"The United States and Soviet Union began to sign agreements limiting their strategic offensive nuclear weapons in the early 1970s. Progress in negotiating and implementing these agreements was often slow, and subject to the tenor of the broader U.S.-Soviet relationship. As the Cold War drew to a close in the late 1980s, the pace of negotiations quickened, with the two sides signing treaties limiting intermediate range and long-range weapons. But progress again slowed in the 1990s, as U.S. missile defense plans and a range of other policy conflicts intervened in the U.S.- Russian relationship. At the same time, however, the two sides began to cooperate on securing and eliminating Soviet-era nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. Through these efforts, the United States allocates more than $1 billion each year to threat reduction programs in the former Soviet Union. However, these programs may slow or stall in the next few years. [...] The international community has also adopted a number of agreements that address non-nuclear weapons. [...] The Chemical Weapons and Biological Weapons Conventions sought to eliminate both of these types of weapons completely."