The withdrawal of the United States from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) in 2019 threatens the collapse of the entire nuclear weapons control system created over the past 50 years. This may lead to an uncontrolled multilateral arms race. This dangerous turn of events is assessed differently by politicians and experts. One of the growing trends of thought postulates that the bipolar world of the Cold War times has given way to multipolarity, and therefore bilateral limitation of nuclear weapons is no longer possible. This premise is complemented by the hypothesis that the latest weapons and military technologies cannot be limited by the old methods of negotiations and agreements, which therefore should also be abolished. It is proposed to focus on the organization of various multilateral forums to create an enabling environment for strengthening nuclear deterrence, transparency, and predictability. However, scientific analysis shows that both of these premises are unfounded. First, despite deep reductions in nuclear weapons over the past 30 years, the share of the two leading powers in the global arsenal of such weapons has barely decreased, and the nuclear landscape remains largely bilateral. Second, the revolutionizing impact of advances in military technology is not new but a common occurrence that has recurred regularly throughout history. The experience of the past five decades has convincingly demonstrated that arms control can be successfully implemented if there is political will at the highest state level to reach agreements on the limitation and reduction of nuclear weapons.

中文翻译：

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武器与外交

美国于 2019 年退出《中程核力量条约》（INF 条约），威胁着过去 50 年建立的整个核武器控制体系的崩溃。这可能会导致不受控制的多边军备竞赛。政治家和专家对这种危险的事件转变的评估各不相同。一种日益增长的思想趋势假设冷战时期的两极世界已经让位于多极，因此双边限制核武器不再可能。这一前提得到了以下假设的补充：最新的武器和军事技术不能受到旧的谈判和协议方法的限制，因此也应该废除。建议重点组织各种多边论坛，为加强核威慑、透明度和可预测性创造有利环境。然而，科学分析表明，这两个前提都是没有根据的。首先，尽管过去 30 年来核武器大幅削减，但这两个主要大国在全球此类武器库中的份额几乎没有下降，核格局仍然主要是双边的。其次，军事技术进步的革命性影响并不新鲜，而是历史上经常发生的常见事件。