1999

by Richard Nixon

  In addition to pursuing these goals, our arms-control policy cannot ignore Soviet violations of past arms-control agreements. These must not be swept quietly under the rug in the rush toward new accords but should be met with a measured response. Soviet arms-control violations should not lead us to throw out the old agreements and quit negotiating. Instead, we should put the issue of Soviet compliance high on the superpower agenda. If Moscow fails to address our concerns to our satisfaction, we must take the position, as the Reagan administration has, that Soviet arms-control violations will be met with proportional American responses.

  Unilateral compliance is unilateral disarmament. We sign agreements for the sake of our security, and we must not abide by agreements when Soviet violations threaten our security. Unilateral compliance will win us not goodwill but contempt from the Kremlin leaders.

  We need a comprehensive compromise on the strategic issues. We need such a deal, not only between the United States and the Soviet Union, but also between the administration and the Congress. For the first time in over a decade, the pieces are in place for just such a comprehensive accommodation.

  A domestic compromise should be easier to achieve than a good international compromise. The Congress today has as much power to determine American defense policy as the President. The administration must recognize this basic political reality. If it does not, the House and the Senate will use their budgetary powers to wrest control away from the executive. If it does, the possibility exists for a coherent strategic policy to emerge.

  This is not to say that the administration should simply follow the prevailing political winds in Congress. The President alone can provide leadership—but he cannot act alone. He must decide what we need to do to maintain our security and must seek congressional approval for his program. He will never prevail unless he takes the opinions of responsible congressional figures into account. There is a responsible majority in Congress, and the President must be responsive to its concerns.

  The reason the administration has had so much difficulty in winning congressional approval for its strategic programs has been its failure to make its case in terms of strategic stability. That is what preoccupies responsible members of Congress. From this point of view, the administration’s decision to deploy the MX missile in silos vulnerable to a Soviet first strike makes no sense. If the problem is the vulnerability of land-based missiles, the answer is not to stick missiles into fixed holes in the ground. These silos simply become tempting targets for a Soviet first strike.

  Congress will continue to cut funding for the Strategic Defense Initiative as long as the administration remains obsessed with building a total defense of the American population. Requests for billions of dollars to develop a “space shield” will not survive because Congress knows that the goal of a leakproof defense, while politically popular, is technologically and strategically unrealistic.

  Responsible members of Congress are further turned off by the administration’s negotiating position on strategic defense. Those who want to trade away the entire Strategic Defense Initiative are a vocal minority. Those who argue that negotiations on limiting strategic defense should be linked with negotiations for offensive reductions represent a consensus around which a coherent strategic program can be built.

  If the administration wants continued offensive modernization and initial defensive deployments, it must change its strategy in Congress. It should adopt a two-part program. First, it should ask for additional MX missiles that would be based in fixed silos but that would be deployed in tandem with a limited strategic defense. It should also ask for the deployment of some mobile, single-warhead missiles, though not as many as originally envisioned. With fewer of these mobile missiles and with a limited strategic defense, the area in which they would need to roam would shrink to a feasible size. At the same time, the number of highly accurate warheads on these missiles should be held below the level that would represent a first-strike threat to the Soviet Union, and the strategic defense would be designed to make a Soviet first-strike impossible. Since the defense need not be perfect, the combination could be deployed in the mid- to late 1990s.

  Second, it should announce a new negotiating strategy with Moscow. The approach of the Reagan administration has been flawed on two counts. On the one hand, its intransigent and unrealistic pursuit of a defense of the American population united a majority in Congress against the administration. On the other hand, some administration officials have shown a willingness to negotiate with the Soviets to restrict strategic defense testing in a way which would in effect gut the chances of deploying a limited defense of our strategic forces. As a result, it has thinned the ranks of supporters who want to deploy a strategic defense and has aided and abetted its opponents who want stop the SDI dead in its tracks. If this President agrees to testing limits that strangle the SDI, no future President will be able to refuse an extension of those limits.

  A more flexible position that continues research for a population defense and retains the right to test and deploy a limited defense of increasingly vulnerable U.S. strategic forces would attract majority support.

  That would create the basis for a strong negotiating position with Moscow. With Congress supporting the President, the Kremlin leaders would know that they could no longer count on the Senate and the House to undercut the administration’s position. They would also know that if they do not come to terms with our negotiators, the United States has set itself on a course to solve its strategic problems on its own. We would then have the leverage needed to strike a deal.

  The lines of a sound strategic-arms-control agreement are clear. What worries the leaders of the Soviet Union is the American Strategic Defense Initiative. What worries the American leaders is the growing capability of the Soviet Union to destroy our strategic forces with the largest Soviet land-based missiles. A trade-off between the two would be mutually beneficial.

  We must be extremely careful about the kind of deal we accept. On the issue of strategic defense, we must take a tough but rational stance: Our research is not negotiable. Our testing is not negotiable. Our development of specific weapons systems is not negotiable. Our option to deploy is not negotiable. The only thing that should be negotiable is the extent of our deployment. We should make it clear to Gorbachev that the extent of our deployment will be determined by the extent of the threat posed by highly accurate missiles capable of use in a first strike. We should stake out that position and never retreat from it.

  We should keep the card of strategic defense in our hand and move forward vigorously in developing a limited defense, not only to create negotiating leverage but also to deploy if negotiations fail. We should lay it out cold turkey to the Kremlin: The precondition for any deal is the link between offense and defense. We will link the number of our defensive systems we deploy to the number of highly threatening offensive systems they deploy. If they want to limit our defense, they can do so by reducing their offensive threat. If they add to their offensive arsenal, we will counter with greater defensive deployments.

  In the communiqué issued after the summit in Washington in December 1987, the broad lines of the START agreement being negotiated by the Reagan administration emerged. It has sought an agreement to cut the strategic forces by 50 percent. Both sides would reduce their arsenals to 1,600 launchers, such as bombers and missile silos, and to 6,000 warheads; and only 4,900 warheads would be permitted on ballistic missiles. While such a radical reduction may be politically appealing, it requires close scrutiny. We must keep in mind that what is at stake is nothing less than the West’s survival.

  Before we look at the numbers, we need to understand what security problems we face on the strategic level and what makes Gorbachev seek an agreement along these lines. Our problem is the Soviet advantage in so-called counterforce warheads—the weapons that are powerful and accurate enough to destroy even the missile silos and communication systems that are hardened to survive a nuclear attack. For an arms-contro
l agreement to serve our interests and the interests of real peace, it must address that Soviet advantage in counterforce weapons.

  Gorbachev’s motives are traditional Soviet motives. Soviet arms-control negotiators have consistently sought to limit developments in American weapons technology and to preserve or increase Soviet advantages in weapons deployments. In that respect, Gorbachev’s proposals are old formulas in new rhetoric.

  We must first ask whether the terms of the agreement kill the chances for strategic defense while preserving the Soviet advantage in highly accurate offensive weapons. While he hedged somewhat during the Washington summit, Gorbachev has consistently sought to get the Reagan administration to abandon the Strategic Defense Initiative as part of a deal to cut strategic forces by 50 percent. Gorbachev’s top preference has been an explicit ban on new defensive systems. His second preference would be for a moratorium on certain kinds of SDI testing or a seven- to ten-year extension of the ABM Treaty. He might be confident that either would induce Congress to gut the SDI program, because deployment would become such a distant prospect. Moreover, he might be confident that the Soviet Union could exert decisive political pressure on any future administration to extend the testing moratorium or to remain bound by the ABM Treaty, particularly because he would assume that no future President would be as enthusiastic a supporter of the SDI as Ronald Reagan.

  It would be a disaster for U.S. security if Gorbachev succeeds in undercutting the SDI—either through a direct U.S. concession or through an agreement which induces Congress to starve the program. Only if Gorbachev agrees to dismantle the threat posed by his highly accurate land-based missiles will U.S. concessions on strategic defense be justified. Without a landmark concession of this kind by Moscow, the United States must stand its ground. If the United States makes concessions on research, testing, and development or trades away the option to deploy a strategic defense at all, the START agreement will actually diminish American security.

  What if Gorbachev backed off his demands on SDI? What if he delinked the talks on offensive and defensive weapons and simply agreed to cut strategic forces by 50 percent? That would not necessarily be cause for celebration. If Gorbachev were to break the linkage, we would first have to look closely at why he did so.

  We know Gorbachev has an advantage in highly accurate counterforce missiles—an advantage in what he would call the correlation of forces. Gorbachev is a different kind of Soviet leader. But no Soviet leader can survive if he unilaterally gives up an advantage in the correlation of forces without getting something in return. Specifically, he cannot go back to his military leaders with a strategic-arms-control agreement that fails to stop the SDI yet also gives up Moscow’s present advantage in offensive land-based weapons. Thus, we must remain highly suspicious if the Soviets accept a formula for major cuts in offensive forces without any linkage to limits on strategic defense. If Gorbachev is happy with those terms, we should be wary of them.

  In order to evaluate whether a 50 percent reduction in offensive forces helps or hurts our security, we must examine what impact it will have on the Soviet offensive threat to our strategic forces. We need to answer one simple question: Will the agreement for a 50 percent cut diminish or increase the Soviet capability to launch a successful first strike against U.S. strategic forces? So far, few have paid attention to the consequences such a reduction would have on the strategic balance. Too many pundits and politicians assume that since nuclear weapons are bad, any cut is good. What matters here is the fine print, the sublimits that prescribe how many and what kinds of warheads can be deployed on land, on submarines, or on bombers. Alone, a sublimit of 4,900 warheads on ballistic missiles would increase, not decrease, the vulnerability of American strategic forces.

  Under this kind of agreement, Moscow would retain a land-based force composed almost entirely of missiles accurate enough to be used in a first strike. It would be a mix of SS-18s, SS-25s, and SS-24s. At the same time, the cuts would reduce the number of targets in the United States that would have to be destroyed for a first strike to succeed. In addition, the agreement would restrict the deployment of our most capable and survivable forces, the fleet of Trident II submarines, to about ten boats. As a result, these could well become vulnerable. Half will always be in port, and the other half will be tracked by over 270 Soviet attack submarines.

  If we agree to these terms for a 50 percent cut, we would see the ratio of Soviet first-strike warheads to U.S. first-strike targets become drastically worse. Thus, the bottom line is that current terms of the emerging START agreement are not in the interest of the United States or in the interest of real peace. Our national security would be hurt, not helped, if we go forward with such a fatally flawed accord.

  While the 50 percent cut under negotiation is unacceptable, we should not walk away from the table. What we should do is negotiate in the areas in which our interests are threatened and negotiate for agreements that increase mutual security and strategic stability.

  First, we must put conventional-arms control front and center on the agenda. We should not go forward on talks for large-scale reductions in strategic forces without making progress in negotiations on the conventional level. If we fail to establish linkage between the two negotiations, we will be accepting the Soviet agenda—and we will be playing right into Moscow’s hands.

  Second, we must keep open the option—and maintain a viable program—to deploy strategic defenses as soon as possible. As long as Moscow has an advantage in counterforce weapons, we must make clear to Gorbachev our determination to deploy strategic defenses—and we should immediately take the symbolic step of beginning the construction of the one ABM base permitted under the 1972 treaty, something Moscow has already done.

  Third, we should redirect the START talks. We should propose a strict limit on the number of strategic warheads capable of destroying hardened military targets in a first strike. Both superpowers would be allowed to retain equal numbers of counterforce warheads. But the level of these most threatening weapons would be scaled back dramatically. This limitation should involve a 75 percent cut from the present level of such Soviet weapons as the SS-18, the SS-24 and the SS-25. It would also require reductions in planned deployments of comparable U.S. weapons, like the MX and Trident II D-5 missiles. In conjunction with such an agreement, the United States should agree to limits on the extent of the deployment of a space-based defense system against ballistic missiles. We should deploy only enough defensive weapons to counter the threat of the Soviet Union’s decreased offensive force.

  An agreement along these lines would create both quantitative and qualitative equality between our forces. Even more important, these terms would reduce the ratio of first-strike warheads to first-strike targets for both sides, thereby improving mutual security and bolstering strategic stability. The bottom line is that under such an agreement we would have true strategic stability. Neither side would have a first-strike capability. Both would have a retalitatory, second-strike capability against the other side’s strategic forces.

  In recent months, some analysts have claimed that under Gorbachev the Soviet Union has undergone a revolution in strategic thinking. Soviet strategists, in this view, have finally accepted the Western concepts of “strategic sufficiency” and “strategic stability.” Since there have been no changes in Soviet military programs or arms-control strategy, a dose of skepticism is in order. But we should put this so-called new thinking to the test. We should put forward a proposal, like the one above, designed to enhance mutual security by cutting to an equal and stable level the weapons systems accurate and powerful enough for use in a first-strike attack.

  We must always keep in mind that, with a total of more than twenty thousand strategic warheads in the superpower arsenals, the relative numbers of nuclear weapons on each side do not matter as much as the relative vulnerability of each to a first strike by the other. Vulnerability, not arithmetic, must guide our arms control negotiating strategy. After all, if
we haphazardly subtract from the number of weapons, we could add to our vulnerability, thereby jeopardizing our security. If we wish the START talks to mark a turning point in the U.S.–Soviet competition, we must redirect them toward the objective of limiting the counterforce weapons which pose the greatest threat to security and stability.

  Fourth, any cut in strategic forces also requires ironclad verification. Those who have argued that the INF agreement has solved the thorniest problems of verification are wrong. The agreement broke new ground by permitting limited on-site inspection. That was a positive development. But no one would dispute that, given the small size and the mobility of the SS-20 missile, a determined Soviet effort to cheat would evade detection. In addition, the provision for on-site inspection lasts for only thirteen years. After that, the United States is on its own. While the verfication provisions in the INF agreement are better than those in any previous arms-control accord, they will not be an adequate model for a START agreement.

  Verification for a START treaty will be far more difficult—and far more important—than verification for the INF agreement. Eliminating a whole class of weapons can be verified much more easily than reducing various classes of weapons, with some based at sea or under it, others on long-range bombers, and still others in fixed silos or on mobile launchers on land. No one in the American government has yet come to grips with the complexity of this task. We must not rush into a START agreement until the problems involved have been painstakingly considered. At the same time, we must remember that verification is a central issue, but not the central issue. The fact that a bad agreement can be verified does not make it a good agreement.