The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty

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Signed in Washington on 8 December 1987 by Reagan and Gorbachev, and the first arms control agreement to abolish an entire class of weapons rather than cap it. It eliminated all ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges between 500 and 5,500 kilometres, on both sides, together with their launchers and support equipment, and it did so under on-site inspection arrangements — including permanent portal monitoring at missile production plants — that were without precedent and that established the intrusive verification model later agreements inherited. The weapons it removed were the ones that had made Europe most dangerous: the Soviet SS-20 and the American Pershing II and ground-launched cruise missiles had flight times to their targets measured in single-digit minutes, which compressed decision time to the point where warning and deliberation barely fitted inside it. The United States withdrew in 2019, citing Russian non-compliance, and the treaty terminated on 2 August 2019.

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