conflicting international geopolitics, as we are currently witnessing.

But for many government officials and representatives of civil society, the inability of states-parties to achieve consensus on a final document demonstrates that the 11th Review Conference was a failure.

This is a very simplistic, linear way of reasoning. The conference provided a platform for delegations to assess the status of implementation of the treaty’s provisions, albeit with strong disagreements, and to discuss the actions and decisions needed to correct it. This is exactly what the treaty requires member states to do every 5 years.

The fact that states-parties did not agree on a text that would reflect that assessment did not prevent delegations from leaving New York with a clear understanding of the current fractures: the conflicting issues and positions, the areas where progress is lacking, and more importantly, the specific cases of actual or potential treaty noncompliance.

Member states took home an “X-ray” of the status of the treaty—one that it is far from acceptable or desirable. They must carefully use the next review cycle to produce a diagnosis and identify processes and actions that could help resolve the fractures if they want to maintain the NPT’s credibility and relevance.

NPT Outcome Masks Depth of Disagreements
By Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova

The just-concluded 11th nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference convened in such a difficult international environment that an agreement on a substantive outcome seemed all but impossible. That on May 22—the last day of the conference—it came down to a disagreement over referencing Iran in the context of noncompliance with nonproliferation obligations masks the depth and breadth of disagreements among states-parties on a variety of other issues.

Debates on the draft final document have demonstrated just how much the salience of nuclear weapons has increased in recent years and how the growing geopolitical competition involving China, Russia, and the United States defines the current dynamics of the NPT review process. Against the backdrop of the modernization and growth of nuclear arsenals and the heightened risk of nuclear weapon use, nuclear-weapon states questioned the urgency of the need to implement Article VI of the NPT and resisted language expressing concern about the humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons. A clear reaffirmation of past commitments on nuclear disarmament was almost a bridge too far for these nuclear-armed states, especially Russia and the United States, let alone agreeing to new progressive measures.

On the other hand, the conference draft did recall the humanitarian and environmental dangers of nuclear testing and recognized the calls for assistance to those affected by nuclear weapons testing and use. The nuclear-weapon states were also prepared to agree to engage in efforts, including “constructive dialogue,” on measures to ease tensions and reduce strategic risks.

The commitment falls far short of the non-nuclear-weapon states’ expectations and calls for nuclear risk reduction and arms control negotiations, but it is worth noting that the language appears to be a result of direct engagement among the nuclear-weapon states during the review conference. Perhaps the pressure of responsibility to achieve some progress, particularly on reducing the risk of nuclear use, could result in more constructive engagement now that the conference is finished.

One of the biggest losses from the lack of final document is the failure to advance enhanced reporting on Article VI implementation and to institutionalize interactive discussions of the nuclear-weapon states’ reports as part of the NPT review process. The issue defined much of this review cycle’s discussions, and even the weakened formulation in the last draft document would have added a new element to the review conferences and helped improve transparency. Going into the next review cycle, states-parties should continue pushing for progress in this area.

Conference Fails Due to Politics, Not NPT
By Adam Scheinman

As predicted by many, the 2026 nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference closed with a thud, with the conference president opting to withdraw a final document that was unlikely to command consensus agreement of the states-parties. With this third consecutive failure to achieve a consensus outcome, some may ask whether the NPT remains relevant or worth preserving. It is.

There is no doubt that the treaty, a product of Cold War diplomacy, is straining under the weight of deteriorating international conditions, not least of which are the ongoing military conflicts in Europe and the Middle East and U.S. President Donald Trump’s monumentally shortsighted forfeiture of global leadership. In the current circumstances, the dangers of nuclear proliferation or even nuclear war are rising. What makes the NPT unique, and strategically necessary in today’s environment, is its establishment of a global principle of nuclear restraint: that states without nuclear weapons will not pursue them and the five nuclear- weapon states bound by the treaty will work to reduce them.

Although that bargain is obviously under significant stress, the treaty is not in danger of collapsing, notwithstanding the failure to reach consensus at this review conference. That outcome is a failure of the treaty’s political process, not of the treaty itself. As long as the NPT endures, nuclear restraint as an organizing principle will continue to carry political and legal weight and to shape future review conference conclusions.

Perhaps by the time of the NPT’s next quinquennial review, conditions will be more favorable for endorsement of actions to lessen risks of a nuclear conflict, address violations, and prepare for the significant expansion of nuclear power. One can hope that the treaty’s political leaders, not least the United States, will be up to the task.

June 2026
By Daryl G. Kimball

Stephen Warnke, 65, a member of the Arms Control Association Board of Directors, died unexpectedly May 13 while traveling in England with his wife, Susan Sommer. He was recently retired from a quarter-century career with the New York law firm Ropes & Gray and looking forward to enjoying life and helping make the world better.

As Stephen’s son, Paul, wrote in a message to us, Stephen “was passionate about ACA and its mission and was excited to serve on ACA’s board with the vigor and dedication he approached so many endeavors in his life. Supporting ACA was his way of carrying forward his father’s legacy—their shared dedication to a principled U.S. foreign policy and making the world a safer place.”

“Above all, my dad was overjoyed that I have committed my career to the immensely challenging yet rewarding pursuit of nuclear peace,” he added. (Paul Warnke is a senior program officer with the Nuclear Threat Initiative Nuclear Policy Program.)

Stephen’s late father, Paul C. Warnke, was a major figure in the field of nuclear arms control and disarmament, a mentor to many younger experts and professionals in the field, and also a member of ACA’s Board of Directors until his death in 2001. ACA held a major conference in his honor in 2004 at Georgetown University, where his papers are archived.

Stephen’s death is a devastating loss. Our hearts go out to the Warnke family, Stephen’s innumerable friends, and longtime colleagues at Ropes & Gray, where Stephen was a well-respected and in-demand healthcare attorney.

As his Ropes & Gray associates recalled in their remembrance, his active pro bono practice extended his impact by improving healthcare quality, expanding access for underserved groups, and fighting for greater transparency in healthcare costs and insurance information. He was at the forefront of New York’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, playing an instrumental role in establishing an emergency standard of care for patients surging into hospitals in the pandemic’s earliest days. His work eased suffering and saved lives. Quite simply, Stephen was a wonderful person: kind, extremely smart, and very committed to making things better for others, as best he could.

A memorial celebration will be held June 16 at 4 p.m. at the Angel Orensanz Foundation, 172 Norfolk Street, New York City.

June 2026
By Kelsey Davenport

U.S. President Donald Trump announced that the United States and Iran are close to reaching a peace agreement, but Iranian officials cautioned that a deal is not imminent. Even if an agreement is reached, Washington and Tehran said it will not address nuclear issues in detail and that more negotiations will be necessary.

In a May 23 post on Truth Social, Trump wrote that “An Agreement has been largely negotiated,” and that “Final aspects and details of the Deal are currently being discussed, and will be announced shortly.”

The previous week, Trump threatened to resume strikes but said he would hold off at the behest of states in the region. The leaders of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates asked the United States “to hold off on our planned Military attack” against Iran set for the next day because “serious negotiations are now taking place,” Trump wrote May 18 on Truth Social.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei concurred that progress was made, but disputed Trump’s assertion that a deal would be announced soon. “We have reached conclusions on a large portion of the issues, but no one can claim that the signing of an agreement is imminent,” he told Iranian state media May 25.

Both Baghaei and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested that the agreement will not address key nuclear concerns in detail and that subsequent negotiations will focus on those issues. Baghaei said in a May 25 press conference that the “focus of the negotiations is on ending the war” and “at this stage, we are not discussing the details of the nuclear issue.”

Rubio told The New York Times during a trip to New Delhi May 24 that “the straits [sic] have to be immediately reopened, and then we will enter, under agreed-to parameters, into very serious talks about enrichment, about the highly enriched uranium, and about [Iran’s] pledge to never have nuclear weapons.”

The future of the Strait of Hormuz emerged as a key issue after the United States and Israel attacked Iran Feb. 28. The subsequent war and Iran’s focus on asserting military control over the strait largely halted maritime traffic through the waterway, a critical route for commodities such as oil and fertilizer. Iran now wants to charge ships for transit, while the United States maintains that the waterway should be open.

Iran is also seeking sanctions relief as part of the initial agreement. Iranian media reported that the head of Iran’s central bank, Abdolnasser Hemmati, accompanied Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi to Qatar May 25 for talks on sanctions relief.

Even if an agreement to formalize the April 7 ceasefire and reopen the Strait of Hormuz were reached, Iranian and U.S. statements suggest that the two sides remain far apart on the future of Iran’s nuclear program and the disposition of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium-235 (HEU), particularly the 440 kilograms of uranium enriched to near-weapons-grade levels. Baghaei suggested a 30-to-60-day window to negotiate a nuclear agreement after Washington and Tehran reached a deal to end the war.

Before announcing that a deal was imminent, Trump maintained that Iran must hand over the HEU to the United States and threatened to send U.S. troops into Iran to retrieve the material.

In a May 25 Truth Social post, however, Trump suggested that he might be relaxing his demand that the United States take possession of the material. He said, “The Enriched Uranium (Nuclear Dust!) will either be immediately turned over to the United States to be brought home and destroyed or, preferably, in conjunction and coordination with the Islamic Republic of Iran, destroyed in place or, at another acceptable location.”

Iranian officials have emphasized that the HEU must remain in Iran. Iran’s supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, reportedly supports that position, saying that transferring the material abroad could increase Iran’s vulnerability to future military pressure or attacks, according to senior Iranian sources quoted May 21 by Reuters.

Araghchi has suggested that Iran offered to blend down the HEU to lower levels, which poses less of a proliferation risk, during negotiations with the Trump administration before the U.S. and Israeli decision to bomb Iran Feb. 28. (See ACT, April 2026.) Down-blending could be what Trump referred to when he said the HEU must be destroyed.

Speaking May 15 at the BRICS foreign ministers’ meeting in New Delhi, Araghchi said that the two sides were deadlocked over the future of the HEU, “but we will come to that subject in later stages.”

Trump also may be demonstrating more flexibility on the future of Iran’s nuclear program. He recently suggested that the United States may be willing to relax its demand that Iran forgo uranium enrichment in perpetuity and accept instead a 20-year suspension of enrichment. “Twenty years is enough, but the level of guarantee from them is not enough. In other words, it’s got to be a real 20 years,” he told reporters May 15 on Air Force One.

Iran has repeatedly rejected a permanent ban on uranium enrichment, which it views as a sovereign right under the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Senior Iranian officials have said Tehran is willing to suspend enrichment but rejected doing so for 20 years.

It is unclear if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would accept a deal allowing Iran to enrich uranium in the future or retain any enriched uranium.

In a May 24 statement, Netanyahu said he discussed the negotiations with Trump the previous day and that the two leaders “agreed that any final agreement with Iran must eliminate the nuclear danger. This means dismantling Iran’s uranium enrichment sites and removing enriched nuclear material from its territory.”

A re-eruption of hostilities also threatens progress. Two days after Trump announced an agreement was imminent, the United States bombed Iran, in what U.S. Central Command described as “self-defense strikes.”

In a May 25 statement, Central Command spokesman Capt. Tim Hawkins said the United States acted with “restraint” and targeted “missile launch sites and Iranian boats attempting to emplace mines” that threatened U.S. forces.

In a May 26 statement, Iran’s Foreign Ministry said that the United States “committed a grave violation of the ceasefire.” These “acts of aggression, coinciding with the ongoing diplomatic process mediated by Pakistan, once again exposes the ill intent and bad faith of the U.S. ruling establishment,” the statement said. “Iran will not leave any act of hostility unanswered.”

If Iran does retaliate, The New York Times reported May 12 that it may be better positioned militarily than previously assessed. Unnamed U.S. officials quoted in the article said that U.S. intelligence assessed that Iran retained about 70 percent of the stockpile of missiles it possessed before the war and roughly the same amount of missile launchers.

June 2026
By Libby Flatoff and Daryl G. Kimball reporting from New York

 After four weeks of intense debate and discussion, diplomats from 130 states at the 2026 nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference failed to agree on ways to address rising nuclear weapons dangers.

With delegates unable to overcome an array of disputes among a handful of states, including Iran and the United States, conference President Do Hung Viet announced May 22 that consensus on the eight-page draft outcome document was not possible.

“No one [state] blocked consensus because I realized there was not consensus, and so I did not put the document forward,” Viet, Vietnam’s UN ambassador, told a news conference. “I had options. I decided I had to make the difficult decision to pursue this path [because] I wanted to maintain my neutrality and maintain my commitment to a balanced approach.”

Viet said there were “difficulties” reaching consensus on more than one section of the final draft text, but “a very important reason” for the impasse was the country-specific language in paragraph 15 of the final draft, which said “Iran can never seek, develop or acquire any nuclear weapons.”

According to diplomats who spoke with Arms Control Today on condition of anonymity, the U.S. delegation insisted that language faulting Iran must remain in the document; Iran refused to accept the reference and objected to the omission of language in an earlier version of the document condemning U.S.-Israeli military attacks on its safeguarded nuclear facilities.

This marks the third-straight NPT review conference at which states-parties failed to agree on a final conference outcome document. At the 2022 conference, held shortly after Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, Russia objected to references to its occupation of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. At the 2015 conference, the United States blocked consensus over a proposal for a conference to discuss the Middle Eastern weapons-of-mass-destruction (WMD) free zone. (See ACT, September 2022; ACT, June 2015.)

The April 28-May 22 review conference at UN headquarters in New York was the 11th such meeting to review implementation and compliance with 1968 treaty obligations, to reaffirm support for the treaty and decisions taken by consensus at previous review conferences, and to identify further steps to advance NPT goals and objectives.

In an interview with Arms Control Today before the 2026 review conference, Viet warned that if there was another failure, “We may lose the credibility of the NPT itself.” (See ACT, April 2026.) In his post-conference remarks May 22, he said, “A third failure to reach a consensus outcome is disastrous for this regime.”

Throughout the conference, states-parties underscored their general support for the treaty and its three main pillars on preventing the spread of nuclear weapons, preventing a nuclear arms race, and advancing the peaceful use of nuclear technology under safeguards. But members sparred on several key issues in the final conference document, including the conflict in the Middle East and Iran’s nuclear program. On day one, the United States led a lengthy objection to Iran’s nomination by the Non-Aligned Movement to serve as one of 35 largely ceremonial conference vice presidents, making it clear that the U.S. priority was to insist that Iran “can never be allowed to have a nuclear weapon.”

Many other states, including in the Western Group, also wanted the conference to “express concerns over the finding of the [International Atomic Energy Agency] Board of Governors of Iran’s non-compliance with its obligations under its Safeguards Agreement with IAEA.”

Iran and some other states emphasized that two nuclear-armed states, the United States and Israel, had attacked the safeguarded nuclear facilities of a non-nuclear-weapon state—Iran—in violation of key nuclear safety principles and international law. This prompted a number of sharply worded “right of reply” statements among the United States, Gulf Arab states, and Iran. Other states noted that the regional conflict underscored the urgent need for further progress on the negotiation of a WMD-free zone.

As was the case at the 2022 conference, Russia’s war on Ukraine and the risks to the safety and security of Ukraine’s nuclear power plants were the target of sharp criticism, mainly from European states. This prompted right-of-reply statements from the Russian delegation, which opposed any language referring to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear facility.

In response to criticism from several states about the forward deployment of U.S. nuclear weapons in certain allied states and potential new nuclear sharing arrangements, several Western European states worked hard to defend their nuclear sharing and deterrence policies as being compatible with the letter of the NPT.

Significant Interventions

Among the most significant interventions were those of the United States, China, and Russia on their concerns about one another’s nuclear arsenals and their stance on nuclear testing and the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Many non-nuclear-weapon states pressed for stronger commitments on disarmament and nuclear risk reduction from the five nuclear-weapon states recognized under the NPT.

The opening U.S. statement by Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Yeaw focused on U.S. criticisms of Chinese nuclear policies, including its buildup of nuclear forces and U.S. allegations that China conducted a prohibited nuclear test in 2020. He noted that all five NPT nuclear-armed states have Article VI responsibilities and said that is why “we have proposed multilateral strategic stability and arms control” talks.

Russia and China expressed regret that the United States had failed to take up opportunities to negotiate a follow-on to the now expired New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START). They urged Washington to actively consider Moscow’s proposal to respect the New START limits for one more year and explore a follow-on agreement “in a responsible manner.”

On April 29, China’s director-general for disarmament, Sun Xiaobo, clearly referenced the United States in his statement, arguing that “One certain country exaggerates so-called nuclear threats from others as a pretext for investing trillions of dollars in nuclear modernization. The so-called ‘multilateral nuclear arms control and strategic stability dialogue’ proposed by certain country is in essence an attempt to shift its special and primary responsibilities as the country with the largest nuclear arsenal onto others. Attempts to shift the responsibility for nuclear disarmament to other countries will lead nowhere. China has no interest in them,” he said.

Sun’s statement continued: “China supports the purposes and objectives of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and honors its commitment on moratorium on nuclear testing, and urges those concerned to recognize the grave consequences of resuming nuclear testing against the trend of history.”

The U.S., French and UK delegations issued a joint statement May 21 to “strongly encourage all nuclear weapon States under the NPT to engage in multilateral strategic stability talks to promote mutual transparency and adopt concrete risk reduction measures.”

Notably, their statement also endorsed the pursuit of “confidence-building measures regarding nuclear explosive test monitoring, including increasing the ability to detect tests of any yield towards ensuring nuclear weapons states adhere to a zero-yield standard,” which was established by the CTBT.

Despite differences on whether and how to advance their joint Article VI obligations, the nuclear five worked together to methodically eliminate more specific elements from the draft outcome document that would have committed them to more specific actions designed to reduce the salience and number of their nuclear weapons.

CTBT Language Saved

However, due to the efforts of the vast majority of states that support the CTBT, U.S. attempts to eliminate language in support of the treaty were rebuffed. The final draft outcome document “underscore[d] the need for nuclear-weapon States to ratify the CTBT, and to uphold and adhere to national moratoriums against all nuclear test explosions and commend[ed] the provisional operationalization of the International Monitoring System and of the International Data Centre” (emphasis as received).

To try to find solutions to these and other differences, Viet presented the first version of the draft outcome document earlier in the conference to allow for more time to negotiate. Each successive draft document was written in an economical style that sought to focus on key principles and objectives without extraneous language that might prompt time consuming negotiation. The first version was 13 pages; the fifth and final draft was only eight pages.

In the final round, two paragraphs were dropped from the document, apparently due to Russian objections, in an attempt to find consensus. One paragraph mentioned North Korea’s illicit nuclear weapons program; the other mentioned the IAEA’s five nuclear safety principles relating to the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. These omissions made certain European states, as well as Japan and South Korea, very unhappy.

Many non-nuclear-weapon states were also displeased that the document failed to commit the nuclear-weapon states to urgently resume bilateral or multilateral arms control and disarmament negotiations. The final draft of the outcome document only called for “constructive dialogue on the basis of mutual respect and acknowledgement of each other’s security interests and concerns, to ease international tension, promote international peace and stability, enhance confidence and reduce strategic risks, and note that such engagement could facilitate future arms control discussions, and help progress towards nuclear disarmament.”

After the conference failure, Ireland published a statement on behalf of its fellow New Agenda Coalition members, Brazil, Egypt, Mexico, New Zealand, and South Africa: “Against a backdrop of elevated nuclear risks, we would have expected to see more flexibility from the nuclear-weapon States over the course of this Conference, particularly given that many non-nuclear weapon States demonstrated considerable flexibility throughout these negotiations. Collective, constructive and bold leadership is required, especially from all nuclear-weapon States.”

If the draft outcome document had been approved, it would have decided that at the next NPT review conference, there would be “structured, in-person discussions and exchanges of views on the national reports by the nuclear-weapon States,” something many states have argued would improve accountability in the NPT review process.

Viet noted at his May 22 press conference that he tried to “appeal to states to come to an agreement that would have contributed to reducing tension and risk and nuclear dangers.” In the end, however, it was not enough, as there was no middle ground between the United States and Iran.

States-parties agreed that the next NPT review conference will be held in 2031 with the next preparatory meeting in 2028.