ARE SALT 2 TREATY CRITICS REALISTIC?

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01315R000400390041-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 3, 2004
• Sequence Number: 41
• Publication Date: April 22, 1979
• Content Type: NSPR

C5 1z u
Approved For'gpgp9Q1M/1 3 DP88-01315R0004qD39
Article appeared 22 April 1979
on page A-3
SA I -F
The past record, says the author, indicates : hat today'sl
alarmists,haven't learned their ,lesson
By George Kistiakows&y
n the coming months Americans
will be facing great decisions about
the future of our defense policy
and our relations with the Soviet
Union. .
Should' we decide to accept in good.
faith the spirit of SALT II as a limitation
on the arms race - a limitation that is in
fact already largely known by the public
- and introduce, the minimum of new
weapons consistent with our security? Or,.
.if the SALT treaty is signed, should we
stretch its provisions and build as many
arms as'are not forbidden by it? Or, final-
ly, should we reject the treaty and choose
to increase vastly our spending on strate-
gic weapons in an attempt to achieve mili-
tary superiority over the Soviet Union?
In recent months a great many books,
articles, speeches, and advertisements -
even a. privately produced and widely dis-
tributed film have been circulated in
order to convince- the American public
that Soviet strategic power is growing
while American defenses are weakening:
We are told again and again that our na-
tional safety is in jeopardy.
The hawks who want to convince the
American public that the danger is grow-
ing severely criticize the SALT II treaty
.now being concluded under which each
side would limit itself to no more than
2250 strategic missile launchers and
bombers between now and 1985. The pro-
posed treaty is said to concede too much
to the USSR, perpetuating our weakness
and consolidating the'Soviet threat.
Such predictions are indeed frighten
ing, but are they realistic, or even plausi-
ble? The past. record of the arms race
argues strongly that they are not.
To understand the current opponents
of SALT, we must first understand how
wrong they have been in the past.
Between the late 1950s and the early
missile systems - the ABM'- that could
destroy most of the deterrent missiles we
would launch after the Russians attacked,
thus giving them a decisive advantage in
a nuclear war..
This alleged threat not only provided
the main pretext for our own expensive
and useless efforts to set up an ABM sys-
tem, mainly in the 1960s. It also was one
of the main justifications, in the late
1960s, for the MIRVing of our missiles, so
that a single missile would carry several
warheads; each"aimed at a different tar-
get.
While working on Eisenhower's scien-
tific advisory committee in 1959 and 1960
I had to assess some of the early claims
that the Russians were developing an
ABM system.
The Soviets, we knew from our intelli-
gence, had a center for anti-aircraft and
anti-missile work at Sary Shagen in CenA
tral Asia. Our U-2 planes observed there a
large radar installation that 'might, it was
thought, be a device for detecting incom-
ing missiles. Our intelligence experts im
mediately linked this installation to the
Soviet tests of medium-range ballistic
missiles at.Kapustin Yar; many hundreds
of miles to the west.
The evidence. was. hardly conclusive
that an effective ABM system was being
tested-at Sary Shagan, but it was enough
to encourage the US Air Force and. Navy
to develop "penetration aids" to be used
on American missiles in order to confuse
a Soviet ABM system.
The Army -justified its campaign? for,
the earliest possible installation of our-
own ABM protect' - with the code name
Nike Zeus - by citing the tests at Sary
Shagan.
Notwithstanding pressure from the
Army, defense contractors, and influen-
tial senators, my colleagues and Ion the
President's Science Advisory Committee
concluded that Nike Zeus defenses, while
rted by
foolish reactions to a fii Jae.0aFEl IReIWA ; 9 11ai'n17amass a a'~:t~ ac R%T
Soviets were building vas* ,antiballistic.
senhower refused to order the Nike Zeus
system ta.be installed.-::,
1970s US strategic policy was disto
But this was only the beginning of the
Soviet ABM scare. In 1961 -- after the
three-year moratorium on nuclear testing
was ended by the Soviets explosions
near Sary Shagan and a defense installa
tion being constructed. near Leningrad
were interpreted by proponents of the..
"worst possible case" as evidence that the.
Soviets were building a huge defense sys-
tem that would eventually .be able to
launch thousands - of ABM interceptor
missiles.
During 1961 'and 1962 Pentagon offi-
cials were making plans to react in kind.
They, and their supporters, claimed the ',
Leningrad defense work justified the de-..
velopment and installation not only of
Mike Zeus but also of multiple warheads.
(MRVs).
` In the mid-Sixties such warheads were
indeed deployed on the American strate-
gic missiles in Polaris II submarines - a
major step. And although proposals by
Sen. Strom Thurmond and others for the
immediate de-eployment of Nike Zeus.'
were defeated by the Kennedy adminis-
tration, these alarms about Soviet ABM
armaments encouraged the development
of Nike X,` a more advanced system de-
signed to defend us from a large number
of, simultaneous incoming missiles.
` In fact, later on in the 1960s, it turned
out that the constructions near Leningrad
were abandoned. The evidence suggested
they were-merely anti-aircraft defense,
But the damage was done; we had already
gone ahead with our plans for MRVs,
During the 1960s the Russians them
selves did much to exacerbate these fears,
particularly after the humiliation otthe
missile crisis of 1962. If, as seems likely,
they boasted about having impressive
ABM defenses in an attempt to conceal
'their own weakness in strategic weapons,;
they only played into the hanis of the
Pentagon hard-liners, . _ .
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Among the leaders of this Pentagon
group was Dr. John Foster, then the direc-
tor of Defense Research and Engineering,
who had long been active in efforts to
convince Congress. that the Soviet ABM
system justified increased American
armament.
The flight-testing of MIRVed Minute
,man and Poseidon. missiles was begun in
August. 1968 and completed in June 1970
when MIRVed Minuteman III missiles
were first deployed. Despite growing
skepticism about the Soviet ABM force,
Pentagon spokesmen continued to argue
that MIRVs were essential for penetra-
tion of Soviet ABM defenses.
In 1969; Defense Secretary Melvin
Laird said: "By the mid-to--late 1970s Sovi-
et startegic air and missile defenses, could
be quite formidable."
This was another false alarm. But it
led the Senate to:approve, although by.
only one vote, the installation of four sites'
for American Safeguard missiles.
In 1972 the.SALT I treaty so restricted
ABM deployments that they no longer can
be regarded as a significant military
threat. But accompanying the false
alarms about the Soviet-ABM throughout
the 1950s and 1960s were equally distorted
claims about the, danger of the Soviet of-
fensive strategic arsenal and these contin-
ue today:
Again. the Russians' own claims were
exaggerated. During the ' l9503,' Khru-
shchev talked proudly about Soviet'pro-
duction of long-range missiles. In 1957,
the White House appointed a secret group
directed by H. Rowan Gaither to assess
the Soviet threat. This group and other
hard-liners, predicted a catastrophic
"missile gap" - claiming that by 1959 as
.,many as .150 Soviet. ICBMs' would be
aimed at the US.
This was a wholly false scare. In fact,
by the end.of 1960 the USSR had, deployed
at most half a dozen virtually, unservice-
able ICBMs.
The Russian. development of ICB1VIs
produced a new campaign in Washington
for a US ABM system. When Nixon took
office in 1969, the new administration pro-
posed that the Sentinel city defense .sys
tern part of the US ABM network tha
was never built be installed,without
major technical changes, but under a dif'-'
ferent guise.
It would not be used to defend the cit-
ies, but rather would be set up. at the
Minuteman silo sites,. functioning as the
so-called "Safeguard". defense against a
Soviet surprise attack.
Despite considerable opposition ' in
'Senate hearings, the administration .con-
tinued to support the Safeguard system.
During the summer and fall of, 1969
Secretary Laird and Henr Kissin er,
who was then assistant tote president
for National Security Affairs,, pressed the
director of the CIA to increase the CIA's
Minuteman force in
estimate of the future threat that Soviet
an initial counter-
missiles posed forte Minute -man orce. force attack. This would leave the USSR
Kissinger is said to have urged the enough strategic warheads to threaten to
CIA to reconsider its estimate that Soviet; totally destroy the United States should
55-9 missiles were armed only with
jyjtVs, as they were and to have made
clear his' own -view that these missiles
were MIRVed, which they were not.
Here we come to yet another case, and'
a crucial one, where false alarms led to
the escalation of the arms race.
In 1969, when it was not yet clear that
either the USSR or the United States had {
a-workable MIRV system, it might still
have been possible to agree with the Sovi-
et Union tp prevent or delay the deploy-:
ment of MIRVs.
When American preparations for the
SALT talks began in the fall of 1969, it
was proposed by one of the administra-
.tion agencies that :we seek a moratorium
on MIRV testing.. This suggestion was
firmly rejected, it was said, by our Joint
Chiefs of Staff.
. What in fact was the evidence that the
USSR was going ahead with MIRVs? Here
the public was again misled In 1968 we
had observed Soviet test flights of a new
heavy ICBM: the SS-9. American intelli
gence noticed a "triplet" of vehicles
reentering the atmosphere together. Were
'the triplets MIRVs, or were they the more
primitive MRVs, which. cannot be target-
ed independently, and which resemble
buckshot although on a much grander
scale? "
LLaird commented on the triplets in
January 1969: "The Soviets are going for
our missiles and they are going fora first
strike capability. There is no question
about that"
Dr. Foster supported Laird's view that
the SS-9 triplets were MIRVs designed to
attack our hard targets. .
In fact, however,.a substantial number
of experts in the intelligence community
concluded that the triplets were only
MRVs
'
They were right, and
the widely re-
ported, assertions of Laird and Foster
were wrong.. The Soviet Union, we now
know, did not begin to test MIRVs unti
1973 and did not deploy them until 1975.
Among the missiles that are currently
deployed in the. Soviet Union, the SS-18
and. SS-19 have MIRVed warheads an
are capable of yet greater throw-weight
a traditional Soviet strength.
The main scare being spread by the op-
ponents of SALT II is that the USSRs 820
MIRVed ICBMs could carry many thou-
sands of the new, more accurately guided
we launch our remaining forces in an
efeebled rataliatory strike.
Like many other fearful predictions of
strategic .weakness, however
this one is
,
based on false and simplistic assumptions
- among them, in this case, that the
American strategic force cdrisist'
overwhelmingly of land-based ICBM mis-
siles.
In reality fewer than 25 percent of
American 'strategic warheads are stored
in Minuteman silos; the rest are carried
by submarines and aircraft. And by the
mid-1980s the fraction in silos will proba-
lily be even lower "-`assuming that Tri-
dent submarines and cruise missiles are
deployed as planned..;
Indeed. the ',so-called "triad composi.
tion" of our strategic forces the distri
bution of'warheads in silos, submarines,
and bombers - was designed to reduce
the threat of -a Soviet first strike aimed at
our land-based missiles.
The current' alarmist scenario does not
account for the several thousand war-
heads on American bombers 'and' subma
rines, which, would certainly survive a So-
viet surprise attack, and would assure our
retaliatory strikes.
Each of these warheads-.is powerful
enough to devastate most of the Soviet
cities with. more than 100,000 inhabitants,.
which also contain. most Soviet industry.
Our submarines could sustain the attack
.for several months.
American hard-liners argue that the
?~ United States has not kept up with the
expansion of Soviet strategic" forces. In
fact, since we began to MIRV our missiles
in 1970, the number of our strategic war-
heads-has more than. doubled, and most of
our older missiles have been replaced by. ii
the new Poseidon and Minuteman 111. the
latter mct thyh US
ore acuraean an teSR
During .the past eight- years we have
deployed ' approximately as many.: new
missiles as the Soviet union has, The only
difference is that we chose to place them-
in existing submarines and silos, while.
the Soviets continued to build new
launchers until they reached the limits
As a result the Soviet ICBM force is
numerically greater than ours and in
Soviet MIRV warheads. Some of these, it
is alleged, cou.'d destroy 95 percent of the
were considerably improved
eludes a number of very large MIRVed
missiles, which could theoretically pose-
an effective threat to - the Minuteman
force if the accuracy of Soviet guidance:
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Soviets do not have a triad of equally po-a
t tent strategic..' forces.- Their strategic{
bomber force is small and obsolescent; nor!,
is a part of it kept on continual alert, as
our SAC bombers are.
Mr. Carter should stress that our pres-
ent defenses are impregnable, that our;
will to resist aggression is firm, that - if
we do not start another round of the stra-
tegic arms race -- the SALT IL treaty will!
improve our national security and allow]
us to give greater attention to domestic:
problems.
Only in this way can we break out of
the vicious circle of alarmism and escala-
tion tion that has characterized the nuclear
arms race for more than 20 years..
George B. Kistiakowsky is 'Abbott
and James Lawrence professor of
chemistry emeritus at Harvard. Among
other government positions, he- served
as Special Assistant to the President for
Science and Technology from 1959 to
1961, and as a member of the US Arms
Control and Disarmament Agency from
1962 to 1969.
Reprlnied with permission from the New York ReNeW of
Books eupycigjt ? 1979 NYREV, Ina. , .
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