Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) introduced legislation on February 7 to limit all funding for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), except for its International Monitoring System (IMS). Although the legislation partially protects funds towards the IMS, portions of its overall budget that pay for staff time and the International Data Centre, which processes information given by IMS operations, are supported by the CTBTO. Since the United States provided about a quarter of the CTBTO budget of $128 million in 2016, the possibility of underfunding the organization raises serious questions about the future of global nuclear detection capabilities.
For more information read "Republicans Seek to Cut CTBTO Funds" in the March 2017 issue of Arms Control Today.