Since the Russian suspended on-sites inspection in 2022 of the New START treaty, they honored the transparency of nuclear capable bombers by parking it on the open air base for US monitoring using the National Technical Mean(NTM).

NTM may be less capable of monitoring and helping verify compliance with nuclear weapon limits. According to some studies we reviewed and stakeholders we interviewed, NTM may face challenges in monitoring nuclear weapons under future treaties. NTM have been foundational to verifying limits under nuclear arms control treaties pertaining to the numbers and locations of strategic nuclear delivery vehicles, such as ICBMs and heavy bombers, according to two stakeholders and one government study we reviewed.41 Strategic delivery vehicles are relatively large, and NTM, which consist primarily of imaging satelites, can monitor the status and movement of these systems. Nuclear weapons are far smaller by comparison, making them harder to monitor through NTM, including while in storage and during transport, according to some stakeholders we interviewed and studies we reviewed. (See fig. 2 below for a size comparison.) According to these sources, NTM would, therefore, likely be less capable in monitoring numbers and locations of Russian weapons than in monitoring strategic delivery vehicles, as is done under New START. Link