US is about to lose key arms-control tool from the closing days of the Cold War - right to station American observers in Russia to count the long-range missiles being built. U.S.-staffed Votkinsk Portal Monitoring Facility at Votkinsk Machine Building Plant, about 600 miles east of Moscow the site where all Russian intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) are built.The reciprocal site to Votkinsk in the United States was the former Hercules Aerospace missile production facility in Magna, Utah, which the Russians left more than eight years ago.Although the United States does not produce new long-range missiles, Russia continues to do so and has built dozens of missiles since the monitoring started15 years ago. START banned certain types of missiles, which Americans at Votkinsk verified by counting and inspecting every missile that left the facility
