Why SALT II

...and by setting mutually accepted definitions and categories for complicated weapons, it puts in place the conceptual apparatus for cutting back the two arsenals...

...One will preoccupy the Senate during the next few months...

...Defenders of salt ii reply that, to begin with, it is far from clear the Soviet Union will be able lo pulverize (he American land-based missile fleet soon, if ever...

...American weapons of similar description (the so-called "forward-based systems" in Europe that American negotiators have fought hard, and successfully, to exclude from the designated limits) would have to be included as well...

...Salt n's defenders will probably prevail...

...The first is small...

...and asks, "Whether or not salt is harmful, is it beneficial in any way...

...The first of these is the Soviets' TU-22M bomber commonly called the "Backfire...

...By the same token, passage will not lead to Soviet-American cooperation in Africa, or the Middle East...

...to approve it would cause no injury...

...Were the Soviet Backfire brought into the arena of the Michael Manl)HBAI m, assistant professor of Government at Harvard L 'ni-versity...

...The other question, although equally important, is more political in character and is likely to receive less attention...

...Because the worst situation the U.S...

...The assertion that our missiles are imminently vulnerable rests on calculations that, in turn, are based on assumptions—e.g., a virtually letter-perfect Soviet attack—that are open to serious doubt...

...As it is, in a letter from Soviet Party Chief Leonid I. Brezhnev to President Carter, the Kremlin has promised not to increase the present rate of Backfire production...

...Critics maintain that longer range ground- and sea-launched cruise missiles are essential to the defense of Western Europe, and that the protocol will serve as a precedent for permanently prohibiting them...

...Since the United States will remain extraordinarily heavily armed, giving up no weapon of consequence and retaining the right to acquire new ones, the nightmares of those who oppose salt are unfounded...

...Those who make this claim point to the largest of the Soviet land-based intercontinental missiles, each capable of hurling up to 10 hydrogen bombs at the U.S...

...Finally, salt helps to smooth the political relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union...

...Second, salt is both an ongoing enterprise and a cumulative process...

...and Mark O. Hatfield (R.-Ore...

...Their nightmare scenario has the Soviets using this capacity to force the U.S...

...to deploy cruise missiles that can be launched from the ground or the sea, as long as their range does not exceed 360 miles...

...The President has signed the agreement...

...There has been a natural progression from the salt i agreements of 1972, which in effect prohibited defensive systems and placed temporary restraints on offensive weapons, to salt n, which limits offensive systems in more comprehensive fashion...

...We do not know what they will do, so we have to proceed on the basis of the worst, from our point of view, that they can do...

...government—why pick this treaty...

...And even if American missiles are becoming vulnerable, continue the treaty defenders, they do not make up the entirety of the U.S...

...Given the many potential options—the many other possible uses of the time and the intellectual and political resources of the U.S...

...Nevertheless, salt n does pave the way for reductions: It brakes the momentum of the strategic buildup on each side, the precondition for starting to go backward...

...retaliatory force...

...In this sense salt n is, as salt i was and, it is to be hoped, salt m will be, a small step for mankind...

...cannot be certain the USSR is observing its every provision...

...Critics of the treaty assert that the U.S...

...True, there can be no guarantee that this will happen, even if the present treaty is ratified...

...we do not depend on any single source for any important body of data...

...Totally apart from the details of the agreements they sign, the fact of agreeing reassures each side that the other recognizes the need for at least enough mutual forbearance and cooperation to avoid war...

...to retreat in a crisis, just as the USSR was forced to retreat in the Cuban missile crisis of 1962...

...Still, the main elements of the argument that salt u's defenders will make are plain enough...

...The first question involves three concerns...

...salt sets limits on this worst situation, which can now be partly calculated on the basis of concrete provisions rather than wholly on speculation...

...Under the terms of the treaty, American B-52 bombers are permitted to carry cruise missiles...

...If arms control consists of so many arms and so little control, why bother with it...

...But the political importance of salt must be seen as the product of the magnitude of its effect on the Soviet-American relationship and the importance of that relationship...

...and Jake Garn (R.-Utah), and asks, "Is salt li, in its present form, dangerous for the United States...

...These monster missiles, they fear, when fitted with the increasingly accurate guidance systems that are becoming available, will be able to knock out all, or almost all, of the American land-based missile force in a single sweeping blow...

...On the merits, my own feeling is that they deserve to...

...The treaty's proponents respond that Backfire's capabilities do not make it an unambiguously "strategic" weapon—that is, a weapon that can strike the homeland of one superpower from the territory of the other...

...salt cannot be decisive in this respect...

...The major worry is that salt n leaves the Soviet Union with a dangerous margin of strategic superiority over the United States...

...The Cuban missile crisis analogy is therefore misleading...

...The third major concern in the salt n debate is verification...

...Of course, we cannot track every nut and bolt in the Soviet weapons program, but we would not miss any important development long enough to permit a clear violation of the treaty to take place, or to allow an unfavorable alteration in the military balance with the Soviet Union to occur...

...Supporters of salt n contend that the longer range weapons could not be available before 1982 in any event, and that the protocol will not bind the United States beyond that time...

...It centers on technical issues raised by such hawkish critics of the treaty as Senators Henry M. Jackson (D.-Wash...

...in 1962 the Russians had only a handful of nuclear weapons, while today both sides have thousands...

...is the author of the forthcoming book...

...Measured by the death and destruction that could ensue if it should go wrong, it is the most important political relationship in modern history...

...salt's opponents argue that the Backfire can strike the United States from the Soviet Union, so it is a "strategic" weapon according to the definition employed in the negotiations, yet it is not included in the treaty...

...and Soviet arsenals...

...Steps that can contribute, even modestly, to keeping it peaceful are worth taking...

...The omission, they feel, needs to be corrected...

...the best of both worlds: restrictions on the Soviet weapon and complete freedom where comparable American armaments are concerned...

...The rejection of the treaty by the Senate will not precipitate World War III...

...an accompanying protocol that runs through 1981 also allows the U.S...

...To reject it would embarrass him and, by extension, the American government...

...Its principal mission is to attack "theater" targets—Western Europe and especially China...

...must prepare for is less bad than it would be without the treaty, and because the treaty does restrict certain weapon systems that might well be produced in the absence of an agreement, salt saves us money...

...This gives the U.S...

...We could still inflict a crushing counter-blow to the Soviet Union with the nuclear explosives carried by aircraft and submarines...

...We must design our arsenal to match that of the Soviet Union...

...The Nuclear Question...

...the second is not...

...This issue is the most difficult of the three to follow from outside the Senate, for the details of the satellites, radar networks and electronic monitoring posts that give the United States information about Soviet weapons are kept secret...

...Logically, salt m should begin to reduce the U.S...

...The deep and enduring differences between the two force them to be rivals...

...The other weapon system at issue is the cruise missile, the small pilotless aircraft that can carry nuclear explosives at subsonic speeds...

...First, it lends a measure of predictability to strategic planning...

...But salt ought to be able to meet a different and more positive standard...

...the existence of the two nuclear arsenals themselves prevents that...

...This country has many ways of gathering the information pertinent to salt...

...Finally, say the defenders, even if American missiles are increasingly prey to a Soviet strike and this confers a disadvantage on the United States, the problem has nothing to do with salt n. No feasible treaty could have protected these weapons, and nothing in the agreement prevents Washington from taking unilateral measures to safeguard them from surprise attack—as President Carter has done by authorizing the new MX missile...

...salt agreement...

...They regard the loss of the electronic monitoring stations in Iran as particularly critical...

...It pertains to the process of negotiating limits on strategic arms, arises from the doubts of such dovish Senators as George McGovern (D.-S.D...

...There are three reasons, I think, why salt, besides not being harmful, is positively healthy for the United States...

...The second principal criticism of salt n is that it deals with two weapon systems unsatisfactorily...

...Thus, the case for the treaty comes down to the proposition that it does no harm...