...OK,THE FIRST QUESTION WAS IF YOU COULD TRY TO SUMMARIZE IN A SENTENCE OR SO THE EXTENT OF YOUR PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE IN ARMS CONTROL AND THEN TO GO ON TO SAY WHAT WAS DIFFERENT ABOUT SALT THAN PREVIOUS EFFORTS.

It would have to be a pretty long sentence. I started in 1950 with the Atomic Energy Commission and we used to work on arms control but a very primitive sort. And uh, our thoughts were very unclear in those days. Then I was uh, deeply involved in setting up the International Atomic Energy Agency which was a hopeful...hopefully a way to get control over the non-proliferation problem. I was the Deputy Head of that delegation. Then I worked a lot on what we call general and complete disarmament for Foster Dulles and Secretary Herter and uh, in those days uh, it seemed like a very quixotic quest. But nowadays where we talk about elimination of nu...nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles it...it seems much more realistic. Then I was in charge of some, I was head of negotiation called the Multilateral Force which was a ballistic missile force in which we tried to bring the Europeans and that also had a non-proliferation angle to it. I then uh, was Nixon's negotiator in the SALT I talks and head of the arms control and disarmament agency. And laterally in 1977, I was Ambassador at large for President Carter in charge of all the non-proliferation negotiations around the world. Now I'm Chairman of the Board of the Arms Control Association. Now how does it differ from, how did the early phases differ? Well, we didn't have a specific target as we did in SALT. We didn't uh, we were sort of feeling around for possible areas of agreement which never really showed up until uh, 1963 when the limited Test Ban Treaty was negotiated by Harriman and Bill Foster. So that uh, the earlier ventures were not really strategic arms negotiations. As I said, some of it was addressed to non-proliferation questions. So I think it's fair to say that the SALT I was the first serious strategic arms limitation negotiations that this government entered into.

CAN YOU RECOUNT A COMMENT THAT PRESIDENT NIXON MADE TO YOU AT SOME POINT EXPLAINING WHY HE WAS BEST SUITED TO REALLY BRING ABOUT AN ARMS CONTROL AGREEMENT BECAUSE OF HIS ANTI-COMMUNIST CREDENTIALS?

Well, I know he felt that way. I can't give you a, I know that uh, President Nixon felt that he was ideally suited to negotiate a limitation on arms. I can't give you an exact quotation, but he felt that with his record starting with uh, his case back in the 1950s and his generally known position against Communism, that uh, he would have the confidence of the Congress, and especially the Senate, if he were able to negotiate an agreement on limiting strategic arms.

WHY DID 1969 SEEM LIKE A WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY FOR GETTING SERIOUS ARMS CONTROL TALKS STARTED?

1969 seemed uh, appropriate because the Soviets were no longer in a position of complete inferiority. I think that it's clear that when one nation is superior and the other's inferior, in certain types of arms, the prospect for reaching an agreement is very poor. But by '69, the Soviets had started to deploy ICBMs. They started to deploy submarine–launched ballistic missiles. They had heavy bombers. And I think President Nixon felt that uh, the prospect of sustaining a long term arms race in the face of congressional hesitancy about funding was not very good and that uh, it would be sensible for us to try to get some agreement which would eliminate the...the arms racing phenomena.

IN THIS CONTEXT, WHAT DID THE IDEA OF PARITY REALLY MEAN?

Well I can tell you better what it didn't mean at eh...at least to us. It didn't mean that each side...

CAN YOU USE THE WORD PARITY?

I think the concept of parity didn't mean that each side had to have the same number of each type of system. The land based missiles, the sea based missiles, the bombers. But in general, I think it meant that both sides had a sufficiency. I remember that as early as 1957, '58 the Eisenhower administration had adopted a concept of sufficiency. If we had all of the weaponry we would ever need to deter the Soviets, then the fact that they might have a few more of one type or a few more of another type should not be alarming. So I think parity is not a concept that you can quantify.

WHAT WAS THE INFLUENCE OF FINALLY ARRIVING AT THE TECHNOLOGY FOR RECONNAISSANCE OF NATIONAL TECHNICAL MEANS? WHAT EFFECT DID THAT HAVE ON GETTING THE TALKS GOING?

I think uh, our capability to use satellites especially for photography was a central development in getting on with arms control. I can remember talking to Foster Dulles and said, "This is the greatest breakthrough for arms control I could imagine," Because up to then, we were flying blind, if you will. We didn't know exactly what the Soviets were doing. With satellites we have a very good idea of their weapons program and our insistence on on sight inspection which had blocked negotiations before that, was no longer necessary. So satellite reconnaissance is, was and is essential now. I have often said, if I had my choice with a reasonable amount of on sight inspection, or satellite intelligence, I would choose the latter in all cases.

WHY IS IT THAT THE SOVIETS ARE SO MUCH LESS CONCERNED WITH THIS ISSUE OF VERIFIABILITY? WHY IS IT EASIER FOR THEM?

The Soviets have a much simpler problem of verifying what we are doing than we have of what they are doing. They have access in the open literature such as our budget hearings, our budget presentations, magazine articles uh, aerial space daily type magazine which describe what our weapon systems are in great detail. We have nothing like that. They don't publish anything that they don't want us to see. Whereas lots goes out of our system that we would prefer that Soviets didn't see. So it's a very asymmetrical proposition.

HOW DID YOU FEEL IN 1969 ABOUT NIXON'S POLICY OF LINKAGE?

Uh, Nixon started in his first administration with uh, a clear hope that he could link such things as a Middle East settlement with progress on arms control. I felt that uh, it was difficult enough to get an arms control agreement by itself without making it carry the extra burden of leveraging settlements in other areas. So I was very disappointed when Nixon started off. I think at the Air force Academy shortly after he was elected and talked about how arms control must be linked to other settlements. Gradually, he, President Nixon moved away from the linkage concept and in the end there was uh, very little of that left. In fact, there was a negative sort of linkage because a month before the ABM Treaty was signed in 1972, we had bombed Haiphong Harbor in Vietnam and hit the Soviet ship. You would have thought that sort of negative linkage might have put a quietus on the negotiation but it had no effect. And we knew at that point that the Soviets really wanted to have a...a deal.

WHY WAS IT ASSUMED THAT WE HAD MORE LEVERAGE THAN THE SOVIETS — THAT WE COULD ACTUALLY LEVERAGE OTHER THINGS BESIDES EQUAL AGREEMENT AT THE TALKS?

I think that's uh, sort of an Americans whimsy that uh, somehow or other we have this uh, extended uh, leverage. Uh, each President seems to start that way about how we're going to get the Soviets to agree to arms control and uh, we'll let them have arms control if they agree to something else like getting out of Afghanistan. Usually, as they get into the details, they find that that extra leverage doesn't exist.

KISSINGER SAID THAT HE THOUGHT THAT ARMS CONTROL ADVOCATES FIGHT THE CONCEPT OF LINKAGE AS IF IT WAS AN INVENTION INSTEAD OF A FACT AND THAT THE SOVIETS COULD ALWAYS USE ARMS TALKS AS A SAFETY VALVE FOR AN EXPANSIONIST FOREIGN POLICY. HOW WOULD YOU RESPOND TO THAT?

Well... maybe linkage is a fact of life, but as I say, the 1972 agreements were not linked to other major political settlements. Now there was window dressing like uh, we had an agreement on principles with the Soviets and there was some trade uh, dressing up the agreement but, basically it was an arms control summit.

WHAT WERE THE KEY AMERICAN OBJECTIVES IN SALT?

I think the key objectives from our side were to get a reign, a uh, restraint on what we saw to be a upcoming race for strategic defenses. I remember looking at an intelligence estimate that the Soviets would have 12,000 strategic defense sites by 1975. Well in the event they had a hundred, which was permitted to them by the treaty as amended. And I thought that was a great accomplishment. Instead of having to see 12,000 missiles that we would have to penetrate if we ever had to make a retaliatory attack, there are one hundred. And if there was nothing else about SALT, I would say that was a great security accomplishment for the United States.

BUT WHEN YOU SAT DOWN AND DECIDED ON A STRATEGY FOR SALT, WHAT WERE THE KEY THINGS THAT YOU WANTED TO MAKE SURE YOU GOT OUT OF THE AGREEMENT? WHAT WAS MADE?

Well, as I say, we wanted to get an agreement on ABMs that would cut down or keep down the numbers of launchers and missiles and radar. And all of those points were separately covered in the treaty. In addition to that, we wanted to get some halt on the Soviet buildup of offensive weapons, the ICBMs, the SL, the submarine launch ballistic missiles, and bombers. And although the SALT agreement, which unfortunately President Reagan has just torpedoed last week, was not a perfect instrument by any means. It did have a restraining effect. People tend to forget that not one Soviet silo has been built since 1972. There was a freeze on silo building. Now granted, they have been able to build a lot of warheads, and so have we. But one of our key aims was to stop the proliferation of silos which are the things you launch missiles from. And that was done.

WHAT WERE THE RANGE OF OPTIONS CONSIDERED FOR SALT WHEN YOU ATTENDED THESE MSC AND VERIFICATION PANEL MEETINGS? AND HOW WAS IT DECIDED WHAT TO PRESENT?

The range of options in the ABM field went all the way from zero to uh, one site for each side, two sites, four sites. Uh, I was very much in favor of trying for a ban. Zero ABM system. And I at one point got the President's authority to sound out the Soviets as to whether they would be interested. And they in effect said, "Well, make us an offer." And at that point, the President pulled off and he said, "Well, we'll... we'll leave that for SALT uh, the next round." Well, in the event... we never made that proposal. It would have been a lot better if there had been a zero arrangement because the present arrangement which permits both sides to have one system is militarily meaningless. And yet it always presents the prospect that it may proliferate. It may be expanded. And that's one of the things one worries about. Now how were these options narrowed down? We would discuss them, on the question of how the choice was made as to what it proposed, uh, the President would make that decision and uh, generally the delegation would get their instructions very late in the game, because the President didn't like it when we would point out errors in our instructions. Or ways of doing it better. Sometimes we wouldn't get our instructions until after we had left the United States. And then there was usually a great flap to try to get them corrected. But the final decision was the President's. He took it, I'm sure, with the advice of Dr. Kissinger and we had to live with some decisions that we were uncomfortable with.

CAN YOU DESCRIBE A LITTLE BIT ABOUT WHAT IT WAS LIKE NEGOTIATING? HOW WERE THESE NEGOTIATIONS CONDUCTED IN VIENNA AND HELSINKI?

Negotiating uh, strategic arms controls with the Soviets is certainly not like any other known negotiation that I have ever had any experience with. It is not a negotiation in the sense that a labor negotiation is. To work out wage rates and other conditions. It's not horse-trading. It's not uhf old Yankee trading sort of hard bargaining. Uh, the negotiators, at least on our side, are guided instruments, if you will. They're on very tight rein. They are getting instructions almost every day. The communications we had were extraordinary. You could pick up a telephone and press a button and talk to Kissinger or talk to the Secretary of State in an instant, at any time. And the Joint Chiefs had their communication...

ALL RIGHT. CAN YOU PICK THAT UP AT THE CONSTANT CONTACT?

So that uh, in negotiating with the Soviets you are in a sort of diplomatic interface with the...the, another political system. You don't say, "Well, if I could get approval to do this, would you do that?" You present your position approved by your government. Now you try to explain it and amplify it, but you don't really go off on your own. Once in a while, this does happen, I understand, but not in SALT I. It didn't happen. Uh, it's... much more like a uh, uh, relationship between two political systems rather than between individuals trying to work out a... a problem to a common solution.

WHAT WAS IT LIKE ACTUALLY IN THE NEGOTIATING SESSION? WHAT WOULD THE DELEGATIONS DO?

In a negotiation session, it was very stilted Uh, we would read a paper, or I think we tossed a coin to see who would read the first paper, and that usually took about uh, 20 minutes to a half an hour because it had to be translated after each paragraph or sentence our interpreter would read it in Russian. Then the other side would do the same thing. And usually that was the limit of the negotiating session. Then we would break up and have private uh, exchanges. I would sit down with my opposite number, Ambassador Semyonov and the military would sit down with the Soviet generals and the State Department people with the Foreign Office people and sometimes we would spend an hour or more just sort of informally exploring what the implications of what we were talking about were. It was very important to have precise records. In some cases the United States has not had precise records of negotiations including the use of Soviet interpreters, so that we had no records of what was said. Well I insisted that that not happen. And sometimes my interpreters would say it took them eight hours to prepare a reporting telegram to make sure that they had all the nuances of what was said in Russian and translate that into English. So that I think the record is probably as precise as in any negotiation that the United States has ever had. I might say in addition to these types of sessions, we had uh, uh, a number of social occasions with the Soviets where one would uh, transact some business and report fully on it to Washington. Uh, there were Soviets as you know liked very much to work at night. And they would uh, sometimes call up at eleven o'clock or midnight and say, uh, "We'd like to talk to you about this subject." So we'd have to get to work and uh, I gather this is still Soviet practice. I, If I had a rule making capability, I would have it no working with Soviets at night. You've got to conduct your business at day because Americans are not as good late at night in working as the Soviets are. I'm afraid that's the truth.

CAN YOU DESCRIBE A LITTLE BIT MORE ABOUT THE ATMOSPHERE OF SPENDING THESE LONG MONTHS IN VIENNA AND HELSINKI AND ALWAYS THINKING THAT YOUR ROOMS MIGHT BE BUGGED AND HOW IT WAS WORKING WITH THOSE SITUATIONS WITH YOUR FAMILIES AND SO FORTH.

Well it was uh, a extraordinary atmosphere because, as you say, we knew we were in an adversary relationship.

YOU CAN'T USE "AS YOU SAY".

All right. All right. I...we knew we were in an adversary relationship in working with the Soviets over many months. And we knew that uh, we probably were subjected to uh, efforts to penetrate our communications and our talk so we had to be extremely cautious at all times. We, I think it is now generally known that uh, American delegations work and especially uh, isolated circumstances to stop Soviet electronic penetration. And that uh, m...made for a funny feeling. We spent hours and hours, hundreds of hours in a, what we called "a bubble". And some of our people smoked intensely in those days and I... I used to kid one of my high associates by saying, "When I got back, my doctor told me to give up smoking." And I hadn't smoked in thirty-five years. But uh, it... it did put a strain on things. Then, uh, we had and many of us had our wives along. I did my best to uh, get that done because it was a rather unusual thing in those days. 'Cause I thought it was important from the security point of view not to have these men exposed to the wilds of Soviet sponsored ladies. And that was very helpful. And I think everybody appreciated it. I think we had a rule if you were going to spend more than six weeks away, you were entitled to have your wife with you. And uh, so that it...it wasn't unpleasant. We...the pace was not intense except in spurts so that uh, there was a good deal time for recreation and cultural achievements, especially in Vienna. We had great visits to the opera and the Musikverein and uh, but uh... it... you knew you were involved in an extraordinary uh, process.

YOU MADE A COMMENT AT ONE POINT THAT NEVER BEFORE HAD OFFICIALS OF RIVAL NATIONS SPOKEN TO EACH OTHER SO BLUNTLY ALL THAT AFFABLY ABOUT THE CAPACITIES FOR EACH OTHER AND THE IMPORTANCE OF MAINTAINING THAT CAPABILITY. CAN YOU GIVE A SENSE OF, DESCRIBE THAT.

Well here...here you are talking with our Soviet opposite numbers about uh, ballistic missiles and we knew that on both sides they were uh, in a ready status and if ever used they could destroy their... the opposite nation and yet uh, you get very callous about this. And you talk about whether you need a thousand or two thousand of these things uh, and uh, you talk about submarines and uh, whether you can replace one type of missile in the submarine with another type and... it did seem to me extraordinary that uh, you could coolly talk about these things that involved uh, possibly the end of the world.

HOW DID TRUST DEVELOP? WAS THERE AN ATMOSPHERE OF MISTRUST IN THE BEGINNING AND IF SO, HOW DID TRUST DEVELOP?

I don't think trust ever developed. Uh, I wouldn't have anything to do with an agreement that depended on trust. I think that our capabilities to tell whether the other side is fulfilling its obligation are quite independent of trust. And ah I must admit, as time went on, you got a feeling that you were talking to serious people, well educated people. But I never had a sense that uh, I could let our guard down and go in for anything that depended on trust. I must say that uh, uh, my opposite number was an extraordinary man. He was a quite a musician. He used to conduct symphony orchestras when he was a young man. He had a very broad knowledge of Greek mythology. He spoke German fluently. And when he would make a quotation from Goethe he would turn to the American interpreter and say, "You translate that", because he knew that our interpreter had spent four years in Berlin studying just Goethe. So that uh, you get a... a give and take in a relationship like that that is not unpleasant.

WHAT WAS THE KEY RESULT OF THE FIRST SESSION?

The first session was in Helsinki and we went for about six weeks. And I think the most important result was that uh, both sides realized that this was a serious negotiation. We had had so many uh, sort of abortive exchanges with the Soviets in the past. Where it was just a matter of polemic or propaganda or public relations or what we call "show boating", but right from the start, both sides I believe sensed that this was deadly earnest business. And the Soviets afterwards told me, they said, "You know, at the beginning, we didn't know if you fellas were serious and we weren't fully prepared and you can be sure that next meeting when we meet in Vienna, we will be more carefully prepared." So I think the SALT I first session was a very useful preparatory step, I think one of the evidences of the importance of the first session in Helsinki was that after it was finished, the head Soviet delegate said to me that they hadn't been sure that the American side was really serious about SALT until they got into this first session and after that, they concluded we were and that they had a great deal more homework to do before the next session and they would be better prepared in the next session.

WHEN DID YOU KNOW THAT THE SOVIETS WERE INTERESTED IN MAKING AN AGREEMENT ON ABMs? THAT THEY WERE REALLY SERIOUS ABOUT IT?

Well it's hard after 15 or 16 years to be precise as to when we sensed that the Soviets were serious, but I would guess as early as uh, March or April of 1970. The second session of SALT I. It became clear that the Soviets were not just fiddling around, that they were interested in some sort of limitation on anti-ballistic missile systems.

WHAT WAS THEIR FEELING, DID YOU GET A SENSE OF HOW THEY FELT ABOUT THE AMERICAN ABM TECHNOLOGY? WERE THEY THREATENED BY IT?

As early as the SALT I negotiation, the Soviets spoke in terms of the danger from anti-ballistic missiles. They pointed out that they could be used offensively as well as defensively. They said they had originally thought that anti-ballistic missiles were humane. They were to protect people. But they had concluded that they offered a de-stabilizing prospect. The concept of a race in defenses leading to more offenses and vice versa. Uh, I think that uh, Secretary McNamara had talked to them along these lines at the Glassboro Summit in 1968 I guess it was. Or maybe it was '67. So that uh, we were surprised at how bluntly they spoke, even at the first session of SALT about the necessity for getting control over anti-ballistic missiles.

ON BEHALF OF THE ADMINISTRATION I BELIEVE THAT YOU TESTIFIED IN CONGRESS IN FAVOR OF WHEN CONGRESS WAS REALLY DEBATING VERY SERIOUSLY WHETHER THEY WOULD FUND THE ABM PROGRAM. AND YOU TESTIFIED ON BEHALF OF FUNDING THE SAFEGUARD PROGRAM. WHAT WAS THE REASON? WHAT DID YOU PRESENT TO THEM AS A REASON FOR GOING AHEAD AND DOING THAT?

I did not testify before Congress, but I told the President that if it would help in his fight to get funding for the ABM, I would be glad to say a few words about the impact of not funding on the negotiation status. And I insisted that this be private because I thought it would look a little foolish if I came out as a public supporter of something that I was trying to...to block. Unfortunately, as in many other cases, it was not kept private. And a number of senators uh, referred to the fact that I was in fact lobbying for the ABM and it caused quite a flap and I was very exorcised at the White House at the time for having let this cat out of the bag. My rationalization was that we were approaching an ABM agreement. And I thought it would be especially harmful psychologically if right in the middle of this final approach the Senate indicated its disdain for ABMs by blocking funding. I think it's quite different from the case where we are going ahead with a weapons system just for its so called bargaining chip advantages. The ABM had been going for a long time. And it seemed to me just the wrong time to choke it off as we were approaching a limitation because I thought the Soviets would be less inclined to choke off their own system if ours was choked off by a Senate action.

DO YOU THINK THAT THE ADMINISTRATION'S MAJOR PUSH AT THAT TIME FOR SAFEGUARD WAS PURELY FOR A BARGAINING CHIP, THAT THEY REALLY DIDN'T THINK IT WAS A VALUABLE SYSTEM FOR US TO HAVE?

No. I think the President's speech in January...

COULD YOU START OVER WITHOUT SAYING "NO"?

The President's uh, statement in January or February of '69, his first year, uh, made a strong case militarily for safeguard, for an ABM system. And he talked about the necessity for uh, controlling accidents or in those days, the Chinese ICBM offered a threat, or some sort of damage limitation. I don't think he thought of it just as a bargaining chip. President Nixon was s... smart enough to realize it would have that effect. It would pressure the Soviets to want to control these things. But I don't think that was his sole motivation.

DID YOU FIND YOURSELF BEING UPSET THAT CONGRESS MIGHT CUT OFF FUNDING FOR ABM WHILE YOU WERE TRYING TO WORK OUT THIS AGREEMENT?

Well I don't remember that I...I was upset by the Congressional action, but as a...as I said, I think it would psychologically have... struck, a poor note coming just at that time.

SESSION TWO HAS BEEN DESCRIBED AS THE LONGEST AND MOST CRITICAL IN TERMS OF STRUCTURING THE FINAL OUTCOME OF THE TALKS. I WAS WONDERING IF YOU COULD BRIEFLY DESCRIBE OR SUMMARIZE WHAT THE KEY EVENTS OF SESSION TWO WERE.

It's uh, taxing my memory to try to recall the specifics of each one of the sessions which happened. This was uh, let's say, sixteen years ago. Uh. In general, the second session was the first time we've really put proposals to the Soviets. And uh, in those days, the Soviets usually react to our proposals rather than making proposals of their own. And as I remember we started in with options for ABM sites for each side or one... I'm not sure of the specific details but uh, one of the mistakes I think we made as government was to give the Soviets a choice. One of the options we proposed to them was to just have a system on each side to defend the nation's capital. Well, that's what the Soviet system that was building was addressed to whereas the system we were building was addressed to the defensive. Our weapons out west, our ICBMs. The Soviets then grabbed at that and said, "All right. That's...that's the one we're interested in." And about that time we concluded we weren't interested in that because I think we felt that a lot of people in the country would say, "Oh, look at those Washington politicians. They're going to be protected and nobody else is going to be." So we started to back away from that and it was very embarrassing. It took months and months to get off the hook that we had placed ourselves on in saying "How about national capital defense?"

... A MIRV BAN WITH ON THE SITE OF INSPECTION, AND D WAS THE DEEP REDUCTIONS OF A 100 LAUNCHERS PER YEAR OVER THE NEXT SEVEN YEARS, AND BOTH OF THOSE WERE TIED INTO A LOW NUMBER OF ABMs. I WONDER IF YOU COULD DESCRIBE BRIEFLY THE ESSENCE OF THOSE OPTIONS AND WHY THOSE WERE PRESENTED AS OPPOSED TO ANYTHING ELSE THAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN TABLED AT THAT TIME?

All right.

OK.

In addition to the ABM aspect of the first or the second session, the one we had in Vienna, there was a whole question of offensive weapons control and I think the central point there was whether we should try to control MIRVs...Multiple Independently Targetable Re-entry Vehicles. Uh, the administration was very nervous about talking about MIRVs at all. For instance, in Helsinki at the first session, they wouldn't even let us mention the word MIRV. But the pressure from the Congress especially was very strong in the winter of 1970 to uh, get some control over MIRVs. These were the only systems that we presently were building in the offensive area. And that I seemed to mean, the only prospect for a significant agreement was if we would sacrifice something while asking the Soviets to sacrifice a lot of other of their offensive systems. I made it a strong pitch with the President on a number of occasions to go strongly for a MIRV control. Well, he finally authorized us to make a proposal but it was so hedged about with impossible conditions that we knew that his heart was not really in it. For instance, one of the conditions was have on site inspection, not just of their uh, ICBMS, but it also I think involved uh, reduction in their systems to defend against airplanes. I think the theory was that if we were not going to have MIRVs, then they ought to reduce their capabilities against our airplanes. And it was perfectly clear that Soviets had no interest in that. They had not tested MIRVs as we had so if there had been a test ban at that point, they would have been cut off from that technology evolution completely. In addition to that, we weren't clear at that point as to whether we wanted to try to get large reductions in offensive forces or just put a ceiling on their numbers as of 1970. Well in the event although we made a proposal involving large reductions, in the event we settled for the second type of option where we would have a freeze and try to prevent any increase in the numbers then existing.

HOW WAS IT EXPECTED THAT WITHOUT STOPPING OUR MAJOR ONGOING OFFENSIVE PROGRAM, WE WERE GOING TO HAVE LEVERAGE TO GET THEM TO STOP THEIR MAJOR ONGOING OFFENSIVE PROGRAMS?

Well... we always... we always had the prospect of starting up reduction of more ICBMs, more submarines, more bombers. So I think it was of interest to the Soviets to prevent that or at least uh, getting a s...situation where if we built a new weapon of one sort, we would decommission a weapon of another sort so the total number of strategic launchers would remain the same. So I think there was leverage on both sides for that sort of an arrangement.

WERE YOU SAYING THAT YOU BELIEVED THAT EVEN IF WE HAD PRESSED A MIRV BAN THAT THE SOVIETS WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN THAT INTERESTED IN ONE?

Uh. The question of what interests the Soviets had in a MIRV ban is one of the mysteries of SALT. I think that when we proposed it, we were proposing that uh, there'd be no more testing of MIRVs. Even though we had finished testing the Soviets hadn't started. There would be no production and there would be no deployment. The Soviets came back and said, "Well, let's permit testing." And...

I THINK YOU MISSPOKE. DIDN'T YOU SAY THAT WE PRESENTED A PROPOSAL TO BAN TESTING PRODUCTION AND DEPLOYMENT?

That's my recollection.

WE NEVER PROPOSED THAT WE BAN...

Production. All right. Strike that.

SO WE CAN START OVER.

We had, in connection with MIRVs, proposed ban on testing... We had proposed a ban on testing and deployment of MIRVs and the Soviets came back and wanted to permit testing. And the natural compromise, I thought would have been a ban on testing and production. And if you couldn't produce, then you couldn't deploy. We... we sent that proposal back to Washington for authority and we never got it. It was perfectly clear that that was as far into the MIRV situation as the administration wanted to go.

AND WHY IS IT THAT THE ADMINISTRATION DIDN'T WANT TO BAN MIRVs? AT THAT POINT, THEY WERE AWARE THAT MIRVs WOULD LEAD TO A THROW-WEIGHT DIFFERENTIAL PROBLEM THAT WOULD LEAD TO ICBM VULNERABILITY AND THAT WOULD CAUSE A FUTURE INSTABILITY. WHY DIDN'T THEY ANTICIPATE THAT AND TRY TO DEAL WITH IT?

Well they knew that in theory.

UH.

They knew that uh, MIRVs once they started to be deployed would be -- The administration knew that to deploy MIRVs in the long run would tend to instability. And I hammered away on that point to the NSC that if MIRVs were to be permitted, it was just a matter of time before the Soviets would have MIRVs and we would be screaming that our ICBMs were unduly vulnerable. Uh. Military, our military was quite loath to try to ban MIRVs. This was our one system that we were way ahead in the technology. We were going into production. The Soviets hadn't even tested them and they So the Joint Chiefs felt that the first SALT agreement should be simple... should just work on large systems like... parts of system like launchers and missiles and radar. And if you got into the qualitative side of weapons such as number of warheads, whether they're independently targetable or not, the verification problem would get to be very complicated and maybe would prevent an agreement from being reached. I think on top of that the administration felt that it was going to be hard enough. On the question of limiting MIRVs, I think that the President felt that it was going to be hard enough to get a... a limitation on ABMs through the Congress, through the Senate. But if in addition to that you were going to come up with a proposal to ban MIRVs, that was more than the traffic in Congress could bare. So that on top of the Joint Chiefs argument I think that probably carried the day. And we had regretted it ever since.

NOW SOME PEOPLE SUGGESTED THAT THE SOVIETS WOULD HAVE, IF WE HAD GONE AHEAD AND OFFERED A REALISTIC MIRV PROPOSAL, THE SOVIETS WOULD HAVE AGREED. BUT HENRY KISSINGER SAYS THAT HE FELT THAT IF THE SOVIETS REALLY WANTED A MIRV BAN, THEY WOULD HAVE PRESSED FOR ONE BECAUSE THEY PRESS STRONGLY FOR ANYTHING THAT THEY REALLY WANTED. HOW WOULD YOU RESPOND?

Well I...I am inclined to agree with Henry for once. That uh, the Soviets did not press hard for a MIRV ban. But I'm not convinced that if we had pressed hard, they would absolutely stone walled it, because they didn't like to be put in the position of blocking a very significant arms control move. I think the best one can say is that we never tried to prove this theory that the Soviets would not have accepted a MIRV ban. We both seemed to be happy not to have a MIRV ban. Uh, I think I had written that it had seemed as if there was a sub rosa agreement on both ...sides part not to have a MIRV ban. I think Henry Kissinger also said that he wished he had thought through the implications of a MIRV world better than he did.

BOTH SIDES REALLY JUST AGREED TO LET IT GO, NOT FORMALLY BUT IT SEEMS LIKE IT WAS ONE OF THE REALLY HOT ISSUES AT THE TIME THAT EVERYBODY SAID, "WELL, WE PROBABLY CAN'T DO IT, SO WE'RE NOT GOING TO TRY SERIOUSLY."

I think both sides uh, were reasonably content that a MIRV ban hadn't become an active negotiating issue. I recall that when Kissinger was negotiating with Dobrynin in 1971... Dobrynin asked him uh, "Do we have to include MIRVs?" And Kissinger in effect said, "No." And that was the tombstone on MIRVs.

CAN YOU TELL THAT STORY AGAIN AND END IT THE WAY YOU DID?

I think that uh, the best evidence that neither side wanted to have a MIRV ban was in 1971 Henry Kissinger was negotiating with Dobrynin, the Soviet Ambassador here. Dobrynin asked him, "Would an agreement have to include something about MIRVs?" and Kissinger indicated to him it would not. And I felt that that was the deathknell for the prospect for a MIRV ban.

HE ALSO SEEMED TO THINK IT WAS A BAD IDEA FOR THE AMERICAN SIDE TO PROPOSE A MIRV BAN, THAT IF WE PROPOSE IT, IT WOULD EVENTUALLY MEAN THAT WE WOULD HAVE TO GIVE THEM UP. DOES THAT MAKE SENSE?

No. Be...it doesn't make sense to me at uh, if we had proposed a serious MIRV ban, it would send a bad signal. In effect, uh, we did propose a ban in 1970, but as I said, it was surrounded with impossible conditions.

AND DID YOU YOURSELF REGRET NOT HAVING PURSUED ONE?

I've regretted it ever since. Yes.

UH...

But I mu...I must say that I thought I had done my best. I argued about it...the need for a MIRV ban and made a nuisance of myself with the President.

CAN WE START THIS AT THE...?

While I...I felt I had uh, made a nuisance of myself arguing with the President about the importance of getting controls on MIRVs, I in the later years wished that I had made even a greater nuisance of myself.

THERE'S A FAMOUS ANECDOTE THAT DURING THE COURSE OF THE SALT SESSIONS, ONE OF THE SOVIET MILITARY MEN COMPLAINED TO THE AMERICAN DELEGATION THAT THEY WERE EXPOSING TOO MUCH DATA ABOUT SOVIET MILITARY CAPABILITIES TO THEIR OWN CIVILIANS. CAN YOU TELL THAT STORY IN A CONDENSED WAY THAT WE COULD USE?

Yes. I think the...Soviet military was quite uncomfortable about --

The question has been raised occasionally as to whether there's any truth in the statement that the Soviet military were uncomfortable with the amount of military information that their civilian colleagues were getting in connection with the SALT process. And I think that's true. I think that uh, I remember especially in the question of how many submarines the Soviets had ballistic submarines and as I remembered we got permission from the government in Washington to tell them. And I think that the...the military were uncomfortable with the fact that this sort of information was getting out to their civilians. They had much greater compartmentation between their military and their civilians than we had. As far as I know, our civilians knew as much as any military man about the general components of our strategic forces. And this apparently wasn't the case with the Soviets.

CAN YOU JUST REPEAT THE LINE ABOUT THE SOVIET MILITARY? I THINK IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN CONFUSED WHICH MILITARY, THAT THE SOVIET MILITARY SAID THEY WERE NERVOUS ABOUT THE INFORMATION THEIR CIVILIANS —

It was my understanding that the Soviet military were uncomfortable about the amount of precise information that their Soviet civilians were getting in connection with the SALT process. Their practice was not like ours. They tried to compartment this information safely in the military and not let their civilians know about it.

WE'VE BEEN TALKING A BIT ABOUT THE PROCESSION IN VIENNA. DO YOU NEED A TIC TAC BREAK?

I can talk.

HOW DID YOU FEEL WHEN YOU FINALLY WENT HOME AFTER THAT LONG SESSION IN VIENNA? WERE YOU OPTIMISTIC? DID YOU FEEL THAT WE WERE GETTING SOMEWHERE?

After the second session, I think I was still — Chewing is finished.

IF YOU'LL JUST LOOK AT CAROL AND TALK ABOUT HOW YOU FELT AT THE END OF THE SECOND SESSION THE LONG SESSION AT THE END.

Well I was far from sure at that point that we were going to get an agreement. I think we were still very much in a tentative frame of mind. Uh, there was lots of groundwork still to be done but I think we were encouraged that the second session had indicated that there was a real potential for an agreement. Whether it would uh, evolve into a reality was far from clear.

YOU...IN A LOT OF THESE VERIFICATION PANEL MEETINGS AND NSC MEETINGS, SOMETIMES THE PRESIDENT WAS THERE. WHAT WAS YOUR SENSE ABOUT HOW THOSE MEETINGS WERE RUN AND DECISIONS WERE TAKEN AND IF YOU CARE TO TELL THE BULLSHIT STORY THAT WE'VE READ ABOUT, FEEL FREE TO.

Well uh, for the most part, the verification panel meetings and especially the NSC meetings were quite uh, well in the NSC let me say, quite stilted. A number of the people knew very little about the subject. For instance, the Vice-President used to sit on...in on these meetings and his comments showed that he was not really clued in and decisions are not made in the NSC contrary to what many people believe. And I had a feeling that it was largely a matter of going through the motions so you could say there had been an NSC meeting. If anything went wrong, as I remember in those days, the first question that a...a Congressman would ask would be, "Has there been an NSC meeting?" And I felt that a lot of what we were doing was to be able to say, "Yes. There had been an NSC meeting." Uh, the verification of panel meetings on the other hand were uh, much more serious and intensive. Most of the people had uh, done a lot of homework and i...a lot of this is what I would call an education for Henry Kissinger. He used to spend a lot of time asking technical questions to improve his knowledge of the subject matter and we felt that was all to the good because he had an immense influence on the President and educating him was an important part of the process. As far as uh, the NSC meeting, the liveliest one that I ever attended was in the Spring of 1972.

YOU WERE GOING TO START ABOUT THE MOST LIVELY MEETING.

The most memorable meeting I had in the NSC was towards the end of the negotiation when I was trying to improve on Mr. Kissinger's work in Moscow on the subject of how many submarines the Soviets would be permitted to keep. And I thought that uh, the number that he had negotiated was not sufficiently high for us. And as I was arguing, Kissinger broke in and said uh, "Well it must be all right because this letter that we're talking about was drafted by Gerry Smith himself." And I had to jump in and say, they had changed the letter from the one I had approved, And with that the President broke in and said, "Bullshit!" which I thought was an interesting intervention in solemn NSC meeting. And after the meeting, Rogers, the Secretary of State said to me, he talked to the President, he said, "Why in the world did you razz Smith that way? He was trying just to get the best deal possible?" And he told me that President Nixon was so upset that he could hardly speak. He just sort of mumbled. So that will give you some idea of the tensions that some of these discussions raised.

AFTER THE SOVIETS HAD ACCEPTED THAT NCA-ABM OPTION, WHY WAS IT WITHDRAWN AND THEN LATER ON IN NEGOTIATIONS THERE WAS A SERIES OF 4-1, 3-1, 2-1 PROPOSALS PRESENTED?

We had offered uh, the Soviets uh, just to have one site on each side to defend capitals, I think that uh, our people finally realized that that didn't make much sense because the Soviets were working on defense of their capital, Moscow, and our system was addressed to another problem of defending missiles out west in. So that uh, we decided to pull away from that offer and then we went to uh, a notion that we should have four defense sites to the Soviet one. I think the origin of that was that the safeguard program, our ABM program contemplated four sites. And to keep Senator Jackson's sweep, who was one of the strong men on the hill for the President's defense uh, pardon me, we were directed to propose four to one. I think all of us in the negotiation felt that was a non-starter, but something we had to go through with to carry out our instructions. Uh, it was perfectly clear that we were going to end up with an even number. I mean, 2-2 or something like that, but we had to gradually go through the motions of presenting 4-1, 3-1, 2-1 and that took a lot of time, because you have to go back after each proposal and explain why it wasn't negotiable. I thought we wasted a lot of time in that process. And my advice to uh, negotiators is "Don't waste time on obviously non-negotiable propositions."

WASN'T PART OF THE REASON FOR THE ADMINISTRATION'S... SIMPLY TO STALL, TO TRY TO GET THE, FINALIZE THE NEGOTIATIONS CLOSER TO THE ELECTION OR IS THAT NOT TRUE?

I think uh, some of the President's motivation was to try to synchronize the negotiation with the situation on the hill about, I think that uh, some of the President's motivation was to coordinate or synchronize the position in Geneva or in uh, Vienna with the position of the ABM funding on the hill. And as I said, uh, we were then pushing for four sites in our program and so it was natural we proposed four sites in the negotiation. I think that uh, eventually it became clear that that was not a practical negotiating position.

LET'S MOVE THE FORWARD BASES ISSUE. WHAT WAS THE SOVIET CONCERN AND WHAT WAS OUR RESPONSE?

The Soviet's first proposed that we include our so-called forward base systems in our total permitted numbers. Very soon after the start of the negotiation in 1969. And uh, it seemed to me they had two motivations. One, a political motivation. They knew that if we started to talk about these systems in Europe, it would upset our allies and cause a split. These forward base systems included uh, carrier based bombers, bomb fighter bombers, they included tactical aircraft or so called uh, uh, I guess they were fighter aircraft in Germany which had a nuclear capability which would have upset the Germans very much. But in addition to that, I think the Soviets have and did have a uh, not unreasonable concern about the damage that these non-strategic systems could do to them. I once saw an estimate that even if we never used our strategic forces, something like 20 percent of all the targets we were interested in could be destroyed by these non-strategic forces. One Soviet general said to me uh, during the war, he had been wounded and was in a hospital. And the hospital was bombed by a German plane. He said, "I didn't ask was that a strategic plane or a tactical plane. All I knew was they bombed me." And that seemed to me a not unreasonable concern on their part. And uh, we... we still are working on the problem of how to handle those systems.

WE KNOW THAT THERE WAS A DISAGREEMENT BETWEEN PAUL NITZE AND ROYAL ALLISON AND THAT IT REFLECTED A DIFFERENCE OF OPINION IN THE DEFENSE DEPARTMENT, BETWEEN THE DEFENSE DEPARTMENT AND THE JOINT CHIEFS. CAN YOU DESCRIBE WHAT THAT WAS ABOUT?

Well...There was a difference in approach between the General Allison and Paul Nitze. Uh, as I had said, I think the Joint Chiefs wanted to have a very simple first agreement. And Paul Nitze who was uh, the burning behind the Defense Department, the Secretary of Defense's office in arms control was concerned about things like differentials in throw weight and the importance of getting tight controls over radar and so from time to time they did disagree. They were always very friendly about it and I think both of them made a great contribution to what we accomplished there. But you're quite right, it...it's quite right to say that they had a different point of view.

I ALSO UNDERSTOOD THAT NITZE TENDED TO BE THE ODD MAN OUT AT SALT — THAT FOUR PEOPLE WOULD TEND TO AGREE AND HE WOULD BE THE, TEND TO NOT AGREE. DID THAT REFLECT A DIFFERENCE ABOUT SECRETARY LAIRD AND THE DEFENSE DEPARTMENT'S APPROACH TO PURPOSE OF ARMS CONTROL?

I don't remember that we ever had uh, or that we often had difference that reflected in a final vote, for instance. I remember on one uh, problem uh, General Allison and the State Department representative uh, Ambassador Parsons took one position and Nitze, Hal Brown and I took another position. That was on the question of how to handle the so-called exotic ABM systems, the systems of the future. Lasers and particle beams but...I don't recall any other situation where we sent back to Washington a split of opinion. Perhaps there were a few but they escape my recollection.

YOU DESCRIBE IN THE BOOK, FEAR WHEN WE HAD MINED HAIPHONG HARBOR AND BOMBED HANOI THAT THERE WAS A GREAT EXPECTATION WHEN YOU WALKED INTO THE SESSION THAT SOVIETS WOULD REACT AND PERHAPS WALK OUT. CAN YOU DESCRIBE WHAT THE DELEGATION WAS FEELING AT THAT TIME?

In uh, April of '72, we heard about the bombing of Haiphong. I think a Soviet sailor who was injured or perhaps killed in that uh, bombing uh...

EXCUSE ME, DID YOU SAY, "BOMBING OF HAIPHONG?"

Yes.

WAS IT BOMBING OF HANOI AND THE MINING OF HAIPHONG?

Well these mines were dropped from airplanes I believe.

OH. OKAY.

Strike. I think you're co... technically correct. The mining of Haiphong uh, concerned the White House. The President uh, sent me a telegram and uh, said prepare for a break in the negotiations and have a break statement uh, drafted in advance. And we felt very blue because we spent a couple of years at that point almost working on this and to have it uh, uh, blown out of the water by a... another Vietnam episode seemed pretty cruel. Much to our surprise the Soviets were very affable and uh, took no notice of the situation. It turned out later that they hadn't heard about the Haiphong episode. But even after they did, they showed no indication that that was going to upset the purpose of reaching an agreement.

WHAT DID THAT SAY TO THE DELEGATION ABOUT LINKAGE?

I think the attitude of the Soviets after the Haiphong episode uh, convinced us that the Soviets really wanted an agreement and that uh, it showed that this linkage concept, to say the least, did not operate in all circumstances. If the Soviets wanted an agreement badly enough, they could overlook things that were against their interest.

I WANT TO TALK TO YOU ABOUT THE BACK CHANNEL. AT WHAT POINT, I THINK YOU'VE TOLD US THAT YOU FELT THAT NO OFFENSIVE AGREEMENT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER THAN THE ONE THAT HENRY KISSINGER BROKERED. WHY DID YOU FEEL THAT WAY?

I don't recall feeling that uh, in general we would be better off, we would have been better off without a offensive agreement. I remember in the last few minutes of the negotiation when we were in Helsinki and the President was working in...in Moscow, it looked as if uh, the whole poss...the whole thing might uh, collapse because of a difference of opinion about a definition of what a heavy missile would be. And I think I sent a wire to the President at that point saying we would be better off with just an ABM Treaty which I thought was in very good shape...than letting the whole dual thing, ABM Treaty plus offensive freeze collapse because of this argument about what a heavy missile was. But uh, except for that time, I think I shared the President's feeling that you had to have some restraint on offensive systems if your defensive systems treaty was going to be a lasting one.

HOW DID YOU FIRST FIND OUT ABOUT THE BACK CHANNEL AND HOW DID YOU FEEL ABOUT IT?

Well we had a few indications that something phony was going on from the Soviets. Uh, for instance I believe uh, Semyonov said something to me in 1970 about a possible summit meeting and that was the first I realized that there was planning going on for a summit meeting. As early as 1970. Uh, the first specific knowledge I had was when I was called back by the President in May of '71 and Henry very politely asked me to breakfast. And he told me that he had been working with Dobrynin for many months and had solved the problem of how to get on with uh, an ABM Treaty plus something in the way of restraint on offensive systems. I felt it a little strange when I learned the details that it was the same deal that we and the Soviets had been talking about the previous October. We could have had the deal in October of 1970 instead of waiting until May of '71. I remember, I recall uh, being less than outraged at his disclosure and I said to him, "Well, the product is more important than the process." Although, uh, I remember Tommy Thompson who is one of the chief delegates is alleged to have said at that point, I should have resigned. Uh, in retrospect, maybe I should have. But uh, then Kissinger went on and he said the President is going to announce this tomorrow or the day after and he wants you back in Vienna. I said, "Well that's strange that uh, when he's going to make this announcement about something that I have been working on for a long time, he wants to get me out of town." And Kissinger saw the point of that and they decided to let me stay but not to take part in the President's announcement. They didn't want anything that would reduce the glory of the White House on this. But...then uh, we were hearing other things from the Soviet delegation that suggested this was going on again. And I sent Kissinger a telegram and said, "This is not only demeaning to the delegation, but dangerous to have two channels with one not knowing what the other is doing." And he quickly sent me a telegram back saying, "I can assure you you will be informed at all...about anything that develops." If I had been less naive I would have wired back and say, "I know. I will be informed, but when?" And uh...I then told him if that happened again, I would really have to resign. And sure enough, it did happen again in April of '72 just before the signing and at that point I told him to advise the President that I...I would be leaving. And I told the President in 19...in the summer that if necessary I would take the first session of SALT II if he couldn't find a replacement and they asked me if I would stay on and I did. I remember the Secretary of State uh, when I told him said, "Well, write me a letter to that effect, so it'll be a clear record because in case the s...White House says they fired you, you can have a record showing that you advised me you were resigning before they made that statement." So I did that.

WHAT WAS WRONG WITH THE SLBM AGREEMENT THAT KISSINGER MADE?

Well it...it permitted the Soviets to h—

CAN YOU SAY "THE ...

The...the deal that uh, Kissinger...

AND THAT, LEAVING OUT THE SBLMs CAUSED A MAJOR PROBLEM LATER ON IN NEGOTIATIONS, RIGHT? BECAUSE YOU HAD TO GET THEM BACK IN AND LEVERAGE THE SOVIETS TO ACCEPT THEM. NOW IF YOU COULD TELL THAT STORY OF HOW KISSINGER LET THEM OUT, AND THEN HOW IT CAUSED A PROBLEM.

The difficulty about the negotiation for including the submarines was that Henry Kissinger had told the Soviet Ambassador in Washington that uh, we would be willing to make an agreement we...if it included IC...uh, SBLMs or did not. And I think that was a clear signal to the Soviets that uh, there was no need for them to worry about the content of an SLBM agreement. If we would make uh, overall deal without them in, the...the result of that was that the SLBM deal that was finally struck allowed the Soviets to have, I think it was 62 submarines and 950 uh, launchers and it allowed to have, I think it was 42 submarines and 656 launchers or some number like that. It just struck me that psychologically that did not look good. I didn't think it made much military difference because our submarines were better and could stay on control much longer than the Soviet submarines but uh I remember saying, "Well, at least, don't spell out the numbers in the agreement and maybe you could have a arrangement that would permit the Soviets to get to those numbers." But "to have the President sign an agreement with the numbers flatly listed out there was psychologically bad. And I think uh, I'm not sure, but I think that's the way it worked out. I don't that a offensive agreement lists the numbers but I'll... I would have to check on that.

SO WERE YOU OPPOSED TO AN AGREEMENT WITH UNEQUAL NUMBERS?

Well I was opposed to having an agreement that looked so unequal. I think that if the delegation had been left to their own devices, we could have worked out something somewhat better. I don't think it would have perfect because, as I say, that our feet had been pulled out from under us on the SLBM negotiation. It was a very complicated thing because it depended on how many submarines the Soviets had in operation and under construction. And the question of how many were under construction was an intelligence judgment. And uh, the Soviets were taking the position they had many more under construction than our intelligence people thought they had. And perhaps it was a question of what is under construction. But uh, uh, it was so slippery a concept that uh, very few people understood it. The formula and I can remember when we got back to Washington after the agreement was reached, I asked the White House to give me a piece of paper reciting what precisely had been agreed and a paper was sent over to me and we sent it back and said, "No. This couldn't have been agreed for the following reasons." It didn't hang together internally. And it took five drafts before they sent over a paper which at least one could support for logical reasons.

TELL US A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE SUMMIT -- THERE'S A NICE PASSAGE IN THE BOOK ABOUT THE PLANE FLIGHT FROM HELSINKI TO MOSCOW THAT YOU SHARED WITH SOME OF THE RUSSIAN DELEGATES. COULD YOU DESCRIBE THAT, HOW YOU FELT AND TOASTED ONE ANOTHER AND SIGNED THE BOOK?

We had uh, started that day I think about two o'clock in the morning and about uh, noon we started to sit down with the Soviets and work out all the details, the last minute details. Then we got on and...a plane and I remember that the uh, the Soviets said, "We have a nice uh, thin finish airline jet and we'll fly you." And I said, "Thank you, but we have an American air force plane." It was much older vintage. It was a propeller plane. And I said, "We're going to go in that. It's been standing by for days. And we'd be glad to have you as our guests." Well that took a little to and fro but they had finally came, agreed to come with us. And on the way to uh, Moscow, uh, we had a... a guest book, an Air Force guest book and we determined to write a little note uh, recording the rather historic flight, that we were coming with an agreed treaty to our Chiefs of Government. So that uh, everybody wrote out a little note and we had that as a...as a record uh. I think that uh, it was that part of the day where I had my only nourishment starting at two in the morning until midnight, I was given a glass of beer which tasted very good.

HOW DID YOU FEEL AT AROUND MIDNIGHT ON MAY 26 WHEN THE AGREEMENTS WERE FINALLY SIGNED?

Well I felt uh, pretty numb because uh, when I arrived in Moscow with Paul Nitze and General Allison, I was given a note from Secretary Rogers saying, "Be sure you attend the press conference that's going to be held at the Embassy." And at the same time, I was rather roughly put into a car by the Soviets saying I was wanted at the Kremlin. I protested but uh, didn't get anywhere. So we got to the Kremlin and nobody was expecting me there at all. I think it was a device to get me out of the way of the press conference. I must say it was quite a treat though, to go to the Kremlin and see the American flag flying in the sunset. Or that maybe it was the moonlight over the Kremlin. That was worth the whole diversion. And we got to the uh, press conference and uh, I was asked a number of questions about our intelligence estimates. And I declined to tell the press what they were. I said I didn't that was an appropriate place to do that. And Kissinger then interrupted and he said he wasn't as careful about these things as I was and he then proceeded to recite the whole thing and he was very upset at me and uh, he thought I was trying to be monkish or something about, he said at, as they were signing the treaties, uh, "What are you trying to do? Create a panic?" And I said, "Henry, you're tired. I know you've been very busy." And as soon as it was over, the President's communication expert, Herb Kline came up to me and he said, "The President doesn't want you to continue in the press conference any longer." I was pretty sure the President knew nothing about it, but they were just using his name. So I went back to the Embassy and there was uh, the famous pianist. I forget his name but uh, he and I had a drink and I turned in. And you said, "How did I feel at that point?" I'd uh, had no feelings left at all. I thought that I had been rather crudely treated by the White House, but I was very pleased that the agreement had been finally signed.

WHAT WAS THE REASON THAT THEY DIDN'T WANT YOU THERE? WAS IT BECAUSE YOU DIDN'T AGREE WITH SOME OF THE OPTIONS OF AGREEMENT OR BECAUSE THEY WANTED THE CREDIT?

Well I think that uh, the President felt according to some people who were there, that the delegation was trying to steal his glory. And he wanted to go to...to Moscow and demonstrate that he could negotiate some of these difficult things. It was nothing very uh, central left to be negotiated but I think we were quite deliberately... told to leave something. Not explicitly, but that was the thrust of it for the great men to negotiate. And at that point, the Joint Chiefs started to get a little bit nervous and I think that probably Kissinger might have felt that we were working with the Joint Chiefs to try to co... throw a little cold water on the President's efforts. Eh, I don't know if it's of interest here, but uh, it was a shambles. I had a telegram from Kissinger saying, "You must understand that we do not know from hour to hour with whom we're going to talk or what the topic will be." And it struck me that was a blueprint for how not to negotiate. And there are a number of other uh, indications that the thing was off the tracks. And we were trying to get it back on the tracks. In the process, I think we gave the President the impression we were bucking what he was trying to do. And I heard from other people that the President thought I was trying to take the credit for the negotiation which was nonsense. And that's why I think they wanted us out of the way. They insisted for — Although we had just arrived at nine o'clock that night, we got out of town early the next morning. Go back to Helsinki.

UM.

You...you asked how I felt. I can leave it to your imagination.

I JUST WANT TO TALK ABOUT THE RATIFICATION ISSUES. HOW DID YOU FEEL ABOUT THE JACKSON AMENDMENT?

Well the Jackson amendment uh, in effect uh, cast doubt on the whole process. It said that, well, "In the future, do things differently." And I asked General Haig, for instance, why we wanted to vomit on our own work like that. And he told me, "Well, it was necessary in order to get Senator Jackson to vote for the Trident submarine." That sounded extraordinary to me to h...to have to pay Senator Jackson something to get a vote for a submarine. But I...I have subsequently learned maybe there was more in that position than I had thought at the time. But I outraged that we were taking this treaty, which I thought was pretty good, and spoiling the image of it by backing this Jackson Amendment.

AND WHY DID YOU FEEL THAT LATER ON THAT IT MIGHT NOT HAVE BEEN SO SILLY?

Well I just recently read, I forget where it was that uh, Jackson had taken a position that he was not in favor of going ahead with the Trident's uh, I guess it was an accelerated speed or something like that.

HOW DID YOU FEEL ABOUT THE STRATEGIC MODERNIZATION PROGRAM AND THE STATEMENT BY MELVIN LAIRD THAT HE WOULD NOT BE SO FAVOR OF RATIFICATION UNLESS WE IMMEDIATELY FUNDED THE TRIDENT, AND THE Bl AND CRUISE AND SOME OTHER PROGRAMS?

Uh. I thought that was just standard rhetoric that a Secretary of Defense had to say in order to keep his position before the armed services committees, uh. I think that uh, this is a process that we, you see all the time in connection with arms control. It's used to beef up our weapons programs. I think uh, this is one of the reasons that uh, the Department of Defense goes along with arms control because it does have this boosting effect on arms programs, modernization programs. So, it was inevitable. I didn't think we could uh, avoid that sort of thing.

DO YOU THINK THAT ARMS CONTROL TALKS CONTRIBUTE TO ARMS ?

I think they...they have had this tendency.

CAN YOU SAY ARMS CONTROL?

I think arms control talks or arms control agreements plus negotiations do have a tendency to inflate requirements for arms. We say we need more as a bargaining chip and then when we get an agreement, we say we need more as insurance against Soviet violations so that it's not all perfect. I think we still should go ahead and try to get arms controls, but we ought to realize that there is this negative side.

HOW CAN WE GET OUT OF THAT KIND OF FEEDBACK? IT SEEMS LIKE ARMS CONTROL HAS THE SAME EFFECT ON OUR PERCEIVED NEED TO BUILD UP AS THE SOVIET BUILD UP WOULD HAVE. IS THERE A WAY TO BREAK THAT SPIRAL?

I think in the long run a process of education is required to convince the people and the Congress that arms control by itself is in our interest. We have a sufficiency of strategic weapons to support an arms control agreement. We ought to be able to reduce step by step incrementally instead of going for a 100 percent reduction overnight, that sort of thing. So that uh, it seems to me that there is a much higher level of arms control education in the Congress now than 10 or certainly 20 years ago. I think that uh, this is owning to the efforts of a number of organizations, one of which is the Arms Control Association. But uh, if you look at these figures from the last, well, I can't talk about the last election, but uh, the flavor, the climate of opinion in the Senate now is quite different from what it was.

CAN YOU TELL US ABOUT SOME OF THE EFFECT THAT JACKSON HAD ON THE DEAL THAT WAS MADE ON THE PURGE AND HOW THAT CHANGED THE ATTITUDE TOWARDS ARMS CONTROL IN THE GOVERNMENT?

Well owing to Senator Jackson a lot of the good people were let go in the executive branch after SALT II, after SALT I. And... [INTERRUPTION AND RESTART] Owing to Senator Jackson's efforts and his dislike uh, of the result of SALT I, executive branch let a number of first rate individuals go. They were dropped. And I think that was a great setback for arms control. Uh. For instance, General Allison who was our Chief Military Advisor, a first rate Lieutenant General, his career was ended in effect. And by Gen... by Senator Jackson who made no bones about it. He said uh, "Oh, you gave Smith bad military advice. You said that the, our silos would not be in... unduly vulnerable in the five years of the SALT I agreement." Well here it is, what is it? Sixteen years later and we're talking about putting MXs in those ...silos that were supposed to be unduly vulnerable in 1971 or 2. So it had a very bad affect. I should think if I were a general and I was ordered to arms control duty, I would think about what had happened to General Allison.

WHAT GAVE JACKSON THAT KIND OF CLOUT AT THAT TIME?

Well Senator Jackson was more knowledgeable than anybody else in the Senate about arms and arms control. And people who didn't want to do their homework and study, would say, "Well what does Scoop think?" And if he was against something, they said, "Well it's a terrible thing." And there was a case of tremendous influence concentrated in one man.

YOU PARTICIPATED JUST IN THE FIRST SESSION OF SALT II, BUT DO YOU HAVE A SENSE OF WHY SALT II WAS, THE BEGINNING WAS SO DIFFICULT AND WAS IT DUE TO MIRVs COMPLICATING?

I think the first session of SALT II was m...mostly a matter of going through the motions. I don't think either side was ready with new ideas for how to take the interim offensive freeze of the previous Spring and convert it into a full fledged treaty. So we just talked uh, in rather general terms. I think we did talk about the possibility of some sort of MIRV control but not in any specificity.

WHAT DO YOU THINK THE MOST IMPORTANT ACHIEVEMENT OF SALT I WAS?

The most important achievement of SALT I clearly was the ABM Treaty which avoided a race for defensive strategic defenses. I remember looking at an intelligence estimate in 1969 which uh, said that by 1975 the Soviets could have 12,000 ABMs. Well in the event they got a hundred as a result of that treaty and I thought that was a great... great success. I think that the fact that we for the first time reached agreements with the Soviets on both offensive and defensive weapons. It was a very significant uh, omen for the future. And I still think that's the case although some of our expectations have not been fulfilled.

WHAT WAS YOUR BIGGEST REGRET OF SALT I?

I think that the most significant defect was our failure to seriously grapple with the MIRV problem.

WAS THERE ANYTHING ABOUT CRUISE MISSILES?

No. The cruise missile thing was still over the horizon. At one point uh, we made a proposal to ban ground launched cruise missiles and the Soviet uh, leader said, "Oh cruise missiles. They come from the Triassic age." And I pointed out to them that uh, years before that, in a negotiation, the Soviet leader had said that bombers were obsolete. And now they were making a great issue about controlling our bombers so that uh, not to be too scornful of cruise missiles, These were the days when our cruise missile was what the Arapahoe or some system like that and then they were clearly not effective, Uh. I recall we did have a point in the negotiation where we had a preliminary agreement to ban all ground-launched cruise missiles of intercontinental range. And it's too bad that didn't survive. But it...it got lost in the shuffle.

YOU SAID A MOMENT AGO THAT THE BIGGEST REGRET WAS NOT GRAPPLING WITH MIRV. COULD YOU EXPAND ON THAT? WHAT HAS HAPPENED SINCE THAT MAKES THAT YOUR BIGGEST REGRET?

The uh, fact that the MIRV situation was not addressed seriously in SALT I has led to the, all of the problems about vulnerability of our retaliatory ground based forces. And that has led to nervousness about the stability of the strategic balance. And as generating, I think, a good deal of weaponry that we would not have needed. For instance, the MX and the Trident uh, II are really addressed to killing Soviet MIRVed ICBMs. They would really have no military function except for that counterforce role. And that's what really has driven the arms race and that's what makes us justifiably concerned about the survivability of our forces.

HOW DID YOU FEEL ABOUT NIXON'S SPEECH RIGHT AFTER THE AGREEMENTS OF THE... I THINK AT ONE POINT YOU THOUGHT THAT HE HAD SORT OF OVERBLOWN IT, THAT IT WAS A MODEST STEP.

Uh, Nixon I guess for political reasons and for his own historical reputation uh, I thought, overdrew the importance of these first SALT agreements. I think he talked in terms of the historical turning point, I think that President Nixon uh, exaggerated the importance of the first SALT agreements. I think that they were, I think that President Nixon exaggerated somewhat the historic importance of the SALT agreements. I think they were very significant but they were not the history-altering event that he made them out to be. So that in a way that accounts I think for the some of the disillusionment that subsequently spread about what these agreements were going to do.

THE ABM TREATY SEEMS TO BE BASED ON THIS CONCEPT OF MUTUAL DETERRENCE BASED ON ASSURED DESTRUCTION BY BOTH PARTIES. BUT BOTH KISSINGER AND THE SOVIET REPRESENT WE SPOKE WITH INDICATED THAT THEY DISAGREE WITH THE DOCTRINE OF... THEY HAD NEVER AGREED WITH IT. WHEN YOU DREW UP THE ABM TREATY, WAS IT IMPLICITLY UNDERSTOOD TAHT IT WAS SAFEGUARDING THE DETERRENT THROUGH THAT CONCEPT OF MAD?

I think the notion...that mutual assured destruction as a doctrine is incorrect. Mutually assured destruction is a fact of life, not chosen by us and I hope not chosen by the Soviets. But it was clear that vulnerability was a fact of life and if you tried to escape from vulnerability by having defenses, you would set off a string of consequent actions including a buildup of offensive forces to get back into this position of vulnerability that existed before an agreement. So that uh, I don't think there's any way one can escape the fact that uh, assured destruction is with and probably is going to be with us for a long time to come.

WERE THE AGREEMENTS IN SOME SENSE EMBODYING AND CONDONING THE CONCEPT OF DETERRENCE THROUGH MUTUAL ASSURANCE OF DESTRUCTION? ISN'T THAT WHAT THEY WERE BASED ON?

I don't recall in the negotiation that mutual assured destruction was ever mentioned. Now maybe it was in the back of peoples' minds, but uh, we are much more sophisticated now about some of these notions like mutual assured destruction than we were then. I think we were anxious to get a hold on weapons period.

ONE OF THE MAIN CONTENTIONS IN YOUR BOOK WAS THAT THE TEAMWORK APPROACH WAS BETTER TO THE PERSONAL APPROACH PURSUED BY HENRY KISSINGER AND DURING NEGOTIATIONS. CAN YOU JUST SUMMARIZE THE REASON FOR THAT?

We uh, in the SALT delegation had uh, a team of people with varying backgrounds. We had military people who had worked with strategic forces. We had diplomats who had worked with international relations. We had scientists and technicians who knew about the, what goes into the body of the weapons. Uh. We had people with some political experience and that combination I felt was a very powerful fact in the negotiation. The Soviet, we had known each other for a large part, for a long time. The Soviet leader told me that until a few days before they started the negotiation, he had never known any of the other people who were on his delegation. And we could work very easily. I had known Nitze for I guess twenty years. I had known Tommy Thompson for twenty years. And when you have a collegium of various skills, of high-level people, I think you're much more effective than a single individual trying to handle this all by himself.

DOES THE CONCEPT OF DETERRENCE THAT WAS WORKED OUT THROUGH SALT I WITH THE ABM TREATY, DOES THAT ONLY MAKE SENSE IN A BI-POLAR SUPER POWER WORLD. HOW ARE WE TO DEFEND OURSELVES AGAINST THIRD PARTY ATTACKS DUE TO PROLIFERATION OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS?

Well...Obviously the most important thing to get control of is the existing situation where we and the Soviets in effect, are mutual threats. There are the British and French and Chinese forces, but they are secondary. I don't think we should say let us not have an agreement with the Soviets to keep our defenses down. To permit us to have defenses against a possible third, fourth or fifth country, ten, twenty, thirty years from now. I think that the only use for anti-ballistic missiles is to defend against ballistic missile attack. None of the candidates for proliferation now offer any ballistic missile threat for decades. And I think that the idea that we should have large-scale defenses because Libya one day might fire one missile at us or two, is nonsense. I think long before they were in a position to deliver ballistic missiles, we would find other ways to prevent that from happening.

TELL US A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE SOVIET CONCERN FOR CHINA THAT THEY MADE EVIDENT AT THE TALKS.

Well the Soviets uh, proposed something called uh, an agreement about uh... The Soviets made quite a point of uh, pushing for an agreement to control what they called the risk of provocative attack. And I think they had in mind that in future, another country might lob a missile into either the United States or the Soviet Union and we wouldn't know what the origin of that attack was. And we might then attack the other super power. I thought that that made a little bit of sense, but uh, since it was so clearly addressed in the Soviet mind to China and since the United States was then negotiating with China about diplomatic relations, our administration had no interest in pursuing that. Subsequently they have moved a little further on that with uh, an agreement about accidental measures. But it still... it's still a bit of a problem.

DID THE SOVIETS EVER PROPOSE TO THE AMERICAN SIDE THAT WE HELP THEM IN A PREEMPTIVE STRIKE AGAINST THE CHINESE NUCLEAR INSTALLATIONS?

As far as I know, they never did. I've heard that they had plans at one point to take out, Lop Nor, whatever the name of the So... Chinese site is but as far as I know, there was never any suggestion that we join them in that sort of mad adventure.

WHAT YOUR SENSE WAS THAT CHINA WAS SOME KIND OF A CONSTANT PRESENCE AT THE TALKS.

It was perfectly clear to me that the Chinese worried the Soviets. Yes. Now whether the worry was more from a conventional attack point of view or future nuclear attack, they were thinking about them.

THERE'S A CYNICAL POINT OF VIEW THAT SAYS THAT THE SALT ACHIEVED A BAN ON A WEAPONS SYSTEM THAT NEITHER SIDE REALLY WANTED THE ABM BECAUSE IT WASN'T COST EFFECTIVE AND IT WASN'T EVEN TECHNICALLY EFFECTIVE AT THAT POINT IN THE CONSIDERATION OF MANY SCIENTISTS. ON THE OTHER HAND THE SALT AGREEMENTS ALLOWED A VERY EFFECTIVE SYSTEM TO GO ON, A MIRV SYSTEM AND ALLOWED EACH SIDE TO ESSENTIALLY BUILD THE OFFENSIVE WEAPONS THEY WANTED TO BUILD ANYWAY. CAN YOU COMMENT?

I know the argument that uh, the ABM treaty merely limited weapons that neither side wanted. I think that overlooks the, what I call, a qualitative limitations as well as the quantitative limitations. If the ABMs vintage 1969 were not cost effective, that said nothing about what the 1979 vintage would be or 1989 and we felt that in the ABM Treaty we got a good stranglehold on future types of systems as well as the then current systems. So that I don't think the argument holds up when you look at the qualitative problem.

AND WHAT ABOUT THE OFFENSIVE AGREEMENT?

Well the offensive agreement which was, The offensive agreement was not a treaty. It was a stopgap. It was an interim arrangement to try to hold the situation while a negotiation could continue to match with an offensive treaty, the defensive treaty that we'd reached in '72. So that it was an imperfect instrument. As I said, it did have the effect of limiting the number of launchers for offensive weapons. It didn't do much about the number of warheads.

IS IT TRUE THAT THE AMERICAN DELEGATION IS THE ONE THAT ACTUALLY PRESSURED THE SOVIET SIDE TO AGREE TO BANNING ALL FUTURE EXOTIC TYPES OF ABM TECHNOLOGIES AND ALL SPACE BASED TECHNOLOGIES?

Yes. We thought it was important we felt to get a control on future ABM systems. We called them exotic systems or systems using technology or uh, devices not then in existence. The Soviets took the position you cannot control things that don't exist. And we said well, often not often but in a number of agreements we had done just that. For instance, weapons of mass destruction... in the Seabed Treaty. Outer Space Treaty. And there was no reason why, if you wanted to you couldn't control weapons that had not been developed. And that's why we included Article V in the ABM Treaty which flatly bans the, even the development of mobile systems or space based systems or sea based systems.

MAYBE YOU COULD JUST SAY CONCISELY THAT THE US DELEGATION PUT FORWARD AN URGED BAN ON THE FUTURE TECHNOLOGY SUCH AS PARTICLE BEAM AND LASER TECHNOLOGY.

The uh, American delegation consistently pushed for controls, bans in effect, on future technology for ABM systems. And the Soviets originally resisted that but in the ...final part of the negotiation, they did agree with our position.

IS THERE ANYTHING THAT COMES TO MIND TO HELP ILLUSTRATE THE TROUBLES WITH COMMUNICATION BETWEEN THE TWO DELEGATIONS, ESPECIALLY AT THE BEGINNING OF THE TALKS THAT HELPS OUR VIEWERS TO UNDERSTAND HOW THE US AND THE SOVIETS REALLY DID DIFFER IN THEIR OUTLOOK IN THEIR WAYS OF LOOKING AT THE WORLD AND THEIR WAYS OF THINKING ABOUT THESE PROBLEMS.

I think that uh, the American side had a clearer view of what it wanted to do than the Soviet side. I think the Soviet delegation was less sure of where it wanted to go in SALT I than the American side. I think that the American delegates had uh, been involved for years in thinking about strategic arms and their controls and that didn't seem to be the case certainly with the Soviet civilians. So that uh, I felt that was one of the main differences at the start. I think that we were impressed how quickly the Soviets uh, seemed to catch a hold of the concepts we were working with and I think for the most part agree with them.

WHAT ABOUT CULTURAL DIFFERENCES IN THE NEGOTIATIONS? WERE THERE STUMBLING BLOCKS BASED ON JUST DIFFERENT OUTLOOKS, DIFFERENT HISTORIES? DIFFERENT WAYS OF THINKING ABOUT NEGOTIATION?

As far as cultural differences leading to different notions of negotiation. As I mentioned, this was not a negotiation we usually think of the word. Uh. There wasn't uh, give and take across the table. It was largely a question of exposition of both sides formal governmental positions, And then gradually uh, evolving those positions with the approval of governments at home. So that I can't think of the fact that cultural differences, which are great, there's no doubt about it, had much affect on the negotiating technique itself.

...In general there are two points of view about arms control and uh, I think I can speak this way because I've taken both points of view over the years. In the beginning when I first got involved, I felt nothing was more important than building up our strategic forces. And then as I saw the process develop that we were not getting more security for more forces, I became more interested in how you control things and avoided unnecessary efforts, expenditure and whisk. Uh. There are people who have not reached that point of view who think that you cannot do business with the Soviets. They are not trustworthy and our best hope lies in an open competition where our presumed technological superiority will win out. On the other hand, there are people who think that uh, nuclear weapons are so terrible, we ought to try to abolish them just as quickly as possible and hang the cost. That anything uh, would be less dangerous than the present situation. I think I am somewhat in the center between those two points of view. I'm for modernization of our strategic forces, but at the same time, I'm still hopeful that we can gradually reduce them and eventually eliminate them over a long period of time, okay?