MR. WARNKE AS CHIEF SALT II NEGOTIATOR AND DIRECTOR OF THE ARMS CONTROL AND DISARMAMENT AGENCY FROM 1977 TO 1979. WHAT WAS YOUR PERCEPTION OF THE SOVIET GEOPOLITICAL INTENTIONS IN 1977?

Well, I think it's quite clear that the Soviet Union would like to have more diplomatic, more political influence in the world than it presently had. It's been a superpower for some years, but only in the sense of military power. As far as political influence is concerned, as far as ability to present any sort of an appeal, in terms of its own system, it's been singularly unsuccessful. And I think that they resent that; I think that they were trying to gain more recognition, really. In terms of military conquest, I think the Soviet Union has everything it can handle at the present time.

SOME PEOPLE TALK ABOUT A SOVIET "GRAND DESIGN FOR WORLD DOMINATION." DO YOU AGREE WITH THAT?

Well, I think that they would like to be Number One... it's not an ambition that's unique to the Soviet Union. I think they recognize they can't do it by force and violence.

THERE ARE TWO COMPETING VIEWS OF SOVIET INTENTIONS: THE GRAND DESIGN FOR WORLD DOMINATION, AND MARSHALL SHUMANN'S VIEW THAT THEY'RE STRATEGIC OPPORTUNISTS.

Well, I think Marshall is absolutely correct. I think that Marshall Schumann has been one of the more penetrating analysts of just what motivates the Soviet Union, but I think that those that see the Soviet Union as bent on world domination by the military jackboot... really don't understand the apprehensions that the Soviet Union has. Now how could they maintain... that sort of an aggressive stance, and still re-, retain control over their existing empire? If you were the Soviet Union's leaders, would you feel that you could trust the Eastern European troops to be fighting on your side? What would happen in the case of a protracted conventional war? I think the Soviet Union is opportunistic, that they will take advantage of situations in which they feel that they can intervene, and gain an edge on the United States.

CAN WE DO BUSINESS WITH THE SOVIET UNION? IS IT POSSIBLE TO NEGOTIATE WITH THEM?

It is possible to negotiate with the Soviet Union on issues in which there is a common interest. The reason we can do business with them on strategic nuclear arms, for example, is because we have a common interest in avoiding nuclear war. Now where you have that common interest it is possible to do business. If we could establish common interests in other regards, then further arrangements might be possible. In many instances, our interests conflict rather than coalesce, and under those circumstances, obviously, you can't do business.

DO YOU THINK THAT MEMBERS OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER, OR SENATOR JACKSON OR RICHARD PERLE FEEL THAT WE CAN NEGOTIATE WITH THE SOVIETS?

Well, I think it's quite clear that people like the late Senator Jackson and his former aide, now Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle, do not believe you can do business with the Soviet Union. They assume that the Soviet Union is bound on world conquest, and that accordingly any deal they make with the United States on strategic arms is bound to be one that advances that objective. I think they're absolutely wrong, but they are sincere.

IN 1966-'67, WHEN YOU CAME INTO GOVERNMENT, WHAT WAS YOUR VIEW OF THE ARMS RACE?

Well, at that point, of course, the United States... had a very large nuclear advantage. My concern at that point -- I think the concern of most people that thought about those issues -- was that Soviet plans for strategic defense would make it impossible to bring about any sort of meaningful control over nuclear arms, and it was for that reason that we set out to try and persuade the Soviets not to go ahead with their strategic defense plans.

THIS WAS SALT I?

This was prior to SALT I, yes.

BUT IN THE MID-'70S – WHEN WAS APES ON A TREADMILL WRITTEN?

I think I wrote that about 1975...

LET'S TALK ABOUT THAT. WHAT WERE YOUR VIEWS OF THE ARMS RACE?

Well, I think it was clear by the mid-1970s that the United States could not maintain any sort of meaningful nuclear superiority, and that anything that we were going to do would be matched by the Soviets. As you recall, we pioneered in the field; we had the first fission bomb, then we had the first nuclear hydrogen fusion bomb. The Soviet Union matched both. We went ahead with ICBMs. As a matter of fact, at one point we thought that there was a missile gap, in favor of the Soviet Union. It turned out that they were way behind us. And therefore in the early 1960s, when we built up more and more ICBMs, and began to develop the submarine-launched ballistic missiles, the Soviet Union matched us then. And it seemed to me by the mid-1970s that we were embarked on a course which I called "apes on a treadmill," that we were leading, but both of us were just sort of staying in place. And that something had to be done to break what Robert McNamara once referred to as the "mad momentum" of the arms race. And I suggested in my article "Apes on a Treadmill" that perhaps some reciprocal restraints might begin to work, if the arms control process of trying to reach formal agreements was falling behind the pace of arms developments. I was roundly criticized for that in my confirmation hearings in 1977. I still think it's a good idea.

BETTER TO ERR ON THE SIDE OF RESTRAINT, OR ACQUIRING MORE JUST AS AN INSURANCE POLICY?

The problem, of course, is more doesn't give you any sort of insurance. As a matter of fact, more can be less security. The real difficulty is that if you have an unconstrained arms race, at some point you may reach a stage at which each side has to figure on perhaps striking first, that a preemptive strike may appear to be the least bad option. That you will feel that both sides have the ability to threaten the retaliatory capability of the other side. Now that's the way a nuclear war would start. Because of panic. Because of the fear that you could not wait, because the other side might otherwise get you and you would not be able to retaliate. Now the objective of arms control is to preserve a nuclear retaliatory capability on both sides so that neither side at a time of crisis panics into starting the nuclear exchange.

WHAT DID YOU FEEL WERE THE MAIN GOALS OF AN ARMS AGREEMENT? IS IT AN AGREEMENT FOR ITS OWN SAKE?

No, that's a totally ignorant statement. The objective of an, of an arms-control agreement, the only objective, is to lessen the risk of nuclear war. And the objective that Secretary Vance had, that I had, was to create a structure that would lessen the risk of a nuclear war. We did so very successfully. What we managed to do is to set the sorts of qualitative constraints that lessen the, what's referred to as the "counterforce" capability of each side; that is, the ability of each side to threaten the retaliatory forces of the other side. The objective of arms control is to create a situation of strategic comfort, where each side recognizes that it is safe, that there is no way in which the other side can figure that it can gain any advantage by striking first. If an agreement does that, it's worth getting. If it doesn't do that, I can't imagine that Secretary Vance or I, or anybody else that thinks about these problems seriously, rather than polemically, would sign that agreement.

HOW DID YOU FEEL THAT THE ARMS TALKS RELATED TO THE OVERALL U.S. STRATEGIC RELATIONSHIP?

Well, the purpose of arms control, as I've said, is to lessen the risk of nuclear war. And therefore it's an essential part of an overall defense policy. You have to look at arms control in terms of defense policy. Unless it improves the security of the United States, it's not worth pursuing, and that's been the fundamental argument about arms control. There are those that feel it is better to go it alone, to be able to take unilateral action without any sort of restrictions. That has been the view, in the past, of Senator Jackson. I think it's the view today of Secretary of Defense Weinberger, and Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle. They don't want any constraints on American freedom of action. Now the other side of the argument is that there's only one way to reduce the Soviet nuclear threat, and that's by negotiated agreement. That nothing else that we can do, either in the way of strategic offense or strategic defense, is gonna take one warhead out of that Soviet arsenal. Instead what it's going to do is compel the Soviet Union to build up more and more warheads, and therefore increase the threat to the United States.

YOU'VE SAID THAT IF WE CAN'T AGREE NOT TO BLOW EACH OTHER UP, THEN IT'S NOT LIKELY WE'RE GOING TO AGREE ON MUCH ELSE.

Well, I think that in many respects, that strategic arms control is the bellwether of US-Soviet relations. If we can't agree not to blow one another up, and probably obliterate the rest of the world with us, then how can we agree on anything else? I've often felt, for example, that if we could make a major breakthrough in controlling strategic nuclear arms, we could then devote much more high-level attention to the talks on conventional forces, the mutual balanced force reduction talks that have been going on now for decades in Vienna, and I think that if we could in fact actually bring about significant qualitative constraints, and quantitative reductions in strategic nuclear arms, that we could then accomplish a great deal more, in terms of the overall relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union.

THE SALT II TALKS WERE THE BEGINNING OF A LONG PROCESS.

Yes, I think that again is one of the difficulties, is that people seem to think that an arms-control agreement has to be the ultimate arms-control agreement, that it should settle all of the problems. You can't do it. Arms control is a step-by-step process. I've sometimes analogized it to trying to get down from the top of a tall tree. If you go down a branch at a time, you're gonna end up on solid ground. If you try and do it in a single step, you're gonna make one hell of a mess.

SOME OF THE LITERATURE OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER SAYS THAT IT BELIEVES IN A "CREDIBLE AND VERIFIABLE ARMS AGREEMENT." PRESUMABLY YOU'D AGREE WITH THE SAME THING. WHAT DOES THAT MEAN TO YOU WHEN THEY SAY THAT? WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE?

I think the difference in approach between the Committee on the Present Danger and me is that the Committee on the Present Danger has never seen an arms-control agreement that it liked. That it seems to feel that somehow an arms-control agreement is going to be an either-or proposition. That one side or the other is going to win. Now the fact of the matter is that any arms-control agreement has to be a draw. It has to have something for both sides. Because unless it's good for both sides it's good for nothing at all. Because neither side would continue to abide by an arms-control agreement that gave the other side any sort of an advantage. So you have to go into an arms-control negotiation figuring that both sides have got to benefit from this arms-control agreement. And since we're talking about eliminating the risk of nuclear war, both sides can gain their objective.

WHAT WAS THE "WINDOW OF VULNERABILITY" CONCERN IN THE MID-‘70s?

The concern about the window of vulnerability, it seemed to me, was an illusory fear that really was inconsistent with the entire logic of the nuclear-deterrent triad. It was recognized as early as the 1950s that at some point the accuracy of nuclear weapons would be such that it had nothing but fixed base, intercontinental ballistic missiles, that both sides would have vulnerable forces. Now that's why we developed the Polaris submarine. That's why we continued to maintain a strategic bomber force, so the called, so called window of vulnerability, as far as I was concerned, was a cross-hatch painted on a brick wall. It wasn't there. Because the Soviet Union, if it tried to destroy our land based force, would have had to hit one thousand hardened silos. Now, it's usually figured that it takes two hits, one airburst, one land burst, to destroy one hardened silo, so there you're dealing with two thousand Soviet warheads. They've never fired these warheads. Any kind of conservative planner would have to figure on at least a 50 percent error, so that you'd have to fire three thousand warheads to have a realistic chance of destroying one thousand American ICBMs, and that's something like 30 percent of our retaliatory force. So the Soviet Union would use up a very substantial proportion of its total strategic warheads to try and destroy 30 percent of our retaliatory force. No rational human being would try and conduct that sort of preemptive attack, so the window of vulnerability was a question of our really scaring ourselves with an illusory sort of threat.

BUT THEY WERE DEVELOPING WARHEADS WITH AN ACCURACY, SO THAT THEY THEORETICALLY MIGHT AT SOME POINT BE ABLE TO ENDANGER OUR ICBMS. YOU DIDN'T QUARREL WITH THAT.

Oh no, as I say, there is always going to be a theoretical vulnerability to any fixed base, land-based intercontinental ballistic missile force. And that is why, as I say, we developed the submarine-launched ballistic missiles. It's why we've developed -- and I've consistently supported -- the long-range air launch cruise missile, that makes it possible for our strategic bomber force to penetrate any sort of Soviet air defense. What we want is an assured retaliatory capability; we have it; we had it in the 1970s.

TO THE EXTENT THAT ONE LEG OF THE TRIAD MAY HAVE BEEN IN JEOPARDY, IS IT IMPORTANT TO, WHAT'S WRONG WITH TRYING TO STRENGTHEN IT SO THAT ALL THREE LEGS ARE USEFUL?

I think that anything that could be done to render any part of the deterrent triad less vulnerable is worth doing. The difficulty, of course, is trying to find out some way to assure the theoretical invulnerability of fixed targets. Now, one way that we've thought of is to make them unfixed. One of the schemes, for example, with regard to the MX intercontinental ballistic missile, was the so-called "protected shelter" system, whereby we'd move 200 MXs at random around a couple of thousand launching sites. The difficulty, of course, is that the immense expense the environmental consequences, led even the Mormon church to conclude that the MX was a poor idea. Now the Soviet Union is trying to ensure the invulnerability of its own intercontinental ballistic missile force, by going to mobile ICBMs. For them that probably is a good option. For us it would be less so; we have less room for a mobile missile to roam, in the United States than they have in the Soviet Union. And in the Soviet Union they don't have to file environmental-impact statements.

ON THIS WINDOW OF VULNERABILITY BUSINESS, IS IT POSSIBLE FOR THE SOVIETS TO BE ABLE TO GAIN ENOUGH SUPERIORITY TO BE ABLE TO COW US IN A CRISIS?

There's no way in the world that the Soviet Union could gain the ability to cow us in a, in a crisis with nuclear superiority, because of the fact that there are so many things that we can do. Now we can't maintain nuclear superiority over the Soviet Union. Despite our superior resources and better technology. There are always things you can do to offset the other side's efforts to gain a nuclear edge. The problem is that if both sides continue that matching process, over a period of time you may end up with more and more of a launch-on-warning philosophy, because of the feeling that the other side has got such an ability to threaten your own retaliatory forces. More of a problem for the Soviets than for us because they are so much more dependent on the land-based ICBMs. We have much readier access to the oceans; our submarines are quieter; our submarine-launched ballistic missiles have far superior and far safer technology, so that the threat to the Soviets is a greater threat than it is to us, but at the present point, each side has an assured retaliatory deterrent, and that's the best you can have in a nuclear age.

BUT DON'T PERCEPTIONS OF NUCLEAR STRENGTH PAY POLITICAL DIVIDENDS, INTERNATIONALLY?

There's no question of the fact that if the Soviet Union were perceived as having a superior nuclear force to that of the United States that would put us at a political disadvantage. It would it would discourage our friends. They would lose confidence in the ability of the United States to offset Soviet military power. So it's not enough to have enough; you have to have enough so that everybody knows that you have enough, because really deterrence depends upon perception. It depends upon not what you think, but what the other side thinks, and similarly about what your allies think. So that's why we have to have more than a minimum deterrent. It would, might be enough to offset Soviet nuclear forces to have a few hundred, rather than several thousand, strategic warheads, but the difficulty is, no one would believe that we had an adequate deterrent.

BUT PAUL NITZE'S WRITINGS IN THE 70s SUGGESTED THAT THE TIME MIGHT COME WHEN THE WORLD WOULD PERCEIVE, THE SOVIETS MIGHT PERCEIVE THAT THEY HAD AN ADVANTAGE, AND EXPLOIT IT.

Those that have worried about the Soviet Union gaining a... per-, a perceived edge, I think, have been very defeatist as to what the United States could do and what the United States was doing. No, there are those that maintain, as Richard Perle has maintained over the years, that we had a couple of decades of neglect, that during the 1960s and 1970s we allowed the Soviets to forge ahead. What they ignore are the things that the United States was doing during that period of time. For example, during the period of the 1970s, we went from something like slightly under 500 submarine-launched ballistic-missile warheads to 5000. That's not exactly standing still. I would say that during that period of time, because of sound strategic decisions, we ended up with a less vulnerable force. And I think the Soviet Union recognized that we were in fact in a position in which they could not gain nuclear superiority. And that's why they were willing to negotiate.

IN THEIR WRITINGS, THE COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER IS CONSTANTLY REFERRING TO THE CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, THE BERLIN MISSILE CRISIS, AS IF TO SAY THAT NUCLEAR SUPERIORITY MATTERS. WHAT DO THESE REFERENCES MEAN TO YOU?

Well, I think that there are those that believe that what really turned the Cuban missile crisis our way was that we had nuclear superiority. I don't believe that. Even if I believed it, we cannot maintain nuclear superiority; there's no way of getting it back. You can't roll the clock back. The fact of the matter is that the Communists have the bomb. They've had it for some time. They're in a position in which if we try and gain a nuclear advantage, they will match us. We're still apes on a treadmill. Take the history of MIRVs. The multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles. Back in the early part of the Nixon Administration, the then Deputy Secretary of Defense David Packard said we should go ahead with MIRVs, because that would improve our bargaining position, because the Soviet Union would recognize that we had technological superiority. It gave us nothing in the way of bargaining advantage. What it gave us, within a period of a few years, was Soviet MIRVs, which then created the so-called window of vulnerability. Now if you look back at history, the reason that we prevailed in the Cuban missile crisis is because we had conventional superiority. We had a tremendous advantage. Cuba was 90 miles off the United States coast. And we had total naval superiority. I don't believe that nuclear superiority had anything to do with the outcome of the Cuban missile crisis.

THE SOVIETS DID HAVE A BIG BUILDUP IN THE 1970s. WHAT DO YOU SUPPOSE THEY WERE UP TO?

Uh, they were trying to match us. I think they recognized that they could not afford to have the United States have even perceived nuclear superiority. I think they also recognized that unless they matched us, they could not negotiate. I think they concluded during the 1960s that they could not afford a nuclear war; they couldn't fight it, survive it, and win it. And they recognized that arms control made sense. But like us, they are not prepared to negotiate from a position of weakness. And what made the SALT talks possible was because the Soviet Union gained rough parity with the United States. I think their objective was exactly that.

IF THE SOVIET UNION DID NOT THINK THEY COULD FIGHT AND WIN A NUCLEAR WAR, WHY THE EMPHASIS ON CIVIL DEFENSE?

I think that civil defense has always been an attractive alternative to the idea that you can't win a nuclear war. There are those in the United States that have supported a strong civil-defense effort; there still are. I think they're unwilling to accept the fact that there is no defense against thousands of nuclear warheads. In addition to which, the Soviet Union faces a number of threats that we don't face. We have only one military threat, and that is the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union finds itself surrounded by hostile Communist neighbors, on both sides. They face the People's Republic of China, which itself is a nuclear power. The People's Republic of China has the kind of nuclear force against which civil defense might make some sense, and if we were worried today about a Chinese attack, then I think there'd be much more pressure for a civil defense that would give us some sort of protection against that sort of a relatively small nuclear threat.

LET'S TALK FOR A MINUTE ABOUT YOUR CONFIRMATION HEARINGS. SENATOR JACKSON SAID THAT YOU FAVORED UNILATERAL DISARMAMENT. DID YOU?

I did not. What I favored, as I made repeatedly clear, was a sensible approach to strategic nuclear arms. Recognizing that we could not get and maintain strategic nuclear superiority, and that therefore the effort to do so would just drive the Soviets to continue to match us, in apes on a treadmill fashion. That was my position then; it's my position today. I favored a number of developments in the way of strategic nuclear forces. I favored, for example, the longer range Trident submarine-launched ballistic missile. Why? Because it improved the survivability of our nuclear force. I favored the air-launch cruise missile, again because that improved the survivability of our strategic bomber force, and its ability to penetrate Soviet air defenses. I think that the difference between my position and that of some of my critics, is my critics, although they would not admit it, still felt that the United States could and should regain strategic nuclear superiority. I regarded that as a dangerous fantasy.

BUT IF WE WERE TO GIVE UP SOME POSSIBLE WEAPON SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT IN ORDER TO GET OFF THE TREADMILL, MIGHT THAT HAVE LED PEOPLE TO BELIEVE YOU WERE FOR DISARMAMENT?

It might have, but I find quite a difference between reciprocal restraint and unilateral disarmament. What I proposed is that we say to the Soviet Union, "We are not going to go ahead at this point with a particular weapon system, and we're going to wait and see what you do in response. If you exercise similar restraint, we perhaps will take another step, and see if you match that. In other words, let's match one another in restraint, rather than in accelerating the arms race." And interestingly enough, one of my successes, the present Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, has made similar proposals in an article in Foreign Policy I'm sorry, in Foreign Affairs.

I'VE READ THAT PAUL NITZE CALLED YOUR VIEWS "ASININE." DID YOU HEAR THAT?

I didn't hear that.

IF IT'S TRUE THAT HE SAID THAT, HOW WOULD YOU RESPOND?

I wouldn't bother responding. I've always had the feeling that Paul Nitze was sort of an example of what Lester Pearson used to , said he was a better reading of the old saying: Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. I think power corrupts, but it's really loss of power that corrupts absolutely.

HIM BEING OUT OF OFFICE?

He was out of office.

WHEN HE WAS IN OFFICE, DID YOU EVER HAVE A SENSE THAT HE BELIEVED IN ARMS CONTROL?

As I recall it back in the Johnson Administration, when Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara was very interested in trying to get arms-control started, Paul Nitze, who was then the deputy, was very supportive of those efforts. And as a matter of fact, he would have been intimately involved in the arms-control talks, if they had taken place as was planned, in the latter part of 1968. I think similarly, if you look at his record today, as a member of the Reagan Administration, he obviously has played a very constructive role. I thought that his effort to try and find some way of solving the intermediate range nuclear force problem, the missiles in Europe, was an inventive one and should have been picked up by the Reagan Administration... that's the so-called "walk in the woods." Where he and his Soviet counterpart tried to agree on something that would very substantially have limited both the Soviet missiles that can strike Western Europe, and American missiles in Western Europe that can strike the Soviet Union.

WHAT WAS THE DECISION-MAKING PROCESS THAT RESULTED IN SECRETARY VANCE'S TAKING TO MOSCOW THE PROPOSAL FOR THE DEEP REDUCTIONS IN 1977?

At the beginning of the Carter Administration, there was the hope that the Soviet Union recognizing that they were dealing with a new president, whom we thought was going to be in office for eight years, might be willing to make quite forthcoming gestures in the arms control field. So the effort in March of 1977, of which I was an integral part, was really to bypass SALT II, and to see if we could get a more far-reaching agreement, that would involve very deep cuts, particularly in the land-based multiple-warhead ICBMs. It turned out to be a miscalculation. The Soviet Union's decision-making process is even more glacial than ours is, and they could not turn around fast enough to deal with this quite dramatic change from what had previously been discussed. The interesting part to me is that over a period of a couple years, many of the items in that comprehensive package were in fact adopted, and as a consequence the SALT II agreement much, went much further than just sort of fleshing out the 1974 agreement at Vladivostok between President Ford and General Secretary Brezhnev.

BUT IN THE DISCUSSIONS IN WASHINGTON, BEFORE YOU WENT TO MOSCOW, WHAT WAS THE DEBATE?

Well, there was a considerable discussion as to whether the best thing to do was to try and get a rapid, Vladivostok-type agreement. And as a matter of fact, when Secretary Vance went to Moscow in March of 1977, he had alternate proposals. The one was the comprehensive proposal that called for quite substantial cuts. The second, the fallback, was a Vladivostok agreement. Now, unfortunately, the discussion never really centered on that fallback position. Instead it centered on the comprehensive plan which the Soviet Union was unwilling to accept at that point.

WHY DO YOU SUPPOSE THEY WERE UNWILLING TO ACCEPT IT?

They were unwilling to accept it, I think, for two reasons. The first is that it was too much of a departure from that which had been negotiated before. As I've mentioned, I think, the Soviet Union's decision-making process is very rigid, very hidebound. I've been told, for example, they don't have the concept of the working group, at a lower level; they don't have inter-agency working groups. So the differences between the ministries concerned have to be resolved at the top level at the Politburo. Now that makes it very difficult to adjust to a changed situation. I think the second feature, and one that certainly I began to recognize later on, was that Mr. Brezhnev was wedded to his Vladivostok understanding with President Ford. I was told by the first deputy foreign minister, Mr. Chernenko (?), that we apparently didn't recognize how much political blood Mr. Brezhnev spilt at Vladivostok. He overruled his military advisers to agree to the principle of equal ceilings, and he wanted to see those equal ceilings spelled out in a Vladivostok treaty. And that's what we gave him in SALT II; we gave him the cosmetics of Vladivostok, which were, as you will recall, a limit of 2,400 on strategic nuclear livery vehicles, and then a 1320 limit, which under the Vladivostok understanding applied to ballistic-missile launchers with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles. Now, in SALT II, we put down the 2400 figure, but then provided that within one year after ratification that figure would be reduced to 2250. Bringing it closer to our comprehensive proposal of March 1977. Then in the 1320 figure, what we did is to include under that ceiling the strategic bombers with the long-range cruise missiles, but there was a sub-limit of 1200 on ballistic missiles with multiple warheads, so we achieved again something close to our March 1977 proposal, a 1200 limit on MIRV ballistic missiles. But, Mr. Brezhnev had his Vladivostok cosmetics, and that apparently was sufficient so that his negotiators could agree to what was really a considerable change from Vladivostok.

SOME PEOPLE SAY THAT HAD WE LET DOBRYNIN KNOW IN ADVANCE WHAT PROPOSAL YOU WERE GOING TO CARRY TO MOSCOW, THAT THEY WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN CAUGHT BY SURPRISE AND THEY MAY HAVE HAD A BETTER CHANCE.

I think the fact of the matter is that the Soviet Union would not have agreed to reduce its heavy missiles by something like 50 percent. What we asked them to do is to cut from the 308 that they were permitted to maintain after SALT I to 150. Now they thought that was going back on Vladivostok, and in fact it was. The compromise at Vladivostok was that the Soviet Union agreed to the principle of equal ceilings, equal ceilings of US and Soviet forces. With no compensation for the fact that they also faced the British, the French, and the Chinese. In return, the United States at Vladivostok in November of 1974 agree that it would not insist in Salt II on cuts in the Soviet heavy missiles. So the Soviet Union regarded correctly, it turns out, as a repudiation of the Vladivostok compromise. And I think no amount of advance notice would have sufficed to enable them to compromise again, and to give up that which they got as the quid pro quo at Vladivostok. That was the fundamental problem.

MR. WARNKE, WHAT DO YOU THINK SENATOR JACKSON'S MOTIVATION WAS IN SUGGESTING THE SAME KIND OF DEEP CUTS THAT PRESIDENT CARTER WANTED SECRETARY VANCE TO TRY TO NEGOTIATE IN MOSCOW OF '77?

Well as I recall the early part of 1977 that Senator Jackson was making a number of recommendations to President Carter. I think that there was some features in his recommendations that were the same as those of the so-called comprehensive proposal of March 1977. But it was not just a slavish adoption of the Jackson proposals. I think that both President Carter and of course, Senator Jackson, and I think everybody else, would like to have seen very substantial cuts in the Soviet multiple warhead ICBMs. So that was a common feature. But as I recall it, what Senator Jackson was proposing is that we accept no constraints whatsoever on any type of cruise missile. Now that obviously was what had been holding up the consummation of the Vladivostok understanding. And it would have been totally unacceptable of the Soviets.

WOULD THAT HAVE BOTHERED JACKSON?

Well I really can't speak for Senator Jackson. All I know is that in my opinion, either he was against arms control, or his proposals were going to have exactly the same effect, because they were so one-sidedly in favor of the United States, that the Soviet leaders could not possibly have accepted them.

WHEN YOU ARRIVED IN MOSCOW, WERE YOU OPTIMISTIC?

I don't think that any of us had any serious expectations the Soviet Union would accept our comprehensive proposal. But that didn't bother me. As a lawyer, I've never gone in first with my last best offer. If I did, I ought to be disbarred. We were asking for more than we possibly could have expected to get. What we did hope is that the Soviet Union might be sufficiently intrigued to come back with some kind of proposal. That was the disappointment. Their inability even to deal with our comprehensive package was in my opinion, a very deflating experience.

WHAT WAS GROMYKO LIKE? WAS HE HOSTILE? WAS --

Gromyko -- I never found him to be as hostile or as cold as the popular image. I found him to be quite an entertaining kind of a guy. And he really had a very good relationship with Secretary Vance, and the discussions were spirited and I think in most cases, even entertaining. He obviously was quite contemptuous of our proposal. He made no bones about that. But he also made it very clear that this was not the end of the discussions. And that he was very interested in continuing the dialogue.

HOW DID THE DIALOGUE GET BACK ON TRACK?

The dialogue got back on track in a couple of ways. First, within a few weeks after the rejection of our proposal in Moscow, I was actually in Geneva negotiating with the Soviet negotiating team. And negotiating about some very serious issues. Primarily, the verification issues. Things like an exchange of data, that would enable both sides to start off from an agreed base. Things like the counting rules, to enable us to measure whether or not they were within the limits of the limit on MRV ballistic ceilings. And then, a couple of people within the Carter administration, Leslie Gelb and Bill Highland, in particular, came up with a very interesting structure. What they proposed, was having a basic treaty that covered most of the items and then a separate executive agreement that dealt with interim restraints on things like cruise missiles. And then finally, a statement of principles and guidelines that would govern what we then referred to as the expected Salt III Treaty. Now then Secretary Vance went, I believe it was, to Geneva and met with foreign minister Gromyko. And the two of them agreed on that structure. Except that Mr. Gromyko wanted to amend it to provide that the so called interim agreement would be a protocol to the treaty. He knew enough about American constitutional practices to recognize that an executive agreement would have a different ratification procedure than a treaty. So he wanted to make sure that the protocol and the treaty would be treated together. But that provided the basis for our preceding at that point. And had it not been for extended features, in my opinion, we could have had a Salt II agreement by the early part of 1978.

IN '78 THE SOVIETS WERE QUITE ACTIVE IN SOUTH YEMEN AND ETHIOPIA. WHAT WERE THEY UP TO?

I think that they were again finding targets of opportunity to extend their influence. I think they recognized that the situation between Ethiopia an...and s...I'm sorry -- Ethiopia and Somalia was a situation in which they could profit, that they could gain-

COULD YOU START AGAIN.

I think they saw they the conflict or incipient conflict between Ethiopia and Somalia as a way in which they could gain influence in that particular region of the world. They previously, as you know, had some defense arrangements with Somalia. They even had a base on Somalian territory. But they recognized that Ethiopia was the stronger, the more influential country. And therefore when Somalia was making threats about crossing an internationally recognized border, and invading part of Ethiopia, the Soviets took advantage of that situation, I think to gain quite significant influence in Ethiopia. At the same time, there was this instability between North Yemen and South Yemen. And the Soviets, I thought, again, tried to take advantage of a local conflict to establish a more influential position. Similarly in Angola....where you had a situation which South Africa was supporting one faction and the Soviet Union supported the non-sympathetic group and gained influence there as well.

DID ALL THIS CONCERN YOU?

Concerned me in terms of overall international affairs, yes. As being a security threat to the United States, nonsense. There was a comment by the then representative to the United Nations, Patrick Moynahan, that a Soviet domination of Angola would be a threat to civil liberties in Brazil. I thought that was a bit hyperbolic.

YOU DIDN'T BELIEVE THAT THIS SHOULD BE LINKED IN ANY WAY TO THE SALT TALKS, DID YOU?

Both Secretary Vance and I felt very strongly that you should not link progress in arms control to the day by day ups and downs in US-Soviet relations. Arms control doesn't take place between friends. It takes place between rivals. The fact that we do have these differences with the Soviet Union is the reason why nuclear arms control is important. In addition to that, those that advocated linkage seemed to think of arms control as a reward for Soviet good behaviour. Now that's nonsense. An arms control agreement is good only if it's good for the United States. If it serves the security interest of the United States, we should pursue it. And we should pursue it regardless of these other frictions in US Soviet relations. In that sense, linkage makes no sense. Now there are of course some international developments that inevitably put a total chill on arms control. I mentioned that in 1968, we were working very hard to begin the SALT talks with the Soviet Union. And on the very day that announcement were to be made in Moscow and Washington, about the beginning of the SALT talks later in 1968, that very day was the day in which the Soviet troops and tanks moved in on Czechoslovakia. And at that point, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind certainly made it imperative that we postpone that announcement. But, at a very heavy price. We lost a year. And that was the year in which the MRVs, the multiple independently targetable or entry vehicles began to be deployed by the United States. And with their by the Soviets. A very severe setback. And in my opinion, illustration of the fact that you ought to try and avoid linkage. It can't always be done, but certainly concern about Russians and Cubans in Africa was not a sufficient reason to slow down the SALT talks.

I THINK IT WAS ON MAY 1ST, MEET THE PRESS, BRZEZINSKI BLASTED THE SOVIETS FOR THEIR ADVENTURISM AND SAID THAT IT COULD AFFECT THE SALT TALKS.

That's correct.

WHAT MESSAGE DID YOU GET OUT OF THAT? WAS HE SAYING THAT IT SHOULD OR WOULD OR COULD?

In my opinion Dr. Brzezinski did believe in linkage. I don't think he made any secret of that. That comment on Meet The Press was consistent with other comments that he made at that time. There was a difference of opinion. I think he was wrong. He thinks he was right.

IN HIS WRITINGS HE DOESN'T SAY THAT – HE SAYS HE BACKS YOUR VIEW OF NON-LINKAGE

Yeah. As in my recollection is that there was a tendency on the part of Dr. Brzezinski to believe in linkage.

WHEN PRESIDENT CARTER SAID THAT EVEN THOUGH IT WAS NOT OUR POLICY TO HAVE LINKAGE, THAT LINKAGE WOULD BE THERE IN THE SENSE THAT IT MIGHT AFFECT RATIFICATION. SOVIET BEHAVIOR MIGHT AFFECT RATIFICATION, AND THE MOOD OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. WAS IT WISE FOR HIM TO SAY THINGS LIKE THAT?

I think that his comment was perfectly accurate. And I won't question the wisdom. You know, there's no question of the fact that the American public thinks of arms control as being part of an overall détente atmosphere. And when the Soviet Union behaves in a fashion that's inconsistent with that expectation, public support for arms control tends to diminish. I think the same is certainly true as far as the Congress is concerned. I mean, let me take certainly an example that I'll always remember. The Soviets moved into Afghanistan in the latter part of 1979. That effectively killed any chance of ratification of SALT II. After that Soviet move, there was no way in the world the President Carter could the necessary two-thirds of the senate to ratify SALT II. Now, as I say, that's linkage. I find it regrettable. I find it an illogic. But I'm afraid it's inevitable. If the Soviet Union acts in sufficiently egregious fashion, that is going to chill the climate for negotiating arms control and kill the chances for ratification.

THE COMMENTS BY BRZEZINSKI OR BY THE PRESIDENT, DID THEY AFFECT YOUR DAY BY DAY DEALINGS IN GENEVA?

My impression was in the early part of 1978 that the overall attitude of concern about Soviet adventurism was in fact, affecting the pace of the negotiations. Yes. I believe that.

ON OUR PART?

On our part.

WERE YOU TOLD TO SLOW DOWN?

No. I was not told to slow down. But the necessary clearances were slower in coming than I think would have been the case had there been no linkage.

CLEARANCES OF OUR BARGAINING POSITION.

That is correct.

CHINA POLICY. CARTER SEEMED TO FAVOR BRZEZINSKI OVER VANCE IN TILTING A LITTLE BIT TOWARDS USING CHINA, TILTING AGAINST THE SOVIET UNION. DID YOU AGREE WITH THAT?

Sorry. I don't understand the question. Did I agree with what?

THERE WAS A QUESTION OF SHOULD WE HAVE ENCOURAGED OUR ALLIES TO SELL ARMS? SHOULD WE HAVE DUAL USE TECHNOLOGY? BRZEZINSKI WAS IN FAVOR OF THESE THINGS THAT WOULD SORT OF THREATEN THE SOVIET UNION. SECRETARY VANCE WANTED NORMALIZATION FOR NORMALIZATION SAKE. WHERE DID YOU STAND?

I believe we should normalize relations with the China. I thought we should have done it years before that. I think we would have if it had not been for the Vietnam War. I believed, however, on maintaining a respectful distance from the People's of Republic of China and the Soviet Union. I think that we gain our maximum advantage by not lining up with either one. Because under those circumstance, each of them is going to be interested in seeing to it that we don't line up with the other side...to the extent that we make it clear that we favor one of the communist giants over the other. We lose the ability, I think, to exert more pressure on the one that feels disfavored. If they think that there is any sort of a military relationship between the United States and China, then I think the Soviet Union's going to be much harder to deal with. I think they will pay a price to avoid that sort of quasi security alliance.

WHAT DID YOU THINK OF THE TIMING OF DENG'S VISIT TO THE STATES?

I thought it stank. I thought it was a very poor time to have Mr. Deng Xiaoping come to the United States. We were having a very important negotiation with foreign minister Gromyko. I think just about the end of 1978 and I think that negotiation was very adversely affected by the pendancy of Deng Xiaoping's visit to the United States. I thought it was a very poor time to appear to be favoring China over the Soviet Union.

GROMYKO SAID WHY DO YOU STEP ON OUR CHINA TOE?

Well I can recall earlier in 1978 at a meeting in New York, there was an article in the New York Times that indicated that Dr. Brzezinski and his visit to China had briefed China's leaders on the status of the arms control talks between the United States and the Soviet Union. And that irritated Mr. Gromyko more than somewhat. And he said at that point, "Why do you insist on stomping on our sore China toe?" Well I think that the visit of Deng Xiaoping, being planned for just about a month after this very important meeting between Secretary Vance and Foreign Minister Gromyko was another instance in which Mr. Gromyko felt the pain in his toe.

DESPITE ALL THE CONCERNS IN '78, OUR CONCERNS OVER AFRICA, THE SOVIET'S CONCERNS OVER CHINA, THE TALKS WENT ON. WHAT WAS THE COMMON INTEREST TO MAKE IT HAPPEN?

The common interest in nuclear arms control is the common interest in national survival. Now it's one thing we share with the Soviet Union. They don't want to see the Soviet Union destroyed. Now sometimes Americans ignore the fact that there is this immense patriotism in the Russian people. And you can see it in the Russian leaders with whom you deal. They love their country. They don't want to see it destroyed. It's very much the same emotion that Americans feel for their country. We can certainly trade on the fact that we both have a vital, inescapable interest in avoiding a strategic nuclear exchange. And that should transcend to any other differences that exist between us.

AND IT DID.

And it did.

DID YOU LIKE THE TREATY?

Did I like the treaty? I thought it was really a considerable improvement on what we had before. And I thought it was the best we could do at that point. As I mentioned before, you've got to look at arms control as a process. To me, the advantages of the treaty were very many. For one thing, it put a lid on Soviet increases in the weapons that concerned us most. There was a sub-limit of 820 on ballistic missiles, land based, with multiple warheads. That was just about the level that the Soviet had. The imposition of that ceiling meant that they had to scrap one hundred already planned SS-17s and -19s. It meant that they have not been able to increase their MIRVed IBCMs since 1979. It would mean today that unless the United States commits the rash -- irrational act of breaking the SALT ceilings, that when the Soviets deploy SS-24s, their new mobile multi-warhead ICBM, they will have to destroy on a one for one basis, their existing SS-17s, -18s and -19s. In addition to that, it set a limit on the number of warheads that could be carried on any type of missile. It meant that the SS-18s, the heavy missiles, are limited to ten warheads each. Without those SALT limits, it was estimated back in 1979 that the Soviet Union could put at least 30 warheads on every SS-18. That'd mean an increase of 6000 warheads. So the answer is yes. I like the treaty. I think most important of all, it set a framework which could now be utilized to bring about very substantial reductions. At Reykjavik, Mr. Gorbachev and President Reagan talked about 50 percent cuts and Mr. Gorbachev indicated that those would be applicable to the MIRVed ICBMs. All they have to do is to take the existing SALT II treaty, take those ceilings, reduce them 10% a year, and within five or six years, you will have achieved that 50 percent cut. Now, in my opinion, that's a good treaty.

SENATOR JACKSON CALLED THE TREATY APPEASEMENT. DO YOU THINK THAT THERE'S ANY TREATY ACCEPTABLE TO SENATOR JACKSON THAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN ACCEPTABLE TO THE SOVIETS?

My impression is that any treaty that the Soviet Union would be willing to sign would be a treaty that Senator Jackson would have regarded as appeasement. He had the same attitude toward arms control agreements as Groucho Marx did about clubs. That he wouldn't want to join any club that would have him as a member. Well, I think that was the attitude that Senator Jackson had about dealing with the Soviets.

WEREN'T YOU CONCERNED ABOUT NOT BEING ABLE TO BARGAIN AWAY THE SOVIET HEAVIES?

No. I accepted the fact that deal had been cut in Vladivostok. And therefore what I was concerned about was setting ceilings that would put a lid on Soviet MIRVed ICBMs, and having a statement of principles and guidelines which we did have, indicating that these ceilings would be reduced in subsequent arms control negotiations. Now if the Reagan Administration had the wit and the wisdom to take advantage of the SALT II ceilings they could in fact bring about those cuts that they're talking about. I have no doubt of the fact that we could now bargain with the Soviets to reduce those SALT II ceilings, everyone of them, including the ceiling on heavy missiles by 50 percent and that ought to be our prime objective.

WELL, SOME PEOPLE WERE CONCERNED THAT THE SALT II AGREEMENT DIDN'T CUT THE SOVIET HEAVY MISSILES, BUT IT DID ALLOW EACH COUNTRY ONE NEW SYSTEM. WE CHOSE THE MX. WAS THAT A GOOD IDEA?

We would have been able to get the Soviet Union to agree on no new ICBMs. I thought that would have been a very good idea. It would have been a definite improvement in the treaty. We should have given up the idea of the MX, they would then have given up the SS-24 which they're going to begin to put in the field next year. However, it was felt that politically we could not afford to foreclose the MX option. I believe that President Carter thought of it as being principally a bargaining point with the Senate, that he could point out that we were in fact free to go ahead with the MX. I'm not sure he ever would have gone ahead with the MX had he been reelected.

YOU DON'T THINK HE WAS THAT CONCERNED ABOUT THE MX SOLVING THE WINDOW OF VULNERABILITY.

I don't believe that President Carter really believed in the window of vulnerability. He recognized that with our submarine launched ballistic missile force we had an absolutely survivable deterrent. He also recognized that we were improving that part of our deterrent triad. That we are developing not only the Trident I (C-4) missile, but also the Trident II referred to as the D-5. Now the Trident I missile gives us a range of 4,000 nautical miles. Now that's the best mobile missile you could possibly have - far more survivable. Far more difficult to attack than any land based mobile. And with a range that eliminates the command and control problems. It can operate in the Continental waters of the United States and still hit every Soviet target. The D-5 Trident II missile was planned to have a range of something like 6,000 nautical miles. Even with more warheads it would have a range of 5,000 nautical miles. So as a consequence we were taking the steps without the MX to insure the survivability of our retaliatory deterrent.

THERE WAS A CHOICE BETWEEN A SMALLER AND A LARGER VERSION OF THE MX.

Yes.

WHAT WAS THE – WERE YOU PART OF THE DECISION-MAKING PROCESS ON WHICH ROUTE TO GO?

No, I was not.

WHAT DID YOU THINK OF THE LARGER ONE?

Well, it seemed to me that if you were going to have a new ICBM it should be a genuine mobile ICBM, and that would really demand the smaller version of the MX. Obviously the bigger you make an ICBM, the harder it is to give it genuine mobility.

DID YOU SAY THAT BRZEZINSKI THOUGHT THE BIGGER, THE UGLIER, THE BETTER?

I really was not part of those discussions so I really can't say. I wish I could.

THE – WHEN SECRETARY VANCE TESTIFIED AT THE RATIFICATION HEARINGS HE SEEMED TO SEPARATE HIMSELF FROM YOUR EARLY JOINT POSITION WHEN HE SAID, I REJECT THE NOTION THAT UNILATERAL RESTRAINT AND WEAPONS PROGRAMS IS A WAY TO ENHANCE OUR SECURITY. AND IN MY VIEW THE U.S. SHOULD NOT LET THE SOVIETS EVER ACHIEVE SUPERIORITY. IT'S BEEN PORTRAYED AS A SEPARATION FROM YOUR EARLIER JOINT POSITION. DID YOU PERCEIVE IT THAT WAY?

I did not. It seemed to me that what Secretary Vance was saying is that we should not take unilateral unreciprocated action, that would be a mistake. I agree with that. What I've called for is reciprocal steps and I think that should be tried. Regrettably however, the country that's trying it at the present point without success is the Soviet Union. For 15 months now Mr. Gorbachev has had an unreciprocated unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing. It would have made sense, it would have been consistent with my view if we had matched that restraint and then hope for similar reciprocal action on other fields.

WHAT DO YOU THINK WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR – WELL, WHAT KILLED SALT II IN THE RATIFICATION?

Well, of course SALT II never died. As a matter of fact like old soldiers it hasn't even faded away. What prevented ratification were two things. First the totally unwarranted flap about a Soviet brigade in Cuba. You know, in the heat of the campaigning at that point there was great concern about this discovery of a Soviet brigade that had been there since 1963. And that slowed down the ratification process. I think it also discouraged the Soviets. And I think that perhaps that was a factor in the Soviet decision to move into Afghanistan. I think they figured that SALT was dead. It was a mistake in my opinion, a mistaken judgement, because of the fact that I think SALT could have been ratified in December of 1979, if the Carter Administration had pushed ahead with it at that point.

WELL, YOU'RE IMPLYING THAT IF SALT HAD BEEN RATIFIED IN '79, THE SOVIETS WOULDN'T HAVE GONE INTO AFGHANISTAN?

I don't know that. All I know is that I have been told by observers both in the Soviet Union and outside that the issue of whether or not to invade Afghanistan had come up several times in the Politburo, and that those that opposed that move had always prevailed until late 1979. I also know that I was told by somebody in the Soviet Embassy before the invasion of Afghanistan that they had concluded that SALT was dead and that they were very much afraid that Soviet foreign policy would reflect that conclusion. I think that there were a number of newspapermen who had similar indications from Soviet officials at that particular period of time.

IF SALT HAD BEEN RATIFIED AND THEN THEY WENT INTO AFGHANISTAN, SOME PEOPLE HAVE SAID THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN THE WORST, YOU KNOW, THAT WOULD HAVE SET BACK ARMS NEGOTIATIONS IN THIS COUNTRY FOR YEARS. IT WOULD HAVE BEEN THE WORST THING THAT COULD HAVE HAPPENED FOR ARMS CONTROL. DO YOU AGREE WITH THAT? PEOPLE WOULD HAVE FELT, WE'VE BEEN HAD.

I think there would have been a very adverse reaction if we had ratified SALT II and then the Soviet Union had moved into Afghanistan. I think it's because of the fact that people think of arms control as being an aspect of détente. And they would have said, "See arms control doesn't work." In my view, arms control stands by itself. That there are sufficient reasons for completing and ratifying a good treaty, so that you shouldn't necessarily expect serendipity. However, we have to recognize that in terms of public moods, that the worse the Soviet Union behaves the less interested the American public is in arms control. So that I think that the ratification of SALT II followed by an invasion of Afghanistan would have set back arms control. Of course the fact of the matter is arms control has gone no place anyway since 1979, so that certainly in terms of the Reagan Administration's response it wouldn't have mattered whether the Soviet Union had moved into Afghanistan or not. Nothing has been done in arms control since 1979 in any event.

WHAT WAS YOUR PERCEPTION OF DR. BRZEZINSKI'S ALLEGIANCES? DO YOU THINK HE FELT MORE COMFORTABLE...HIS POLICIES MADE HIM MORE AT HOME WITH THESE PEOPLE OUTSIDE THE ADMINISTRATION LIKE PERLE AND JACKSON AND THE COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER CROWD? OR DO YOU THINK HE FELT MORE COMFORTABLE WITH SHULMAN AND VANCE AND WARNKE?

I don't believe that Dr. Brzezinski's positions followed anybody elses. I don't think he was a captive of the Committee on the Present Danger, and I don't believe that he was necessarily an adherent of the views of Secretary Vance. He's been deeply involved in foreign policy over a great number of years and he's formed his own views. And I found them quite idiosyncratic.

SALT – SOME PEOPLE SAY SALT II WAS A BETTER TREATY THAN SALT I, BETTER FOR US...

Well, any....

WELL, IF YOU AGREE WITH THAT, WHY DID SALT I GET RATIFIED AND SALT II NOT?

You've got to remember that at the time of SALT I ratification Richard Nixon was at the peak of his political power. He had mined Haiphong Harbor in April of 1972, and had then gone to Moscow and had been received very favorably by the Soviet leadership. He had demonstrated his ability, I think the American people felt, to handle foreign affairs. He had the break-through to China. Watergate wasn't even a cloud on the horizon at that particular point. So as a consequence he was able to get any treaty through that he was willing to sign. In addition to that he'd benefited from his anti-communist reputation. And as a result he had no difficulty getting through the ABM treaty. He had very little difficulty getting through the SALT I agreement on controlling offensive arms, even though that gave the Soviet Union a numerical advantage over the United States. So it really was a question of political power. At the time that SALT II came for Senate consideration, President Carter was on the slippery slope. He had lost his political clout. There was a considerable feeling that he was a lame duck. So that was the basic difference. President Carter in 1979 could not get the moderate republican votes that would automatically have come to President Nixon or would automatically come to President Reagan.

HOW DAMAGING DO YOU THINK TO THE WHOLE RATIFICATION PROCESS WERE THE EFFORTS ON THE PART OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER?

I think that the efforts on the part of the Committee of the... Present Danger gave a sort of respectable, intellectual camouflage to opposition to arms control. I think it served that purpose. In addition to which since it very faithfully reflected the views of Senator Scoop Jackson it meant that those in the Senate and there were quite a few of them, who tended to go along with Senator Jackson were encouraged to oppose SALT II. So because of the influence of Senator Jackson the views of the Committee on the Present Danger had an unwarranted influence on the process.

PD-59.

Yes.

WHAT WAS IT AND DID YOU LIKE IT?

PD-59 was basically a review and revision of the targeting policy of the United States. It was portrayed in the heat of a Presidential campaign by some White House spokesmen as being a revolutionary change. It was not. It was basically an evolution of previous targeting doctrine. I did not like it because it seemed to me it perpetuated the myth of a nuclear war fighting capability. It talked about the United States having the forces that could fight a limited and protracted nuclear war. Well, Davy Jones, who was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs has testified to the Congress that in his opinion it's asinine to try and get the ability to fight a limited and protracted nuclear war. And I thought that Secretary of Defense Harold Brown gave the only rational explanation for PD-59. What he said basically in a speech to the Naval War College is that he knew there could be no such thing as a limited and protracted nuclear war. That President Carter knew it too, but we didn't know whether or not the Soviet Union knew it, and therefore, we had to pretend that we didn't know it either, and that would increase deterrence. So he cast it not in terms of war fighting, but of nuclear war being deterred by having this flexible capability. Now the fact of the matter is it's an entire myth. There is no such ability. There is no way that either side can fight a limited and protracted nuclear war.

AS THE DIRECTOR OF THE ARMS CONTROL AND DISARMAMENT AGENCY WERE YOU INVOLVED IN THE DECISION MAKING ON THE B-1 OR THE NEUTRON BOMB?

Ah, the answer is no. No, on the B-1, I was not notified of the decision to cancel the B-1 program until something like 45 minutes before it was announced. I regretted that because I thought that I would probably have been able to get some bargaining advantage out of a cancellation of the B-1 program. On the neutron bomb we were in fact consulted as to the arms control implications. And I concluded that the arms control implications were very minor indeed. That it wouldn't really lower the nuclear threshold because the nuclear threshold depends upon your conception of the retaliatory motives of the other side. The neutron bomb is designed to inflict less property damage if you use it in Western Europe. You kill more Russians, but you destroy less German property. Now I submit those kinds of characteristics are not apt to make the Soviet Union exercise restraint when it comes to responding to the use of neutron bombs. So as I say from the arms control standpoint, I considered it basically unimportant.

ON THE B-1 CANCELLATION DID YOU HEAR FROM ANY OF YOUR SOVIET COUNTERPARTS? DID THEY RAISE ANY QUESTIONS ABOUT WELL, WHY DIDN'T YOU TRY TO BARGAIN THIS AWAY?

Ah, both Ambassador Dobrynin and Chief SALT Negotiator Semyonov both complained about the fact that they had not been able to get any credit for that sort of cancellation. And they suggested that if in fact this had been on the bargaining table that both of us could have benefited from bargaining it away.

THEY THOUGHT IT WAS A DUMB MOVE?

They thought of it more as being a lost opportunity, and so did I.

FOR THEM TO GIVE UP SOMETHING?

Yes. I think that they felt that they had made such a fuss about the B-1, you know, they had talked about its immense potential, that it was more of a threat. They wanted to count it twice in the overall count of strategic nuclear delivery vehicles. And I think they found it difficult to understand why we gave it up without asking for something in return. And unfortunately of course the rationale for giving it up was that we were going to do something that was better for us, namely to go for the air-launch cruise missiles and equip our strategic bomber force with that. So that effectively nullified any bargaining advantage that we could have used.

CANCELLING THE B-1 BOMBER AS A UNILATERAL ACTION, ISN'T THAT IN LINE WITH YOUR IDEA OF RECIPROCAL RESTRAINTS IN THE LONG RUN? WOULDN'T YOU HAVE BEEN IN FAVOR OF THAT?

The fact of the matter is that you've got two ways that you can achieve arms control. One is by reciprocal restraint in the absence of bargaining. But you shouldn't be practicing reciprocal restraint at the same time as you're bargaining because the two processes are fundamentally incompatible. But the difficulty there is that we should have done it at a time at which negotiations were not actively in process if we wanted to do it as a unilateral act. But if you're in the process of bargaining then at that stage you want to use any planned action of restraint as part of the bargaining process.