OK. WE'RE IN 1969 AND WE'D LIKE TO KNOW WHAT YOUR AND THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL'S CHARGE CHIEF TASK WAS AT THE BEGINNING OF THE NIXON ADMINISTRATION.

Well, there were a number of chief tasks. A lot of them had the common theme of enabling the President to develop his own positions and his own points of view on major national security and foreign policy issues. And to give him a basis for doing that. So that we undertook to review major areas of American foreign and military policy for the new President, and provide a basis for him to make some of his earliest decisions. Obviously the war was a, an important issue and perhaps the first effort was to gather a factual picture of the situation at Vietnam but we also very shortly undertook to review the entire United States military posture, a strategic military posture and eventually came around to trying to review most of the important areas of foreign and military policy that he would be active in.

SHOULD WE REDO THAT? WHAT WAS THE MAJOR TASK BEFORE THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL AT THE BEGINNING OF THE NIXON ADMINISTRATION?

I think the major task was to prepare the President to make decisions in areas such as the war and how to...

START AGAIN AND SAY, "IN THIS NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL..."

Oh. OK.

VIETNAM WAR ALSO.

OK. All right. Strigger, cue me again.

WHAT WERE THE PRIMARY CONCERNS FACING THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL STAFF AT BEING IN THE NIXON ADMINISTRATION?

I think the National Security Staff was under the mandate to prepare the President for decisions he would need to make early in his administration on such critical subjects as the Vietnam War, the United States defense budget and the, in general, the United States budget in general, the United States policy towards the Soviet Union and in particular towards strategic arms limitation talks, towards relationships with the United States' allies and a whole host of other issues.

OK. WHAT WAS THE MAJOR PREOCCUPATION?

I suppose the war was a major preoccupation. It would have to have been given events of the preceding years. And given Nixon's, the President's determination to — and his promise to develop a strategy for ending the war. So that was a major preoccupation. But not the only one. The President had a very wide ranging view of foreign policy and a very substantial experience and points of view about our role in the world, and our — the importance of American power, the importance of American policies towards the Soviet Union and China and our relationships with our allies, so that urn... I can't remember what the question was now.

THEN LET'S STOP FOR A SECOND.

Yeah.

THIS QUESTION ABOUT THE APPROACH OF NIXON AND KISSINGER TO STRUCTURING THE FOREIGN POLICY PROGRAM, THAN PREVIOUS ADMINISTRATION.

What was different in their approach?

UM HM.

Both the President and Kissinger were far more inclined toward a systematic process for producing foreign policy decisions than, than prior presidents. President Johnson had operated in a much ad hoc fashion than I think President Nixon would've, would have been comfortable with. And he and Kissinger immediately, indeed on the first day of the new administration organized the National Security Council staff in order to enable them to control the processes of preparing the President for foreign policy decisions. He wanted a structured approach. He wanted to consider a wide range of options. He wanted... access to facts and to analysis of those facts. And he wanted it in a much more systematic way than I think had been true of either Johnson or Kennedy.

CAN WE TALK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE DESIRE ON THE PART OF THE PRESIDENT AND DR. KISSINGER TO SORT OF CONSOLIDATE DECISION MAKING OUT OF THE BUREAUCRACY AND IN THE WHITE HOUSE. CAN YOU DESCRIBE THAT?

I don't recall hearing Dr. Kissinger ever talk explicitly about consolidating power in the White House. What he spoke of was the importance of the President's being able to exercise intelligent direction of foreign policy and he was convinced that the only way that would — was possible, was for there to be a major, an important capability in the White House, and it in the really, in the National Security Council staff to compel the bureaucracy to address certain questions of interest to the President and to produce the kinds of information that the President would find useful instead of being left to their own devices and to their own ways of addressing issues.

OK. NOW, LET'S MOVE ON TO THIS REVIEW. COULD YOU TALK ABOUT, I MEAN EARLY IN THE PACKARD REVIEW WAS COMMISSIONED OF ALL OF THE STRATEGIC POSTURE OF THE UNITED STATES AT THAT TIME. YOU WERE INVOLVED IN IT. CAN WE TALK ABOUT WHAT THE PURPOSE OF THE REVIEW WAS AND WHAT THE FINDINGS WERE?

Dr. Kissinger made it clear in his in his memoirs that urn, he and the President both felt that enormous changes had taken place in, in preceding years in America's strategic position and in America's interests abroad as well as in military weapons system technology, and they felt that it was timely for them to engage in a fundamental look at America's military commitments and interests abroad and in the kinds of forces and military capabilities that would be appropriate to those interests, rather than simply carrying forward positions and weapons systems and strategic assumptions from the past without examining them. So the purpose of this review was to take that fundamental look at the American military posture and its rationale.

NOW CAN YOU DESCRIBE... CAN WE ASK THAT? I WONDER IF YOU COULD GIVE A SHORTER ANSWER THAT BASICALLY SAYS, "BECAUSE THAT NIXON AND KISSINGER REALLY WANTED TO CREATE A FRAMEWORK TO REALLY GRAPPLE WITH THE NEW SITUATION IN THE DECISIONS THEY HAD TO MAKE THAT THEY — PACKARD MADE THIS REPORT TO STUDY OUR STRATEGIC POSTURE."

OK. I thought I said that. Ask me... What question do you want me to ask? Do you want me to answer? Don't tell me to shorten my answers because that's hard for me to do. Tell me what, tell me what you want.

I THOUGHT HIS LAST SENTENCE DID SAY IT CLEAR. NOW WHAT WE WANT TO ASK YOU IS, AND THIS IS PROBABLY A DIFFERENT, WHAT WERE THE RESULTS OF THAT STUDY THAT YOU PARTICIPATED IN? MAYBE YOU COULD SAY, "I PARTICIPATED IN THE STUDY AND WE FOUND..."

I was the National Security Council staff representative on this study effort. The results were quite gratifying. The President issued a National Security decision memorandum that established a set of new criteria for use in American force planning. Indeed, we felt it was the first time that a President had been so clear about the assumptions that he wanted his agencies to follow in developing their budgets and their forces. These new assumptions did represent a departure from those that were implicit in the planning of previous administrations and seemed to all of us to be much more consistent with the budgetary and technological and foreign policy realities of the of the seventies.

CAN YOU OUTLINE BRIEFLY THE MAJOR ASSUMPTIONS AND HOW THEY WERE DIFFERENT?

Absolutely not, but let's see... Perhaps the most important new assumption, of the new assumptions was the abandonment of what had become known as the two and one half war strategy. That was a strategy that had been followed by the previous president and his defense secretaries that said that the United States should be prepared to fight two major wars and a minor war simultaneously. President Nixon decided that that was unrealistically ambitious, that we couldn't afford the forces that would enable us to engage in such combat, and accordingly, he adopted what he believed and we all believe was a more realistic goal for American military forces, a goal that stressed the possibility of a major war, either in Asia or in Europe plus perhaps another contingency, but not fighting two major wars simultaneously.

OK. WHAT ABOUT OUR STRATEGIC POSTURE, NUCLEAR WEAPONS? WHAT ABOUT THE ISSUES OF WERE WE GOING TO GO ALL OUT AND TRY TO MAINTAIN SUPERIORITY OR WERE WE ACCEPTING OUR SITUATION OF PARITY WITH THE SOVIET UNION?

The, the President's view on US strategic needs was I think enunciated quite early... when he began the, using the term, "strategic sufficiency". By that he meant implicitly that we would not pursue the goal of superiority in every category of weapons vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, but rather we would maintain the forces and the ability to use those forces that would be quote, "sufficient" for the kinds of military threats that we could realistically foresee. He regarded that as a more realistic goal and one that would indicate that we weren't simply engaged in a an arms race with the Soviet Union, to outdo them in every area of weaponry.

WHAT DID SUFFICIENCY MEAN?

Sufficiency never had a, an exact meaning. And it was up to those of us involved in force planning and in war planning to decide what that meaning meant. It meant a combination of being able to deter the principal threats to American security, both strategic and non-nuclear, both nuclear and non-nuclear threats, as well as the ability to engage effectively in, in war and in the use of our forces when the need arose. And the tests, then of sufficiency meant, "Can we do what we need to do? Can we engage and can we engage in a way that protect our interests in those kinds of threats that we regard as foresee — we regarded as the most likely.

WHAT WAS KISSINGER'S ROLE IN POLICY MAKING?

I'm sorry. No. It's a general question. Henry Kissinger, almost from the outset played an important role in formulating let me, let me start this again, cause that's such a broad question. Henry Kissinger right from the outset became an important adviser to the President. And the organizer of the processes that would inform the President and enable the President to make major foreign policy decisions. I believe that was foreordained when the President chose Dr. Kissinger for that role. I think it's a role that, that that Kissinger quite naturally regarded as important and the more he became familiar with the issues facing the President and with the capabilities within the United States government, the more he became comfortable with playing an active role and in building a capability in the NSC staff to help the President direct the government.

OK. CAN YOU TELL US WHAT THE MOTIVATIONS FROM THE INSIDE FROM BEING PART OF THOSE DISCUSSIONS — WHAT WAS THE MOTIVATION TO CHANGE THE ABM PROPOSAL BEFORE CONGRESS FROM THE SENTINEL PROGRAM TO THE SAFEGUARD PROGRAM?

Well it was fairly clear to the President, indeed, to everyone that the Congress was uninterested, unwilling — was likely to, to be unwilling to endorse the previous Presi... the previous program, the sentinel program. There was certainly great reluctance to endorse a major protection of American population against a nuclear attack. And that, that object, those objections from Congress, indeed from many segments of the public had a lot of different motivations. Part of it was the expense that they thought would be involved. Part of it was controversy over whether such a policy was needed. Part of w... had to do with very local considerations. Do we all Do I want an ABM radar in my district? Um. But I think there was general skepticism in the legislature about the wisdom of the sentinel program and the President realistically understood that he needed to develop his own ABM position and in all likelihood a posi... make it a position that would be more palatable to the Congress. So I think what motivated his, his decision was a desire to continue with ABM deployment but to do it in a way that would win support on Capital Hill.

NOW, THERE'S A MAJOR SHIFT IN THE ABM PROGRAM FROM BEING AN AREA DEFENSE TO HAVING IN FOCUS MUCH MORE ON DEFENSIVE MISSILE SIGHTS. DID THIS SIGNIFY A SHIFT AWAY OR BACK TO A REALIZATION THAT MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION WAS A CONDITION THAT WE HAD TO LIVE WITH?

I'm sorry.

IN SHIFTING FAR AWAY FROM A POPULATION DEFENSE, THE IDEA TOWARD A DEFENSE OF OUR DETERRENT, OUR LAND BASED MISSILE DETERRENT. WAS THAT ESSENTIALLY AN ACCEPTANCE OF THE FACT THAT WE LIVED IN AN AGE IN WHICH MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION WAS THE CONDITION THAT WE HAD TO DEAL WITH?

I wouldn't say that. I wouldn't say that the new policy was designed to reinforce the concept of mutual assured destruction. In fact, probably the contrary was the case.

WE HAD TO PROTECT OUR POPULATION SO WE CAN HAVE A, BY IF YOU'RE DEFENDING YOUR MISSILES, YOU'RE JUST DEFENDING THAT FACT —

You're defending your capability. It's also defending your, you know, you're defending your ability to, to use, to use your forces in any of a variety of different kinds of contingencies as well.

RIGHT.

Which is where they were really heading.

RIGHT.

They were heading away from use. Well we can talk about this...

THE QUESTION IS WHETHER NIXON WAS SHIFTING OUR STRATEGIC EMPHASIS IN OUR, OF THE USE OF WHAT OUR NUCLEAR FORCES WERE FOR AND SHIFTING AT THE SAME TIME.

I think the answer's probably there was there it was a more, it was a change designed more to give him more political credibility and prepare for SALT than it was...any any doctrinal considerations.

IT'S NOT USABLE. I'M SORRY. COULD YOU JUST START BY SAYING "THE CHANGE FROM SENTINEL TO SAFEGUARD..."

Ok. I understand what you're saying. I'm trying to remember to do that. Shall I start again?

YES.

Ok. The change...

CAN YOU MAKE IT A DIFFERENT SENTENCE?

Sh... What? Who's talking?

YOU ARE. GO AHEAD.

The change from sentinel to safeguard probably was motivated by a desire to position the President for future decisions in the strategic policy area, rather than being very tightly associated with a change in doctrine. I think the new administration was skeptical of a... mutual assured destruction rationale for our nuclear posture and ultimately want, wanted to enlarge the premises on which our strate...

WE'RE TALKING ABOUT THE MOTIVATION IN SWITCHING FROM SENTINEL TO SAFEGUARD.

In switching from sentinel to safeguard, the President certainly had to be mindful of attitudes in Congress and of their opposition to mouth features of sentinel. And for those reasons, he was bound to adjust his own position to try to make it more palatable to the Congress. Two, I think he had in mind the desire to put himself in a better position for subsequent decisions on such matters as strategic arms talks and on other weapon system decisions. I don't think the sentinel safeguard shift in and of itself signaled a major doctrinal shift in, in the new administration. I think that was to come later after further review.

ALL RIGHT. MAYBE YOU CAN HONE IN ON THIS QUESTION. WE ASKED KISSINGER WHAT HIS FEELING WAS ABOUT MUTUAL ASSURED DESTRUCTION, HE SAID THAT THE ADMINISTRATION HAD NEVER ASCRIBED TO MUTUAL ASSURED DESTRUCTION, AND YET, DAVID PACKARD SAID TO US, "WE REALIZED THAT MUTUAL ASSURED DESTRUCTION WAS UNAVOIDABLE. THAT WAS THE CONDITION WE WERE IN. IT WAS INESCAPABLE." HOW CAN THEY — EXPLAIN THAT CONTRADICTION.

Ok. I think in trying to understand the concept of mutual assured destruction, it's important to understand its original use. It came into use by in the defense department and an effort to try to define a limit to the buildup of American strategic forces. In ah, an effort to answer the question, "How much is enough?" And the concept of mutual assured destruction was easily quantified and lent itself to establishing limits on the American strategic force buildup. The concept by itself was not adequate however, to describe American strategic policy. And it was, the new the new administration I think understood that and therefore from the outset there was an expectation that a different concept of American strategic doctrine would emerge. But it, the concept of mutual assured destruction had become so deeply engrained in public understanding of nuclear forces in the way Congress understood nuclear forces, and in the way planning was done in the Pentagon, that would have been impossible to entirely eliminate it as one criterion for thinking about the adequacy of US forces. But I think what Kissinger and others were determined to do, were to introduce additional criteria for thinking about US nuclear forces. And indeed, the concept of sufficiency was designed to suggest that those criteria needed to be broadened.

OK. WHAT WOULD THAT BE OTHER THAN, INSTEAD OF JUST DETERRING WAR, WE'RE GOING TO SHIELD THE POP, WAS ABM, WAS THE PRESIDENT'S DESIRE FOR AN ABM PROGRAM SAYING, "LOOK, WE'RE GOING TO SHIELD THE POPULATION AND IN THAT WAY WE CAN ACTUALLY GET AROUND OUR SIDE OF THE MUTUAL ASSURED DESTRUCTION EQUATION"?

Well, I think the original... The reason for the President's endorsement of a thin area defense I think had a lot to do with simply raising the cost of launching a nuclear attack on the United States. And indeed eliminating the possibility of small threats, and raising the cost, as I say, of maintaining the forces for foreign attack. I think beyond that, I think the President was looking towards the possibility of making our United States retaliatory forces more secure by defending missile fields. Again refresh me with where I ought to be going.

CAN YOU RESTATE THAT?

I think that one of the reasons for endorsing a thin area defense of American population is to raise the cost to the Soviet Union, and the difficulty facing the Soviet Union of mounting an offensive attack, a first strike, on the United States. There is a question of whether it's worth it to, to buy an ABM defense for that reason, but nonetheless it is a, a plausible rationale for a thin area defense, and was plausible to the President. I think in addition to that, he felt that it would be useful to increase the amount of defense of America's retaliatory missile forces, land-based missile forces... Additionally, the... safeguard system offered some limited additional protection of United States land-based missile forces. That too would be a way of preserving America's retaliatory capability, and that was regarded as, as a useful thing to do.

YOU'RE SAYING THAT THE SAFEGUARD WAS REGARDED AS DESTABILIZING

There, there's, there is merit in the argument that some ABM deployment would appear destabilizing; I think it was... the decision of, of both President Johnson... and President Nixon to indicate quite clearly, not only in what they said, but in the way we deployed our forces, that we were not building a first-strike defense capability. We were not building a destabilizing ABM, that we were building one that was only could only be used for, for defensive purposes.

MAYBE YOU COULD EXPLAIN, GIVEN ALL THE COST-EFFECTIVENESS ARGUMENTS, DESTABILIZING ARGUMENTS, MADE AGAINST ABM, WHY WAS IT SO IMPORTANT TO THE NIXON ADMINISTRATION TO PUSH THAT DEPLOYMENT, WHEN THERE WERE OTHER OPTIONS THEY COULD HAVE CHOSEN?

I think the ABM deployment, and possibly also the continuation of, of MIRV deployment, was important to the President because... he didn't want to begin his administration, and to begin his own relationship with the Soviet Union from a position... which he would have regarded at which he had virtually nothing in the way of strong initiatives to support his policies. He was facing a determination in Congress to reduce the defense budget; we had no we had... very few important weapons-system developments underway; in contrast, the Soviet Union appeared to be engaging in a rather rapi-, rapid buildup of its forces, of their forces, and I think he did not want to be left without any weapons systems developments that would provide an incentives for the Soviet Union to talk seriously to him about arms control, or about modifying their own position, so I think I think that issue was important to him symbolically, and important to him politically. He needed, he needed to have some momentum of American military of, of improving American military strength in, in developing his policies towards, towards the Soviet Union.

WHAT WERE THE FACTORS THAT MADE CONGRESS DO A FLIP-FLOP ON THE ABM ISSUE?

Yeah... I, I don't know what all of those factors might, might be; I think that certainly the President, President Nixon, faced much more opposition in Congress to weapons systems of all kinds; the... and, I think a lot of that had to do with a general war-weariness and a general skepticism, on the part of the public and on the part of Congress as well concerning the defense department's claims on the budget, and concerning the inability to control those claims. Moods in the country, and moods in Congress change, and Nixon faced a change in mood that affected his... what he could do in ways that limited what he could do. And, what I can't answer is, is whether or not there was any important personnel shifts and... committee chairmanships and whatnot...

WHAT IS IT THAT BROUGHT NIXON TO SAY THAT HE WANTED AN ERA OF NEGOTIATION ANYWAY?

Oh... President Nixon, perhaps more than, than any — President Nixon was acutely conscious of his historic role as President of the United States; perhaps no one came in, has come into the office in recent decades with a greater sense of the historic role of the President; and given his extraordinary lifetime interest in foreign policy, perhaps no President came into office... with a larger concept of what the United States should do and should try to accomplish on in the world. And for those reasons, I think and, and because I think he... given his sense of a historic role, would, was, was eager to become a president to make historic accomplishments in progress towards world peace and towards stability; I think it was natural for him to articulate these larger strategic aims. Even though it seemed out of character from how he might have acted as a Congressman or even as a candidate he readily took to the challenges of the office itself, and never mistook being a can-, may, be... being a President for being a candidate for the office.

WHAT WAS OUR MOTIVATION TO APPROACH SALT NEGOTIATIONS IN 1969?

Oh, I think that in part it was, there was momentum carrying over from the previous administration; there has been a, a near-miss in establishing SALT talks. I think the prospect of serious discussions with the Soviet Union on strategic arms was the kind of issue that the President saw as one that would offer him opportunities for leadership. I think he and Kissinger both had a high degree of, of realism about the prospects for those talks; I don't think they had any exaggerated optimism, but I think they saw... a historic opportunity, provided that they were able to prepare for it carefully, and provided that they were able to establish that the conditions were such that such talks might be useful.

I'VE SEEN IT SAID THAT NEITHER KISSINGER NOR NIXON PUT A LOT OF STOCK IN ARMS CONTROL... CAN YOU EXPLAIN THAT?

I... think that neither the president nor Dr. Kissinger saw arms control as some kind of a panacea. There was still there were still many in the Congress, for example, who somehow imagined that we would accomplish miraculous savings in defense budgets if we could have an arms-control agreement. I think there were others who believed that the Soviets wanted arms control... we were the obstacles, and that if we would only be forthcoming surely arms control would follow. I think that the President and Kissinger rejected the, what they regarded as those naive hopes about arms control. They were much more realistic about the prospects for meaningful arms control, realized that, that it, it was not likely that good agreements would result, and that if they did result, it would only come after long and difficult negotiations, and I think they also realized that arms control would not bring miraculous savings, or solve all of the, would not be end all tensions between the United States and and the Soviet Union and its allies. So they saw arms control as one element of a foreign policy, but not an entire foreign policy, and for that reason, many saw them as less than enthusiastic about arms control, but I think the real explanation is, they saw it in a wider context, and against a background quite, quite different background than some of their critics.

WHAT DID THEY ASSUME WAS THE SOVIET MOTIVATION FOR WANTING TO ENTER INTO SALT NEGOTIATIONS?

I don't know that they... I think their view was doubtless reflected the belief that... the... Soviet Union could see arms talks as leading to, at outcomes that would be advantageous to them. Perhaps because we would agree to certain limits because we would be willing to negotiate away certain of the capabilities of our allies because we would be willing to put certain kind of controls on technologies that perhaps were threatening to them. I think that what the President and Kissinger were willing to do was to test Soviet interests in the possibilities of of... gains to their own position through arms-control talks. I think that that Kissinger and, and Nixon both felt, however, that the Soviet Union was benefiting from their own ability to proceed with their strategic buildup in the face of a very great reluctance on the part of the United States to, to build up its forces strategic forces, considerably. And so, I think they realized that it was not clear that we would get any kind of arms control agreement given, given the Soviet gains from, from the status quo.

THERE IS ALSO THIS THINKING THAT MAYBE THE SOVIETS WANTED TO NEGOTIATE THIS MORE THAN WE DID. AND THEREFORE MAYBE WE COULD EXTRACT...GET SOME HELP FROM THEM IN RESOLVING THE VIETNAM WAR AND MIDDLE EAST CRISIS?

I'm not an expert on that. If there was, it would have had to have been based on some assessment of internal strains within the Soviet Union, and their own, problems with their own economy, and problems within their own bureaucracy. I'm just, I just can't remember enough about that to say very much, I'm afraid.

LET'S TALK ABOUT MEETINGS... YOU WERE CHAIRMAN OF THE WORKING GROUP FOR THE VERIFICATION PANEL... KISSINGER HAD CALLED TOGETHER REPRESENTATIVES OF THE GROUPS... WHAT WERE SOME OF THE CONCERNS AND DIVISIVE POINTS?

The initial concern of the departments, or the thing that was... the issue that was so divisive was whether or not the United States could adequately verify different provisions of an arms-control, potential arms-control agreement. That was why it was called a verification panel. St one of the National Security Council meetings a completely divergent views emerged on the part of the President's advisers, with the CIA and the... Arms Control and Disarmament Agency claiming that the United States could verify any potential agreements, and with General Wheeler of the Joint Chiefs of Staff flatly disputing that claim. It would be difficult for any president to deal with that kind of a, of a division of opinion within, among his advisers. The solution ended up being to create a working group, a panel, to study carefully and dispassionately US verification capabilities. So that was, that was the principal initial issue, and indeed it was a divisive issue. Various agencies that were part of that verification panel, had very different attitudes towards US veri-, verification capabilities and it was up to me as chairman of the working group, and others of us on that working group, to try to in effect get to the bottom of the issue, and assess different departmental positions, and see what the truth was.

WHAT DID YOU FIND?

I think we reached important conclusions, and we did so by analyzing US verification capabilities under two different assumptions. One, under the assumption that the Soviet Union did not in any way attempt to cheat on the arms-control agreement, or to conceal illegal activity from us. And the other assumption... We reached important conclusions about US verification capabilities by analyzing them under two different assumptions. The first assumption, that the Soviet Union would not cheat on an arms-control agreement, and would not try to conceal illegal developments from us, and the second assumption, that the Soviet Union would employ every means that we believed available to them, to conceal cheating from us. What we discovered was that in the absence of Soviet efforts to cheat, the United States had substantial capability through its intelligence collection systems to verify the provisions of arms-control agreements, but that if the Soviet Union did cheat... they could conceal a substantial amount of important activity from us. And what that made clear was that those who had initially said, "We can verify arms-control agreements," were really saying "The Soviet Union won't cheat," and those who were saying, "We can't verify agreements," were saying, "We believe the Soviet Union will cheat." What we then faced was a much more difficult question, What can we, or what should any president assume about Soviet behavior under an arms control agreement. But... at least we were able to progress beyond the stage of arguing over whether we could or could not verify.

YOU COULD VERIFY BECAUSE YOU HAD NATIONAL TECHNICAL NEEDS, RIGHT?

Yes. Well... um, let me restate the conclusion, that if the Soviet Union did not attempt to cheat, we, that we possessed... US, we possessed the technical capability, without on-site inspection, to verify most provisions of a of a potential arms-control agreement. However, if... the Soviet Union did cheat on an agreement, that our national technical means would be inadequate to detect a great many activities that they might be undertaking and concealing from us.

WHAT WAS THE EFFECT OF THE ABM DEBATE IN CONGRESS, AND THE MIRV DEBATE, ON THE STRUCTURING OF THE PROPOSALS FOR SALT? DID IT MAKE YOU WANT TO HURRY UP... ?

Well, I think there were twin, I think there were competing pressures on the President. One was the pressure perhaps arising from his own convictions in the matter, that he didn't want for the administration to rush into talks without being prepared, and to appear to be overeager for those talks. The other, of course, was the pressure to get on with it, because Congress expected it, because a certain amount of momentum had built up behind the possibility of talks, and because there were a substantial number of advocates within the administration for going ahead, including the secretary of state. So, I think the President therefore had to reconcile these conflicting pressures, and did so by the, the time he finally did chose... choose, for announcing that he was prepared to move ahead.

WHY WAS IT THAT THE PROPOSAL THAT WAS FIRST MADE ON ABM AT SALT WAS THE NATIONAL COMMAND AUTHORITY PROPOSAL, WHEN NIXON HAD GONE THROUGH THIS BIG PROCESS OF CONVINCING CONGRESS THAT WE WANTED TO MOVE TOWARD MISSILE DEFENSE? WHY WAS IT SETTLED ON THAT WE WOULD PROPOSE TO THE SOVIETS ONE NATIONAL COMMAND AUTHORITY SITE EACH — WASHINGTON AND MOSCOW?

Yeah, I read that stuff that you just gave me. Uh, I'm trying to... resurrect... a sense of that. Let me... there is... I have one general kind of answer to that. The reason... that the... option to limit ABM to simply a defense of the national command authority was in-eluded, even though it appeared inconsistent with our position as... presented to Congress, is in part because... the two processes, one advocating our budget before the Congress, and two, developing arms-control proposals for presentation to the Soviet Union were not entirely related. Inevitably, processes the, the... such, as complicated as those two processes move in part on separate tracks and according to their own internal logic. Indeed the...one, the best I can say is, You had to have been there. In part, to understand the way the peculiar logic of the evolution of positions develops.

IF WE PROPOSED NCA ON EACH SIDE, THEN WE'RE SAYING TO THE SOVIETS, OKAY, YOU'VE GOT IT ALREADY, WE'LL ACCEPT WHAT YOU'VE GOT, AND WE'RE TELLING THE CONGRESS TO PROTECT MISSILES AND WE'LL SAY, WELL, WE'RE GOING TO CHANGE OUR TUNE WITH CONGRESS, WE'RE GOING TO SAY SOMETHING AL TOGETHER DIFFERENT

Well, it's as... in a sense... in effect it says to Congress to the extent that they understand what we're doing to propose NCA and, in arms control, and to propose something more ambitious, to the Congress is in effect saying to the Congress "We're certainly prepared to give up this more ambitious ABM," "We're, we're ready to give it up if the Soviets... make agreements with us, and we presumably will be willing to give it up with you." So it undercuts the, the, the arms control position undercut our position, in effect served to undercut our position with the Congress.

BUT WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR COMING UP WITH THAT NCA PROPOSAL?

Oh, you know, I can't remember. I honestly....

WAS KISSINGER ULTIMATELY RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT WAS... ?

Kissinger... I think it's fair to say that Dr. Kissinger,, had primary responsibility for the options finally considered by the President, but as he himself has said he had to be mindful of the various positions being advocated by... other members of the administration, in per... in formulating those proposals. He was not a free agent; it would have undercut his position as an impartial adviser to the president, if he hadn't taken into account the positions within the administration. So he was probably the final designer of options, but, but, but he was not a free agent in designing those options; he was a member of the administration.

YOU PARTICIPATED IN A SERIES OF MEETINGS THAT DR. KISSINGER HELD WITH A GROUP OF INDEPENDENT SCIENTISTS WHO WERE ADVISING HIM ON STRATEGIC ISSUES. CAN YOU DESCRIBE KISSINGER'S ATTITUDE TOWARD THAT GROUP, AND WHAT HE GOT FROM IT?

The independent scientists that met with Kissinger... in a, in that series of meetings included a great many, if not all of them who were old associates of Kissinger: these were people that had been just talking to each other and debating these issues for many many years, and I believe in, in large part, Kissinger felt that, it was an important constituency, it was a group of old colleagues, and therefore it would be useful to carry on a set of discussions with them. I-

YOU WERE TALKING ABOUT KISSINGER'S ATTITUDE TOWARD THE GROUP.

On the other hand... I'm not certain that... Henry felt that these talks were of primary benefit to him or to the President. I think he regarded a great many of the participants in those talks as having well-established views and therefore it wasn't likely to be especially enlightening to hear those views discussed repeatedly again. On the other hand, as I said... he was interested in... making certain that he understood the positions of people on every side of the issue, and these were important people, who would be testifying later, who would be part of the debate on arms control, and therefore talking to them could be useful. And that's why he did it.

IS IT IMPORTANT FOR SOMEONE IN KISSINGER'S POSITION TO HAVE THESE KIND OF CONSULTATIONS, TO BE ABLE TO SAY, "YES, I CONSULTED WITH SO AND SO..."?

I... it often... Discussions with groups of experts like that often have a cynical motive: they enable the convener of the discussions to say, "Yes, I consulted with the experts." I think Kissinger had a, a more direct motive for engaging in those talks: he habitually attempted to understand the points of view of critics, because he felt he could learn something from, from that kind of understanding. He used to assign me to develop arguments against presidential positions, and to develop the best argument I could, against a presidential position, simply so that he would know in advance what that criticism would be like, and how it could be properly dealt with, and indeed, if some change in position were called for.

I READ THAT YOU HAD IN FACT DEVELOPED AN ARGUMENT FOR HIM AGAINST THE ABM, AND THAT IN THE COURSE OF DOING THAT YOU FOUND OUT THAT YOU WANTED THE ABM. CAN YOU DESCRIBE WHAT YOUR THINKING WAS?

During the course of the of developing the administration's position on the ABM... indeed, fairly late in that process, Kissinger asked me if I would try and prepare the strongest possible case against deployment of an anti-ballistic missile defense system, and in so, in developing that case, if I would do it on the basis of the arguments being made by all of the different experts and, and arms control experts and advocates that in, inside the government and outside. I started with a skepticism about that decision myself, and tried to do the best job I could of... discovering the strength of the opponent's argument, and writing it down in a clear and coherent and compelling fashion. In the course of doing that, I simply became convinced that the President had the better case, and came out of that exercise, not only, I think, with a... helpful view of the opponent's position, but with a better sense, on my part, of the rationale for the administration's position.

DO YOU REMEMBER WHAT THAT WAS?

Substantially the rationale... the, the rationale I ended up believing in was substantially the rationale that was in the President's March 14th announcement of his decision.

WHAT ABOUT THE ARGUMENTS THAT WERE PRESENTED ON THE MIRV ISSUE? AT THAT TIME WE WERE IN THE MIDDLE OF A SERIES OF TESTS, AND IT WAS CLEAR THAT TESTING WAS THE THING MOST ABLE TO BE VERIFIED ON MIRVING, THAT YOU COULDN'T SORT OF TEST TO SEE IF THE OTHER GUYS HAD ALREADY PRODUCED THEM. SO, WHY WASN'T THERE EVEN JUST A SLIGHT MORATORIUM MADE SO THERE WAS TIME TO DIGEST WHETHER IT WAS IN THE UNITED STATES' BENEFIT TO GO AHEAD WITH MIRVING?

The decision not to delay testing, not to...accept a moratorium on testing, reflected, as far as I can recall President Nixon and Dr. Kissinger's conviction that... unilateral actions by the United States in, in such matters, were unlikely to benefit the US position in the long run, that we would be simply conceding, an opportunity to the Soviet Union to continue to develop their own technology while we held up on the development of ours. I think they were more convinced that a better course for the United States was to proceed with our testing, and see if in talks the Soviet Union was prepared to to discuss a ban on nerve deploy- MIRV deployment. But that was a judgment call? it's a, it's a the kind of decision that reflects a s-, a set of values and a set of beliefs about, how the behavior of the Soviet Union is influenced by the be-, behavior of the United States, and the Presidents... simply believed that testing would not be in our interest. That, that a moratorium on testing would, would be in our interest. The president simply believed that a moratorium on testing would not be in our interest.

IT JUST SEEMS THAT WAITING FOR SIX MONTHS AND MAKING A MORATORIUM ON TESTING TO SEE WHETHER WITHIN A YEAR WE COULD HAVE AN AGREEMENT BANNING TESTING, PRODUCTION, DEPLOYMENT ON MIRVS WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN WORTH IT, WHEN WE LOOKED DOWN THE ROAD AND SAW MIRVING OF SS-9S WOULD BE TO OUR DISADVANTAGE.

'Cause you don't wait just six months. I think one of the problems, Okay. Some people argue that it would be a good move for the United States to delay for perhaps as short a time as six months to, and, and gi... use that time to explore a MIRV ban with the Soviet Union. I think the problem with that position is that a moratorium of six months would in all likelihood turn into a moratorium of eight months, or 12 months, or two years, that once the testing was stopped, there would be enormous pressures never to resume it again unless there was some overriding reason to do so and there-fore the, the notion that it was, would merely be a short-term moratorium was an argument that was not convincing or not persuasive to Kissinger or the President.

BUT WHAT WOULD BE THE PROBLEM IF A SHORT-TERM MORATORIUM BECAME A LONG-TERM MORATORIUM AND THEN AN AGREEMENT, IN THAT NEITHER SIDE WOULD PRODUCE MIRVS.

Because there, there wouldn't be, there would be no problem, perhaps, in a moratorium that led to an agreement to ban MIRVs, but you don't know, when you're sitting in that position, that a moratorium is in fact going to lead to such an agreement. You have no way of knowing... it's a gamble, and in the case of a MIRV ban, where there was considerable skepticism on the part of many, that the Soviet Union would ever agree to it, it looked like a bad gamble, and the President didn't want to make it.

One of the problems with thinking about moratoria or other similar types of moves is that it's tempting to think one step ahead, or maybe two steps ahead, and it's fairly easy to construct favorable scenarios one or two steps ahead. The difficulty is to try to think several steps ahead, and try to imagine all the different contingencies that could arise, and what would happen if you indeed encountered some of those different contingencies. If there's anything that's a hallmark of the way Kissinger tried to develop American foreign policy alternatives, it is that he was attempting to think several steps ahead, and attempting to anticipate the kinds of eventualities that could occur to anticipate the kinds of things that could... go wrong, to anticipate opposition, or stalemating, or stonewalling, or whatever during negotiations, and it was against that attempt to think many steps ahead that he and the President then tried to, to decide on what kind of a gamble to take. But often they were dealing with critics who would say, "Do it, and see what happens. Do it, and maybe they'll respond favorably." And I think the President and Kissinger were saying, "That's not an adequate basis on which to make such consequential decisions."

BUT THEN ON THE OTHER HAND YOU HAVE KISSINGER SAYING IN DECEMBER OF '74, THAT HE WISHED HE HAD THOUGHT THROUGH THE CONSEQUENCES OF A MIRV'ED WORLD MORE THOROUGHLY, AND YOU HAVE LOTS OF PEOPLE TELLING HIM, INCLUDING THE DOD, IN 1970, "LOOK, IF THEY'RE GOING TO MIRV, THEY'RE GOING TO MIRV SS-9S AND WE'RE GOING TO BE REALLY VULNERABLE, OUR LAND-BASED FORCE IS REALLY GOING TO BE VULNERABLE."

My conviction is that Henry Kissinger thought very carefully about the MIRV issues, in 1969 and 1970, and I don't know what the meaning of his subsequent statement that he... wished he'd thought more carefully about it could have been, but I know that he was thinking extremely carefully about it, at the time. Your, you can only do the, you can, your decisions have to be judged not on the basis of what happened in the world subsequently, but on the basis of whether you made intelligent use of the information available to you at the time, and whether you made an intelligent reaction to the uncertainties that existed. And I think, the, their decision can be defended on those grounds.

ANOTHER THING I WANT TO ASK YOU WAS, THERE SEEMS TO BE SOME SENSE THAT OUR GOING INTO SALT WAS A CLEVER WAY, AT A TIME WHEN CONGRESS WASN'T LETTING US EXPAND OUR DEFENSE CAPABILITIES, OF GETTING THE SOVIETS TO STOP THEIR OFFENSIVE PUSH, SO THAT WE COULD GET A BREATHER AND MAYBE CATCH UP. THE MOTIVATION WASN'T REALLY TO STOP THE ARMS RACE.

Well, when you ask what was the motivation for engaging in SALT talks, was it to stop the Soviet build up, or was it to lessen the risk of nuclear war, or was it to give us a chance to catch up or some other reason, I think the, the answer has to be that a, a good policy position is a position that lots of different people find attractive, and which has lots of different plausible motivation, motivations. I think the decision to engage in SALT talks, indeed the decision to, to reach an agreement, had several different kinds of motivations and it would be inaccurate, or really a mistake to say one or another of those motivations was the predominant one.

WHAT ABOUT THE CONFLICT BETWEEN THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE STATE DEPARTMENT AND ACTA, AND THE CIA, WHO SEEMED TO AGREE WITH A LOT OF THINGS, INCLUDING SLOWING DOWN MIRV PRODUCTION, AND THE DOD AND THE JOINT CHIEFS, ON THE OTHER HAND.

The, there were substantial conflicts of opinion and of view within the administration, right from the outset, and these device this divisiveness was bound to prove troublesome to a president, and... the distrust that underlay that divisiveness, I think, was found to prove troublesome. Now this may be a digression, but the problem... that confronted President Nixon was that somehow these warring, contending factions had managed to reach a consensus on an arms-control proposal in the Johnson Administration. And the only proposal they were willing to endorse at the early stages of the Nixon Administration was the same proposal, because once having shed blood over it, they didn't want to have to do it again. And the problem the President faced was trying to get those issues opened up again, and examined afresh. In attempting to do so, what he discovered was substantial distrust, substantial disagreement, and indeed a great deal of hostility between, for example, the military services the defense intelligence agency, and the defense, Department of Defense research and engineering on the one hand, and the Bureau of Intelligence and Research and CIA — at the State Department, and CIA, and the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency on the other. What Henry Kissinger saw as one of his roles was to try to cut through the distrust and understand what is the factual basis for these disagreements. Is there any way of bringing the parties closer together, is there any way of discovering real common ground, and can that help the president then in his formulation of arms-control proposals. That's why he formed the verification panel, to try and cut through the distrust, and to cut through the divisiveness, and see if he could establish a clearer sense in which parties did agree, and what the facts actually were, and therefore, in a more precise sense, in, in which, in, about where the disagreements lay. And I think in fact he did accomplish that.

MAYBE YOU CAN GIVE US AN EXAMPLE. HOW WOULD SOMEONE LIKE ADMIRAL MOORE, OR DAVID PACKARD, OR PAUL NITZE, VIEW SOMEONE LIKE JERRY SMITH, OR PHIL FARLEY...?

Well, it would probably be too simple-minded to say it was a kind of hawk-dove controversy, but there were elements of that type of difference in those, in the different factions that existed. I think that some of the contending parties in the administration... were optimistic about talks with the Soviet Union... were convinced that American military policy since World War II had provoked Soviet arms policies and the Soviet military buildup. And that a different American policy would produce different Soviet behavior. I think others, and, and these, these tended to be those associated with the Defense Department— simply didn't believe those things. They believed that the Soviet Union had aggressive has aggressive purposes does seek to dominate its neighbors does seek a position of strength with respect to the United States and its allies, and would only exploit American attempts to slow down its own arms buildup and to enga-, and would only exploit the opportunity for discussions to their own advantages. Those are simply two different world views, and at some level, they are not to be reconciled. The president simply has to decide what he himself believes, and what he... he believes is in the interests of his administration.

WHAT WAS THERE IN THE NATURE OF KISSINGER AND NIXON'S APPROACH TO POLICY MAKING THAT LED THEM TO WANT TO HAVE A BACK CHANNEL TO THE SOVIET UNION? MAYBE SOME OF YOUR OWN PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF WHAT THOSE MEETINGS WERE LIKE....

Hmmm... I, I've been looking at the piece you showed me — I, I... had failed to remember that they threw me out of the room at one point... at the critical point. One could look on the emergence of a back channel as evidence of how sincerely interested the President and Kissinger were in reaching some kind of an arms-control agreement. Um, it really should be judged in that context — what does it say about their determination to find a common ground with the Soviet Union? Uh, it's a mistake to look at it as a, as a, as undercutting the United States delegation when in fact statesmen are going to find whatever channel of communication with their adversaries is appropriate to accomplishing with they hoped to accomplish. And I think that's what was going on with the creation of that back channel. I think that the President... admittedly was not entirely confident in his delegation; um, I think was more confident that a direct communication would get his point across in a manner that was reflective of his thinking. And therefore probably sought sought those forms of direct communication. And I have a feeling that Soviet leadership viewed the matter in, in the same way. They know everything that we know about the conflicts that exist in the United States government, and about the different opinions and views that existed in the United States delegation; I suspect they had their own incentive to want to cut through, those the... those problems within the United States delegation and get directly to the people that influence the President, and to the President himself. If that leads to an arms-control agreement, you have to say that that's a, that's a desirable development.

IS THERE A SENSE THAT KISSINGER AND NIXON DIDN'T QUITE TRUST JERRY SMITH AND OTHER MEMBERS OF THE DELEGATION?

I wouldn't say... personally... that they didn't trust Jerry Smith, in the sense that they believed that he would deliberately undercut the President's positions. In fact, I think Gerard Smith was loyal to a fault. I think what they believed was that Jerry Smith and many of his people on the delegation had a different set of values, and a different set of goals and that, than the President did, and in contrast, I think they saw Paul Nitze as, if you want to use the term, more hard-headed, more tough-minded certainly no less dedicated to arms control, as we have as we have seen in his subsequent life certainly a man dedicated to trying to reach understanding for the Soviet Union, but they saw him as a man perhaps more willing to ask the hard questions, more willing to take a cynical view than, than some members of the delegation, and that's why they tended to rely on some of the things that he was he was telling them.

CAN YOU DESCRIBE SOME OF THE WAYS IN WHICH BACK CHANNEL WAS CONDUCTED...?

I don't know that much — I was I, I was at that one meeting, and for the life of me, I still don't know why I was there other than, I think, that... there were so few perquisites that they had to give you something. But I really don't know much about the operation of that back channel. Um— it was a... you know, it was, it was serious but I don't know much about it.

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE VERIFICATION PANEL? KISSINGER ACTUALLY ADVOCATED PRESENTING TWO PROPOSALS WHICH HE WASN'T THAT CRAZY ABOUT. HE REALLY WANTED A THIRD ONE, AND YET THERE WERE POLITICAL AND OTHER REASONS WHICH MADE HIM TACTICALLY PRESENT THESE OTHERS. COULD YOU JUST TALK ABOUT THAT?

Kissinger was convinced that one of the reasons why Americans had b-, were relatively ineffective negotiators was because of their tendency to expend their energies to arrive at a consensus position, and then to offer that position in talks, and when questions arose about the positions, to have literally no response, because all they had been able to do was reach agreement on one proposal, and therefore they were unprepared to engage in subsequent discussions, um, if questions arose. Therefore, when he said "I would like to see us offer C and D, and see what response we get from the Soviet Union, but then be prepared to fall back to different options," what he was, all he was doing was saying, um, "I would like to see if these positions are acceptable, but if they are not acceptable, I would like to have positions that we can then put forward, so that the talks can continue. And... so that we don't... then have to, if their... if our initial positions are rejected have to go home and renegotiate another position." I think he saw his... choice of tactics as enabling our negotiators to stay at the table for a much longer period of time, because they had several different tactical positions already thought out in advance.

DO YOU THINK HE ALSO THOUGHT, "WE TRIED A MIRV BAN, WE TRIED THESE THREE ACTIONS, THEY DIDN'T GO FOR IT"?

I can't say that he didn't have that in mind; there might be some advantage associated with that, but I do believe that when those positions were offered by the United States delegation, they were offered with the full faith and backing of the President and his national security adviser. That is, I don't think it was a cynical maneuver? I think it was a maneuver that they felt was in was a, was a proper approach to negotiations, and one most likely to lead to some useful outcome.

WERE YOU WORRIED AT THE TIME OF THE CAMBODIAN INVASION THAT THE SOVIETS MIGHT PULL OUT OF THE TALKS?

Was I personally worried? No. I, I wasn't — I don't recall...very much discussion of any kind about the Soviet reaction to the Cambodia invasion, or to jeopardizing SALT. I suppose those concerns were raised whenever we contemplated taking a position that would be controversial with the Soviet Union, the question of linkage would arise, but I don't recall that being a major element in the in the thinking about that invasion.

WERE YOU INVOLVED WHEN THE SOVIETS TRIED TO MAKE A PROPOSAL AT THE SECOND SECTION ABOUT A POLITICAL ALLIANCE AGAINST CHINA?

Just vaguely, I don't think I have anything to say about that.

DO YOU HAVE ANY SENSE OF REGRET THAT WE DIDN'T PUSH A MIRV AGREEMENT IN SALT I?

I don't have a sense of regret about that; perhaps that reflects the fact that I was so deeply immersed in the analysis of, of the issues and alternatives that I... didn't take time to develop a... an overriding conviction on that issue, but as I say, I felt that the preparation and the thought that went into our choice of positions, um, was unprecedentedly careful, and will stand the light of day and subsequent historical judgment, so I wouldn't tend to make that judgment, no.

IS THERE ANYTHING THAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SAY THAT WE HAVEN'T ASKED YOU ABOUT?

Yeah... a lot of the stuff, though, that I, I — No. I think the vindication of the kind of... preparation for SALT that was done in the first couple years of the administration is what's happened in the last couple years where there's been virtually no systematic preparation and where a president was almost badly embarrassed, or was badly embarrassed, depending on the way you look at because he and his, because he and his advisers simply... hadn't thought about things. I... if there's anything that, that we got a red light coming on... I think there is enormous value in the kind of careful systematic preparation that was undertaken by Nixon and Kissinger, and, and by the top members of the administration. As they went through this process of preparation, of developing options, analyzing verification, considering their strategic consequences there was an enormous amount of education going on, and even though people... retained their differences of view, those differences were ba-, were grounded on a much better sense of what the issues were, and a much better awareness of why people held the views that they held, and I think that kind of a process is much superior to one in which the President is simply confronted with a set of competing positions, with no basis for being able to, to understand why the differences exist, and how they can be narrowed, and what in fact we know and don't know about the issues that have to be decided.

Accidents of timing can be absolutely critical to the, the unfolding of events, let me give you an example. At one of the National Security Council meetings, a sharp dispute broke out among the President's adviv-, advisers over US abilities to verify arms-control agreements, with the head of the Arms Control and Disarmament agency and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in flat opposition to each other on, on our ability to verify. The day after that contentious NSC meeting, Gerard Smith forwarded a memorandum to the President, saying, "Because of the importance of this issue to the formulation of your positions, Mr. President, I recommend that you create a process for getting out the facts of US verification capabilities." Kissinger, who was wondering how to get on top of that issue, saw that memo, and instantly recognized it as an enormous bureaucratic opportunity, because in effect, the head of ACDA was asking the White House to take charge of a terribly important issue. His response was to create the verification panel, and it was the verification panel that enabled him to exercise so much direction over the staff work for the preparation of our arms control positions. But it was in effect a fortuitous event, or the timing of a fortuitous event, that led to the creation of that panel, in the, in the form that it took.

CAN YOU JUST STATE, USING KISSINGER'S NAME, THAT KISSINGER SEIZED THE OPPORTUNITY....

Henry Kissinger saw Gerard Smith's memorandum recommending that the White House take charge of an analysis of the verif-, US verification capabilities, as an enormous bureaucratic opportunity to take— charge of the analysis of that very critical issue. And he used that opportunity to suggest to the President that in response to Gerard Smith's memo, the President should direct the creation of a verification panel, under the chairmanship of the national security adviser. And the President did that, and that shaped the subsequent course of the staff work on this issue.

DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THE SLBM THING...? YOU TOUCHED ON, EARLIER, THAT WITHIN THE NSC, THE VARIOUS POINTS OF VIEW IN THE DIFFERENT AGENCIES, ALL BOILED DOWN TO WORLD VIEW. WHAT WERE THE RUSSIANS UP TO...? FROM YOUR EXPERIENCE IN GOVERNMENT, DO A LOT OF THINGS BOIL DOWN TO THAT?

I think a substantial number of the conflicts that arise in the course of policy making can be traced to an underlying set of beliefs and values held by the various people participating in the process. The difficulty facing a president is to sort out issues of fact from issues of value, to be able to identify where people are disagreeing because they have different information, or because they disagree about what the facts are, from those instances in which they're disagreeing because of, very sharply different convictions about the world, about how to about the kind of goals that should be pursued, and about how human beings react to various circumstances. I think one goal of good staff work is to help sort out those issues which are properly regarded as factual and analytical and those issues that are properly regarded as philosophical and oriented towards goals and beliefs.

YOU MENTIONED EARLIER ABOUT WHETHER VERIFICATION COULD BE RELIED ON… ACTUALLY, WE'VE BEEN TOLD BY MANY PEOPLE THAT WHAT MADE SALT I POSSIBLE WAS NATIONAL TECHNICAL MEANS MEANT THAT YOU COULD VERIFY AGREEMENT AND NOT HAVE TO RELY ON TRUST. AND I THOUGHT THAT THAT'S WHAT MADE SALT AGREEMENTS WORK.

It is, okay, what, what resulted from our, verification panel's deliberations was the clear conclusion that the United States possessed the technical means to verify Soviet compliance with arms-control agreements, without on-site inspection, so long as the Soviets did not systematically engage in deception and cheating, deception and, oh, I see what you're talking about. Um what... yeah. Um... that we possessed the technical means of verifying Soviet compliance with arms-control agreements, so long as they did not attempt deliberately to, deceive us, and to conceal their activities from us. That is, if they systematically engaged in attempts to cover up, put under cover, certain of their developments, or to create decoys, or to send out erroneous information through various channels, that is if they sys-, systematically tried to prevent our technical means from operating, they had the capacity to do so, but if they didn't deliberately try to interfere with our technical means of verifying arms-control compliance, then we would be able t-to verify that compliance. That's what I meant to say. Is that clear?