We can negotiate with Iran, and it looks like negotiations are moving in the right direction. This vindicates sanctions as a means to procure leverage in negotiations, particularly since this breakthrough comes on the heels of Russia declaring sanctions a possibility. I am interested in knowing what rationale my country is giving for the START treaty not going below 3,000 warheads each. Albeit, there are all sort so different terms for these things that makes it easy to get these things mixed up. The expiring START treaty involved a reduction to 1,700 to 2,200 "deployed" warheads. And the new treaty was supposed to reduce the number of "deployed warheads" to 1,500 to 1,675. But certainly destroying nuclear weapons is a more substantive accomplishment than simply taking them off of missiles. I don't in general understand why both sides can't just agree to decrease their arsenals down to 300 nukes each and then involve France and the other runner ups in further negotiations. Perhaps that would make people feel too insecure, but if our goal is 0 than presumably that is a sacrifice we are willing to make. It just seems like a pointless kicking of the can down the road that reveals ambivalent feelings regarding the reductions to go as slowly as we are going.