You have summed it up perfectly. Although I also try to understand Putin's paranoia based on the antecedents of the US. No one will sleep well knowing fully well that there are enemies holding missiles, artilleries et al, by his windows. Nevertheless, his utterances and behavior cannot be excused.
I hope a permanent solution is found soon. Actually, I think the entire world needs to be nuclearly disarmed. Another weapon should serve as deterrence.
What about your "no first deployment" idea? Is there a chance anything like that could come about?
The problem is, realistically, the countries most in need of nuclear weapons are the ones that would be easily defeated if they didn't have the nukes. Russia, for instance, will 'easily' lose a conventional war - so why would it ever give up its nuclear arsenal? Same with North Korea. And even then, there's biological weapons, chemical weapons... We're fixated on nuclear, but I don't know if biological weapons aren't as big a problem that we just choose not to talk about, maybe because of lack of clear information about what's currently possible.