Numerous prominent nuclear arms control experts, including George Shultz, Richard Lugar and Sam Nunn, urged Trump to preserve the treaty. Gorbachev criticized Trump's nuclear treaty withdrawal as "not the work of a great mind" and stated "a new arms race has been announced". The decision was criticized by the chairmen of the United States House of Representatives Committees on Foreign Affairs and Armed Services who said that instead of crafting a plan to hold Russia accountable and pressure it into compliance, the Trump administration had offered Putin an easy way out of the treaty and played right into his hands. Similar arguments had been brought previously on 25 October 2018 by European members of NATO who urged the US "to try to bring Russia back into compliance with the treaty rather than quit it, seeking to avoid a split in the alliance that Moscow could exploit".