ARMS HURDLE: TRUST IN SOVIET

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01315R000400390056-8
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 3, 2004
• Sequence Number: 56
• Publication Date: April 20, 1979
• Content Type: NSPR

roved For Release ? Q 198$ ? W- DP88-01315R00040069fl0 - / r
ARTICLE 073" - ~- p ( It z ~c,~ t
ON 20 APRII, 1979 C} ~` ~~ f .. .__!..._...._..
Arms Hurdle:
'''rust in Soviet
Skizmish on Verification
Heralds Coming Debate
By HEDRICKSMITH
S>eclal to The New York Times
WASHINGTON, April 19 -The latest
skirmishing over the touchy issue-of pro-
tecting against Soviet cheating under a
new arms treaty has produced no winners
this week. But It has pointed up a predica-
ment inherent in the entire effort at arms
News
Analysis
control for the 1980's.
.' A fundamental objective
of the Administration's
arms control policy is to fos-
ter confidence and trust be-
tween the superpowers and
to provide a backdrop of relative predict-
ability in the arms race so that some un-
foreseen international crisis does not in-
volve the United States and Soviet Union
in a nuclear war. i
Yet the snappish tempest over verifica-
tion illustrates that one of the greatest ob.
stacles President Carter faces in trying
to win Senate approval of a new arms
treaty is mistrust about Soviet intentions
and suspicions about how far Moscow in-
tends to carry the nuclear buildup it has
carried out since the first strategic arms
agreement In 1972.
That suspicion and mistrust - seven
years after the first arms accord - are
what make many senators so profoundly
undecided about how to cast their votes
and prompts a handful of others to argue
that Washington is not well enough
equipped today to detect Soviet cheating.
And though the main events of the
arms debate are months off, the prelimi-
nary bout over what the arms controllers
call verification is a harbinger of the
thorny fight that lies ahead. ...
The issues are bafflingly. complex.
They touch on such highly classified na-
tional security questions that full public
debate is hampered by inhibitions
against giving away vital secrets to the
Russians. And feelings run so strong that
each side In the national debate can be
quick to impugn the other's motives and
accuse its antagonist of bad- faith and
slanted, self-serving leaks to the press.,
/ rl T fit w, K y
Furor Over Use of U-2 But that assurance has not put the mat-
The opposition to a new strategic arms ter to rest. Privately, a senior. Pentagon
official ns conceded . Bron's that, estimate technical corea-
limitation treaty was outraged by the ap- su
limitation of a report in The New York foes, Mr. Brow urulh
slip
d,
Times quoting Administration officials could months. Even further delay, he sipaisa
as saying they planned to use U-2 spy result from the need to gain permis-
as planes to improve American means of lion on from Turkey andpossibly other
countri
es overons byAmerican U-2
verification. Senator Jake Garn, Republi-
can of Utah, accused the Administration planes trying to monitor Soviet missile
of a "distorted" leak of top-secret infor- tests.
mation intended to make the treaty more Beyond that, Senate critics and skep-
palatable while Congress was. sworn to tics were quick to raise objections. For
secrecy. example, Senator John Glenn, an Ohio
But just a few days later, Jody Powell, Democrat who has sensed public mis
d .
trust of Moscow and made verification a.
the White House press secretary, sarcas- major issue as he campaigns for re-elec
tically quipped that Senator Gam would tion, suggested a slowdown in the whole
be dismissed if he was a White House em- procedure.
ployee, on the ground, that. the Utah Re-,
publican had leaked "a distorted" ver-l why Not Wait aYearp
siod . of secret C.I.A. testimony to The' If it was going to take a year or more to
Tinley n-d a ort to discredit the Admin- be ready on verification, Senator Glenn
istration's intelligence program. In fact, suggested in a telephone interview, per-
both articles were less leak than journal- haps President Carter ought to wait a
istic piecing together. , - - year or so before sending an arms treaty
The contretemps over' the articles to the Senate, since he had often promised
produced not only partisan feuding be- not to submit any treaty that was "not
tween Congress and the White House but verifiable." .
also private-sniping within the Adminin- As the Senator put it, other Govern-
stration, evidence of the edginess on all ment timetables have slipped in the past
sides on the paramount issues of national and arms control is too critical a matter.
defense and arms control. . . for the Senate to agree on what he called
The immediate point of contention this "the prospect of adequate verification"
week has been how long it will take the and not to insist on "the real thing."
United States to recover from the loss of The months ahead will undoubtedly
two American electronic listening posts produce sharp and occasionally acri-
in Iran, one of which was described by monious debate on Soviet heavy missiles
American officials as "a gold-plated and on the medium bomber known in the
wiretap into the Soviet missile test- West as Backfire. It will examine the
launch program based in Soviet Central overall United States defense posture, the
Asia. vulnerability of the American interconti
'Total' and 'Adequate' - nental missile force and the need for a
Senate critics of arms control cried out new mobile missile.
in alarm after Adm. Stansfield Turn tr;
Director of Central Intelligence esti-
mated at a private Senate net g that it
would take roughly until 1984 to totally re-
place the intelligence-gathering capacity
lost in Iran. Defense Secretary Harold
Brown sought to ease these fears with his
public assurances that while total re-
placement might take that long, enough -
could be recovered in about a year for the
United States "to verify adequately"
Soviet compliance with an arms treaty.
lii'is contention is that, while American-
Intelligence might miss a Soviet missile -
eH ere a there, it normally takes Mos-
cow years to develop, test and produce a
.brand-new missile. So he was confident
that the Russians could not get away with
a whole series of tests and steal a march
on the United States with some entirely
new weapon.
Approved For Release 2005/01/12 : CIA-RDP88-01315R000400390056-8