Standards for ‘Star Wars’ Modified : Cost, Survivability Tests for Deployment Appear Eased

The Reagan Administration appears to be weakening the standards that its “Star Wars” space defense system must meet before it would be deployed.

Officials have modified the criterion that “Star Wars,” which is still in an early research stage, be “survivable” in case of an enemy attack. Now, they say, it must only be “reasonably survivable.”

And the requirement that the system cost less than the offensive weapons it is to intercept also seems to be eroding. Senior State and Defense Department officials contend that the Strategic Defense Initiative, the program’s formal name, does not need to be cheaper than enemy offensive missiles for it to be deployed.

The easing of the strict standards--initially advanced by Paul H. Nitze, President Reagan’s chief arms control adviser and endorsed by presidential national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane--would increase prospects for eventual deployment of the anti-missile system by a future President if it proved technically feasible.

Could Spur Opponents

But easier standards also could light a new spark under opponents of the controversial program. Critics had welcomed the strict standards because they promised precise, almost mathematical measures that would either persuade the Administration to abort “Star Wars” or convince even the most determined skeptics of its value.

Nitze, in first presenting the two criteria in a Philadelphia speech Feb. 20, said “Star Wars” research “must produce defensive systems that are survivable”--able to withstand a preemptive strike. Otherwise, he said, “the defenses would themselves be tempting targets for a first strike,” and this would decrease rather than increase stability.

Nitze also said the new defensive system must be “cost-effective”--that is, “cheap enough to add additional defensive capability so that the other side has no incentive to add additional offensive capability to overcome the defense.”

If it were cheaper to build one more offensive warhead than one more defensive interceptor, he explained, financial pressures would encourage proliferation of offensive systems rather than push the superpowers toward greater reliance on defensive systems.

Standards Less Rigorous

But this week, senior State and Defense Department officials indicated that Nitze’s standards are less rigorous than they might appear.

Under Secretary of Defense Fred C. Ikle said in an interview, “It is wrong to think that the considerations of survivability and cost-effectiveness as applied to SDI will be any different than for other weapon systems,” even though the space defense system would revolutionize today’s concepts of nuclear deterrence and stability.

The cost-effectiveness standard sparked particular disagreement within the government. Senior State and Defense Department officials said this week that “cost-effective” need not mean that space defensive weapons actually must be cheaper than the offensive enemy warheads.

“We’re richer than the Soviets, and not spending that much on national defense,” said a State Department official, who spoke on condition he not be identified. “So cost-effectiveness is an interesting criterion but not a primary one.

How Much Is Too Much?

“If defense costs 100 times more than offense, that should be taken into consideration. But if the difference is only marginal, and if it improves the national security and protects our citizenry, how can you decide that a price tag is too high?”

And Ikle said that even if defense costs 10% or even 100% more than offense, “that should not be decisive.”

Nitze denied that Ikle’s views conflict with his standards. But on the views of the unnamed senior State Department official, Nitze said during an interview, “I disagree with him and I believe everyone else in the Administration disagrees with him.”

As for the requirement that “Star Wars” be able to survive enemy attack, Nitze himself made a modification last month.

“I did not want to suggest that absolute survivability was required,” he explained this week, “but rather that the (space defense) system as a whole must be survivable, that there be enough redundancy in it so it would work if you lost one radar or one satellite” in a system projected to have tens or hundreds of both.

‘A Matter of Degree’

Ikle, an outspoken champion of “Star Wars,” said every warship and bomber must also hold the promise of being reasonably survivable before it is built. “Survivability is a matter of degree,” he said. “It depends on the resources an enemy throws at the system and the nature of his attack. (As a criterion), it’s not worth making too much of it.”

The cost-effectiveness standard defeated efforts to build an anti-missile system 15 years ago, when multiple warheads atop big missiles could overwhelm defensive systems very cheaply. But now, according to Pentagon experts, the cost of offensive warheads is rising as missiles are made mobile, while the cost of defensive systems is falling, thanks to powerful, miniature computers.

In the next decade, when a future U.S. President must decide whether to deploy “Star Wars,” defense may be half the cost of offense, a Pentagon official estimated. If true, the defensive system would meet Nitze’s cost-effectiveness criterion.