The INF Hard-Sell

...achieved all it could reasonably have sought by way of on-site inspection arrangements, the treaty would have remained rich in plausible cheating scenarios...

...will enjoy under the treaty to SS-20 and SS-25 base areas and facilities, virtually ensures that the Soviets could covertly deploy additional SS-20s with little difficulty should they choose to do so...

...Then there is the question of the extensive commonality of the SS-20 and the unconstrained SS-25...

...The fact of the matter is that the Soviets have never recognized a distinction between theater ballistic missiles and missiles of intercontinental range: in Soviet eyes, both are "strategic...

...This fact, together with the limited access the U.S...

...and it has opened a wider debate on the future of the NATO alliance with potentially enormous complications for U.S...

...The White House has shown amazing insensitivity to complaints from its conservative flank in Congress about its inability or unwillingness to take any concrete measures to counter Soviet actions that the President has himself certified to be in violation of existing agreements...

...THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1988 15...

...INF systems (Pershing II ballistic missiles and ground-launched cruise missiles [GLCMs]) were intended to make up for the weakness of NATO's conventional forces and to improve linkage of nuclear forces in the European theater with the American strategic deterrent...

...Yet reaching agreement on all of these areas of military competition, and doing so with reasonable simultaneity, is a daunting and probably impossible task...

...Understandably, the INF treaty has aroused deep apprehensions in Europe, whatever European leaders feel compelled to say in public about it...

...the Administration, and very likely a series of congressional amendments, reservations, and declarations that will cast doubt on the treaty's fundamental value and severely diminish its political worth to present or future occupants of the White House...

...Contrary to what is said or implied by 14 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1988 many treaty supporters, the treaty does not require the destruction of actual nuclear weapons, as distinct from the launch vehicles and support equipment needed to deliver them...

...It is virtually certain that conservatives will attempt to force the Administration to adopt a compliance policy for both past and prospective treaties as part of the price for their support of INF...

...Many treaty supporters—including many on the left who are interested in minimizing the political bonanza the Administration will reap from an INF treaty—have conceded the force of these criticisms, but argue nevertheless that the treaty is desirable as a stepping-stone to a wider agreement limiting ICBMs and other strategic weaponry...

...Indeed, a new violation of the ABM treaty has evidently occurred on his watch...

...Unfortunately, there is as yet little reason to believe that the spirit of glasnost will affect Soviet arms control behavior in any significant way, other than improving the quality of Soviet propaganda on the subject...

...will essentially have no way of verifying the non-deployed figures given our very limited knowledge of Soviet missile production and storage...

...Administration spokesmen will no doubt find it impossible to resist making the mostextravagant claims for the verification arrangements of the new treaty, especially given the weakness of the substantive case that can be made on the treaty's behalf...

...In the absence of a treaty constraining ICBMs, it is not clear that an INF treaty imposes any meaningful limitation on the overall Soviet threat to Europe...

...Probably the most solid argument on behalf of the treaty is that it requires the actual destruction of missile hardware in a proportion that heavily favors NATO...

...American INF systems do indeed represent a unique capability—that of striking deep in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union from sites in Western Europe...

...This INF-START linkage puts the Administration in a bind...

...But Soviet theater and intercontinental systems (ICBMs) are generically similar, and the latter can easily substitute for the former...

...Bernard Rogers...

...Even here, however, the fine print tells an awkward story...

...Moreover, as the INF debate has made Americans increasingly aware, it makes little sense to attempt to control nuclear arms if conventional weapons are allowed to run free, especially given the overwhelming advantage the Soviets enjoy in the conventional area...

...The pro-treaty arguments are by now familiar, since all of them long pre-date the actual appearance of a treaty text and associated documents at the summit...

...The answer plainly is: it all depends...

...It will not do merely to argue that the missions of the Pershings and GLCMs can be taken over by other nuclear or nuclear-capable theater forces, since such a step would obviously not be cost-free for the alliance...

...The compliance issue is another on which the Administration is acutely exposed to attack...

...To begin with what is only the most obvious and intractable problem, the U.S...

...But this is very far from self-evident...

...The U.S...

...The treaty on intermediate-range nuclear forces (INF) signed at the Washington summit is a large mouthful indeed...

...it is certain to attract intense scrutiny as a source of gain or peril for Republican presidential hopefuls...

...Perhaps the most serious failure in the verification terms of the treaty as currently written is that U.S...

...In the case of the SS-20, the Soviets provided American negotiators with several different sets of figures at different times during the final run-up to the summit...

...Here too, as is now apparent from the treaty text (and the subsequently released memorandum of understanding on treaty-related data), the Administration has dug itself a deep hole...

...The problem here is that arms control is not something that can be pursued in neatly separable increments...

...This might include a credible program for improving intelligence collection against Soviet targets of opportunity—for example, developing a reserve of satellites capable of rapid launch...

...But even had the U.S...

...Will these arguments sustain the treaty through to ratification...

...If an INF treaty is to stand alone, then, it must somehow be argued that the elimination of nuclear weapons is good in itself...

...A nd, last but hardly least, there is the question of verification...

...Such a policy would likely involve, among other things, a set of pre-agreed military responses to evidence of Soviet violation of the INF limits...

...The treaty's primary effect there has been to reinforce anti-nuclear sentiment and to raise widespread doubt about the seriousness of the American commitment to Europe...

...There is evidence that US...

...has little real idea of the total number of missiles possessed by the Soviets in the various categories covered by the treaty...

...The higher figure (about 650) is still some 250 below the estimate of the Defense Intelligence Agency (though it roughly agrees with that of the CIA...

...But it tarnishes the treaty's political luster...

...In particular, Gorbachev has so far taken no meaningful steps to improve Soviet compliance with existing arms control agreements...

...Given current and foreseeable shortages in so-called special nuclear materials (bomb-grade plutonium and uranium) in the United States, this may well be a net benefit for our side...

...Its hundreds of pages of fine print make baffling reading even for initiates...

...Also not clear is the effect of a serious INF debate in the Administration's timetable for START, though it seems not unlikely that a protracted wrangle over INF could make the START question moot for the remainder of the current Administration...

...I s it a good thing to eliminate an "en- 1 tire class" of nuclear weapons...

...intelligence estimates of such matters that we were apparently unaware that the Soviet SSC-X-4 intermediate range cruise missile was even in production before being notified by the Soviets that some ninety of the missiles were in storage at a facility in Latvia...

...In the absence of a treaty constraining ICBMs, it is not clear that an INF treaty imposes any meaningful limitation on the overall Soviet threat to Europe...

...access is restricted to declared, as distinct from suspect, SS-20 facilities...

...positions on various inspection provisions of the treaty were unduly compromised in the last few weeks of negotiations...

...The meaning of any INF agreement cannot really be defined except in the strategic context, just as the meaning of limitations on strategic offensive weapons depends on how one handles strategic defense...

...On the other hand, relinking START to INF will no doubt cause complications with the West Europeans, who now regard elimination of INF as a political fait accompli, and will seriously constrict the Administration's freedom of maneuver and bargaining leverage in START negotiations with the Soviets...

...The Administration has yet to explain why it is beneficial to do away with a class of weapons perceived by many Europeans as a critical element of their security...

...T here are several ways the Adminis- 1 tration could attempt to climb out of this hole...

...One is to begin downplaying the on-site inspection aspects of the treaty and to reemphasize the role of technical intelligence in monitoring Soviet INF activities...

...If it accepts the argument that an INF treaty is worthless and even potentially dangerous taken by itself, it will have difficulty insisting on ratification of the agreement with 'no strings attached prior to concluding a START agreement...

...Given the very real uncertainties associated both with the INF agreement and with the broader intentions of the Soviet Union in the era of glasnost, a more leisurely digestive period might be a good idea...

...The question is whether this morsel—which may well constitute only an appetizer before the main course of strategic offensive and defensive reductions expected later this year—will sit as well with the body politic as many seem to assume, or will afflict us with the gas pains so vocally experienced by former NATO commander Gen...

...Unfortunately, even a cursory examination of the fine print shows that such claims cannot be sustained...

...Another (to which the Administration may be driven in spite of itself) is to downplay the significance of verification loopholes on the plea that Soviet treaty behavior will be different under Gorbachev—putting the matter somewhat brutally, to "verify—but trust," as it were...

...While the Soviet total purportedly includes non-deployed SS-20s and other missiles, the U.S...

...foreign and national security policy in the coming years...

...Abandonment of the Pershings in particular requires NATO to give up unique capabilities for prompt assured attack against vital military targets—such as communications and command facilities—within the Soviet Union...

...It needs to be further asked whether the term "class" has the same meaning when applied to American and to Soviet INF systems...

...For what...

...In fact, in its penny wisdom and pound foolishness, the Administration's approach to verification of the INF treaty amounts to little short of a fiasco, and can be expected to encounter a skeptical reception from many segments of the political spectrum...

...Particular classes of nuclear weapons presumably serve particular purposes...

...The Soviet SS-20 intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) is identical to the first two stages of the obsolescent SS-16 ICBM, and apparently very similar to one or more stages of the new SS-25 ICBM...

...For years, Soviet SS-11 and SS-19 ICBMs are believed to have been targeted against Western Europe...

...It will be difficult to counter the contention that there is nothing to prevent the Soviets from recycling INF warheads into new strategic nuclear systems with identical capabilities...

...Confidence in the Administration's grasp of these issues is not strengthened by the apparent absence of any clear plan for strengthening NATO's shorter-range nuclear missile force or its conventional capabilities...

...Few are now willing to predict outright defeat for the treaty in the Senate...

...It is premature to predict the intensity of skepticism toward the treaty on Capitol Hill and elsewhere in the coming months, or the shape of the strategy that skeptics will devise...

...According to its defenders, the treaty eliminates an "entire class" of nuclear missiles (those with a range between 500 and 5500 kilometers), does so with considerable advantage to the United States in number of missiles and warheads destroyed, includes the "tightest verification procedures in history," and opens the way for a comprehensive agreement on strategic offensive and defensive weaponry...

...It hardly increases confidence in U.S...

...Yet there are already signs that the treaty's manifold deficiencies will guarantee at a minimum deep embarrassment for Carnes Lord is director of international studies at the National Institute for Public Policy in Fairfax, Virginia...