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START I and START II are two treaties that reduced the nuclear weapons stockpiles of the United States and the Soviet Union (and its successor, the Russian Federation). Negotiations for START I began in 1982. Washington and Moscow set a preliminary goal of reducing nuclear warhead stockpiles to 5,000 each. The deployment of U.S. intermediate-range nuclear weapons in Europe led the Soviets to withdraw from the discussions in 1983, but the talks were resumed in 1985 with a new proposed ceiling of 6,000 warheads for each of the superpowers. Negotiations continued over the next several years as the Soviets attempted to link prohibitions on space-based weapons and defense systems, such as the American Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), to the nuclear reductions. In 1989, Moscow abandoned the SDI linkage during negotiations between U.S. secretary of state James A. Baker III and his Soviet counterpart. Final agreement between the two superpowers occurred at the Washington Summit in 1990, and START I was signed on 31 July 1991 by U.S. president George H. W. Bush and Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev.

START I limited the United States and the USSR to a maximum of 6,000 nuclear warheads apiece, of which no more than 4,900 could be ballistic missile warheads. In addition, each country was limited to 1,600 delivery systems, including submarine launchers, bombers, and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). The treaty reduced the total number of nuclear weapons among the two superpowers by 35 percent. START I also contained one of the most thorough inspection regimes of any arms control agreement and provided for 12 separate means to monitor the arsenals of Cold War foes. The agreement was to last for 15 years following ratification and could be extended for five-year periods thereafter.

START I was signed five months before the demise of the Soviet Union. On 23 May 1992, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Ukraine signed the Lisbon Protocol in which they pledged to abide by the terms of START I as the successor states to the Soviet Union. Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine subsequently disarmed, or transferred to Russia, all their remaining nuclear weapons. The U.S. Senate ratified START I on 1 October 1992. By December 1994, the parliaments of the four Soviet successor states had ratified the agreement and it entered into force. Meanwhile, in December 1993, President William J. Clinton had ordered the United States to accelerate its reductions under START I. In March 1995, the first START I verification inspections begin. By 2001, more than 450 missile silos in the United States had been destroyed. On 5 December 2001, Washington and Moscow issued a joint statement that all obligations under START I had been met.

Bush initiated the negotiations over START II with Russian president Boris Yeltsin in 1992, when the two leaders agreed to reduce the total number of nuclear warheads to no more than 3,500 in each country. On 3 January 1993, Bush and Yeltsin signed the START II accord. START II called for each country to reduce its total warheads in two phases, eventually reaching a target of 3,000-3,500 warheads each. The Senate ratified the agreement on 26 January 1996, but the Duma refused to approve the treaty until the United States agreed to an additional protocol that would pledge both states not to pursue ballistic missile defense. . .

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