; Whereas the Russian Federation’s illegal war against Ukraine represents the greatest threat to European security and freedom in a generation; Whereas, on February 27, 2022, President of Russia Vladimir Putin ordered his military to put Russia’s nuclear forces on ‘‘special combat readiness” in an escalatory response to the United States’ and its Western allies’ unequivocal condemnation of the Russian Federation’s illegal invasion of Ukraine; Whereas, on September 21, 2022, President Putin warned he was ‘‘not bluffing’’ when he said Russia has ‘‘various weapons of mass destruction’’ and ‘‘will use all the means available to us’’ to defend its territory shortly before annexing additional Ukrainian lands through ‘‘referendums’’; Whereas, in February 2021, the United States and Russian Federation extended the Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms, signed on April 8, 2010, and entered into force on February 5, 2011 (commonly referred to as the New START Treaty ), for 5 years until February 5, 2026; Whereas, on February 21, 2023, President Putin announced the Russian Federation’s purported suspension of the New START Treaty, the last major remaining bilateral nuclear arms control agreement, in a move deemed legally invalid by the United States; Whereas New START has had bipartisan support and limits the Russian nuclear arsenal to 1,550 warheads on no more than 700 deployed delivery vehicles, and to 800 deployed and non-deployed strategic launchers; Whereas New START has permitted robust and strict transparency and verification measures and on-site inspections, which have provided valuable insight into Russia’s nuclear arsenal; Whereas the United States has decades of bipartisan leadership in nuclear arms control, including cooperation with the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation even when relations were strained