Old business & new

...The chance to move in that direction, through greater liberalization in the Soviet Union and openness across borders, may now be emerging...

...He was principal consultant for the bishops' 1983 pastoral letter, The Challenge of Peace...

...It then recognizes that the letter's position on retaliatory (or second) use in a "limited exchange" is "less categorical than its opposition to civilian bombing and it is less clear than its opposition to first-use...

...Earlier-an example it would be nice to see our bishops invoke-Catholics and Protestants in Central Europe stopped killing each other in the name of religion...

...The "acceptable" role of nuclear weapons-as deterrents, or as weapons for possible use in war-especially needed explication...

...Rather, could the factual condition of freeing the world from assured destruction likely be achieved by SDI, and, if not, would the effects of deploying it likely be pernicious...

...It is also not clear whether any tempering (or tampering) now would produce a more progressive document...

...Even with the restricted charge, three major pieces of business require attention...

...Such hypothetical uses of nuclear weapons are hard to imagine...

...But most of the report is concerned with matters like deterrence and arms control, and shows some fear of appearing naive about Soviet-American relations...

...We must not condemn our posterity to unending reliance on policies of threats between adversaries...

...Their skepticism is obvious...

...The paradox of the nuclear age is that vast amounts of intellectual and political energy must be expended to assure that something does not occur: nuclear war...

...But this is an insufficient conception of the political-moral challenge of our time...

...Because the temperature of East-West politics has wanned so markedly since 1983, we must develop some vision of the world beyond nuclear deterrence...

...The Western democracies, after bitter wars in which some were ruled by totalitarian regimes, have for more than forty years constituted, among themselves if not toward others, the largest zone of peace in the history of the world...

...The bishops do not wish to keep this company...

...Consequently, the press may treat the report as "the bishops' letter on SDI,'' which would be a pity because there is much more to it...

...The problem, of course, is that for nuclear weapons to have any effective role in deterrence there must be some, however slight, possibility they might be used, and that possible use must not be clearly and certainly illicit...

...risks that defensive systems can have real or perceived offensive uses...

...The new report repeats the "absolute categorical" prohibition against deliberately targeting civilians, and restates the very strong presumption against any first use of nuclear weapons...

...For example, "the two nations are divided by history, philosophy, polity, and conflicting interests...

...Existing tensions will not disappear overnight...

...American-Chinese relations are a contemporary example...

...Without compromising our principles and ideals, the current confrontation must ultimately be superseded by broad political understandings...

...The bishops then tot up the risks of pursuing SDI: "risks to the existing arms control regime...

...This is too timid...

...An authoritative clarification was needed explicating points that were deliberately left ambiguous, or compromised, in 1983...

...Challenge of Peace...

...Capitalists and Communists also can learn to live with each other...

...and some mischievous (to discredit the document by attributing to it an argument that could then be ridiculed...

...that burden is "a very heavy one.'' Any use that would not be condemnable would have to respect the traditional just-war principles of discrimination and proportionality...

...It was to use The Challenge of Peace as a baseline from which to evaluate policy developments, not to call into question any of the fundamental principles of that document...

...a judgment on the moral status of deterrence...

...We can say yes to regulation, but yes also to transcending...

...But there is a chance now to begin the process of establishing a less-threatening and more secure basis of peace...

...Reduction of Soviet-American hostilities and improved understanding will take time and be fraught with difficulty...

...some deliberate (to claim support for particular evaluations or recommendations...

...The second bit of unfinished business concerns deterrence itself...

...Good intentions are not enough...

...This restricted range, nevertheless, requires practical moral judgments, by individuals, judgments which depend on differing guesses about the real prospects and the values at stake that would make any use "proportionate" or not...

...An equal amount of human effort must be invested in shaping a just relationship among states and within states...

...While SDI should be "maintained as a research program, within the restraints of the ABM Treaty," the risks above pose a danger "to the dynamic of deterrence that leaves us unconvinced of the merits of proceeding toward deployment...

...Here the bishops distinguish between an ' 'ethic of intention" and an "ethic of consequences...

...The bishops' formulation is intended to dispel "notions that nuclear weapons are 'normal,' 'controlled' instruments of military policy," and "to build a barrier against nuclear use...

...The final piece of business is new as well as old...

...The possibility which may be open is not to transcend these fundamental differences, but to regulate the competitive relationship with new criteria...

...The bishops can help, as can we all...

...This is a good passage, and there are others in the same vein...

...The report will be considered for adoption by the bishops as a whole in June...

...Still, self-serving interpretations by SDI advocates have made the bishops "part of the problem" for SDI opponents, and the new analysis is welcome...

...As a result, many SDI proponents could thrust themselves under the bishops' umbrella, claiming SDI to be the "moral high ground," since, if practicable, it would make countercity warfare deterrence both unnecessary and impossible...

...The bishops' "presumption against second-use" was therefore "not a prohibition...

...its effect, however, "is to place the burden of proof on those who assert that 'limited use' is politically and morally possible...

...risks of introducing . . . uncertainty into the already delicate political-psychological fabric of deterrence...

...To counter the claim for SDI, the report goes on at length-perhaps too great a length, taking as big a portion of the report (25 percent) as some SDI advocates would like it to take of the federal budget...

...Observers who judge the 1983 letter to be less than perfect may regret these restricted terms of reference...

...The first concerns the bishops' evaluation of SDI (Star Wars...

...The letter's analysis was subject to varying interpretations: some inadvertent...

...Despite liberalization, the Soviet Union may never be a democratic society as we comprehend that term...

...Wherever each of us falls on this narrow range, the bishops' stance shows a respect for individual conscience that we should value-in this or other realms of moral discourse...

...finally, risks that some forms of SDI would be ineffective against an adversary's first strike, but more effective against a retaliatory second-strike, thereby eroding crisis stability...

...Great ideological and religious conflicts of the past have ultimately softened as adversaries came to understand if not always agree with one another...

...the door is open only the barest crack...

...Nevertheless, the 1983 letter grew out of a much more intensive effort than could possibly be mustered for a new report, less than half as long, produced so soon afterward...

...The committee's charge was' 'to assess all the relevant facts and moral principles needed to present...

...thus interpreters have had to infer what the bishops' attitude would have been had they addressed it directly...

...BRUCE RUSSETT Bruce Russett is Dean Acheson Professor of International Relations at Yale...

...THE CHALLENGE OF PEACE' OLD BUSINESS & NEW THE BISHOPS, SDI, & DETERRENCE The National Conference of Catholic Bishops' ad hoc Committee on the Moral Evaluation of Deterrence Policy has released its draft report on the 1983 pastoral letter, The Challenge of Peace...

...The SDI controversy erupted only after the 1983 letter was essentially complete...

...The permissible range of judgment runs from one that in practice no use could ever satisfy just-war principles, to one that says some very limited retaliatory uses might not be utterly unacceptable...