Democrats Threaten to Curb ‘Star Wars’ if Stand on ABM Treaty Is Not Clarified

Democratic congressmen threatened Thursday to hobble the Administration’s space defense program unless the White House explains satisfactorily why it has radically altered its interpretation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty to permit a far wider range of “Star Wars” tests.

The new interpretation, which came to light indirectly this week, could jeopardize the entire treaty, according to some experts.

The ABM treaty, concluded between the United States and the Soviet Union in 1972, places sharp restrictions on the development and installation of systems that could shoot down or destroy an opponent’s ballistic missiles.

Research Only

Since the treaty’s inception, the U.S. government’s Arms Control and Disarmament Agency has taken the position that only research--not testing or deployment--of new ABM technology is permitted under the treaty.

Under the Reagan Administration’s new approach, however, the treaty is being interpreted to permit research, development and testing of laser and “beam” weapons such as those being studied for use in the space-based anti-missile program widely known as “Star Wars.”

Rep. Dante B. Fascell (D-Fla.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, announced that he will conduct special hearings to question Administration officials on the change in interpretation, which he said, “jeopardizes arms control as embodied in the ABM treaty.”

Rep. Norman D. Dicks (D-Wash.) said he and Sen. Albert Gore Jr. (D-Tenn.) will seek to tighten a provision in the defense budget now before Congress to prevent spending any of the $2.75 billion assigned to the Strategic Defense Initiative for work that would erode the ABM treaty as previously interpreted.

Former Ambassador Gerard C. Smith, who led U.S. negotiations on the treaty, said the Administration’s new view makes the treaty “a dead letter.”

However, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) pointed to Administration claims that the Soviet Union has fired lasers at objects in space, thereby testing a full-scale system at a fixed ground site that might eventually be converted into a space-based system. “Nobody has complained about the Soviets doing it,” Stevens said.

‘Approved and Authorized’

The issue surfaced Sunday when national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane said in a television interview that research, development and testing of ABM systems “involving new physical concepts . . . are approved and authorized by the treaty. Only deployment is foreclosed.”

Later in the week, a senior Administration official confirmed that McFarlane’s statement reflected government policy.

The new interpretation appears to conflict with basic provisions in the treaty itself, as well as earlier interpretations of the pact by this and previous Administrations.

In technical terms, the basic argument is whether an “agreed statement” included in the treaty must be interpreted in the context of the pact or whether the statement can stand alone. The treaty dealt with conventional rocket-powered anti-missile weapons. The agreed statement dealt specifically with exotic weapons “based on other physical principles.”

Article III of the treaty limits deployed ABM systems to 100 interceptor missiles, with associated launchers and radar stations, by each country in fixed land-based sites. Article V states that “each party undertakes not to develop, test, or deploy ABM systems or components which are sea-based, air-based, space-based, or mobile land-based.”

But the treaty’s “Agreed Statement D” states that, to fulfill obligations under Article III, “the parties agree that in the event ABM systems based on other physical principles and including components capable of substituting for ABM interceptor missiles, ABM launchers or ABM radars are created in the future, specific limitations on such systems and their components would be subject to discussion. . . .”

The Administration is now arguing that this statement permits research, development and testing of ABM systems that are based on “other physical properties,” while critics maintain that the statement only permits those activities for fixed land-based ABM systems, not the space-based “Star Wars” system.