U.S. Seeks Deep ICBM Reduction : ‘Star Wars’ Unaffected in Offer to Cut Back First-Strike Threat

President Reagan announced Thursday that U.S. negotiators in Geneva, building on “positive elements” in a recent Soviet proposal, today will unveil a comprehensive new counterproposal that would embrace the principle of deep cuts in nuclear weapons while reducing the first-strike threat posed by huge land-based missiles.

The Administration’s new plan also would permit research to proceed on “Star Wars,” the space-based anti-missile system that Moscow has portrayed as the greatest stumbling block to a new arms-control agreement.

In a letter transmitted to Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev, Reagan asked that the current round of arms control talks in Geneva--scheduled to end today--be extended for a week to allow “a real give and take” on his proposal. He called the latest U.S. offer, together with the Soviet plan, “important milestones” in the arduous arms-control process.

Targeted on Europe

The Soviet plan, presented to Reagan last month by Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze, calls for a 50% across-the-board reduction in strategic weapons, including both missiles and bombers, capable of reaching the other superpower’s territory. That approach would have affected not only intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) but the medium-range missiles the United States has deployed in Western Europe; the Soviets’ medium-range weapons, however, would not be cut, because they are targeted on Western Europe, not U.S. territory.

The U.S. plan, while incorporating the overall 50% cut, reportedly would set separate limits on different categories of weapons systems and would be aimed primarily at curtailing the Soviets’ vast fleet of land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles.

These highly accurate missiles, whose high speed permits only a brief warning time after they are launched, are considered by U.S. experts to pose a greater first-strike threat than air-launched and submarine-launched missiles, which are slower and less accurate.

Washington will also propose that no more than 50% of each nation’s nuclear force be ICBMs instead of the 60% ceiling the Soviets offered, reliable sources said.

The Administration plan parallels Moscow’s offer in proposing a freeze on U.S. and Soviet medium-range missiles in Europe but imposes additional conditions, such as counting not only missiles based on the continent but also those capable of hitting the continent. Thus, the Soviets would be required to move some of their medium-range missiles deeper into Siberia.

A Pentagon official said that the new American proposal “takes the 50% concept” advanced by the Soviets “and translates it into something more equitable.”

Mounting Pressure

As Reagan’s Nov. 19-20 summit meeting with Gorbachev in Geneva draws closer, the President has been under mounting pressure from the allies to counter the Soviet proposal and prevent Gorbachev from stealing the arms control spotlight.

In an interview with Soviet journalists Thursday, Reagan expressed hope that there will be “concrete achievements at Geneva.”

Secretary of State George P. Shultz leaves Saturday for talks with Gorbachev and Shevardnadze in Moscow on Nov. 4-5. In a news conference, he said Thursday that his trip is “part of a continuing and intensive process to prepare the way” for the summit. Shultz described the new American proposal as “far-reaching” and said it seeks “drastic” cuts in nuclear weapons.

Reagan refused to divulge the specifics of his plan, declaring, “History has shown that progress is more surely made through confidential negotiations.”

Administration officials have been annoyed in the past when the Soviets have publicized various proposals in the media without first presenting them in Geneva, where three sets of arms control talks have been under way since March. With the public relations war between the superpowers heating up in the final weeks before the summit, however, Administration officials quietly disclosed the framework of Reagan’s new proposal.

‘Defense Is Safer’

In Reagan’s nationally televised announcement, he characterized the U.S. position as calling for “deep cuts, no first-strike advantage, defensive research, because defense is safer than offense, and no cheating.” He expressed hope that an initial verdict will be reached on the plan’s merits during the next week of preliminary talks in Geneva.

“After all, it isn’t that deep a document,” he said.

A Pentagon source said that final touches were put on the proposal Tuesday while Defense Secretary Casper W. Weinberger was in Brussels meeting with North Atlantic Treaty Organization defense ministers. Seeking to head off speculation that the proposal was adopted over the Pentagon chief’s opposition, the source said that Weinberger is not unhappy with it.

“It puts the ball back in Gorbachev’s court just before the summit,” the source said, speaking on the condition that he not be named. “It’s something we can support.”

Weinberger has been a consistent hard-liner on arms control. Other officials, not wishing to sabotage the summit before it even begins, have maneuvered to ensure that Weinberger will not attend the Geneva meeting, despite his intense lobbying for a seat in the delegation.

To Weinberger, a selling point in the new plan is its insistence on maintaining “Star Wars” research and development. At the same time, it seeks to cut more deeply into Soviet ICBM stockpiles, which the Administration contends are the most dangerous nuclear weapons.

The Soviets argue that, with most of their nuclear arsenal in ICBMs, isolating that weapon category for especially deep cuts is not fair. They also have said repeatedly that agreement in Geneva is not possible unless Reagan is willing to concede something on “Star Wars.”

In his press conference, Shultz listed arms control second when he discussed the issues that will be raised at the summit. He put the resolution of regional conflicts at the top of his list, just as Reagan did last week in his address to the United Nations. And he suggested that progress on arms control is probably not possible unless superpower tensions are eased around the world.

“We’re talking about a broadly interrelated set of matters here,” he said. “There is not total linkage but a substantial amount of interplay.”

As for Gorbachev’s strides in wooing public opinion in advance of the summit, Shultz noted that the Soviets have grown more forthright in recent months in stating their views on a variety of subjects.

And while declining to predict that the change in atmosphere would lead to agreement at the summit, he said: “If Mr. Gorbachev wants to compete for the attention of our people, I say welcome. He’ll find that the American people are very sensible and quite capable of picking things apart that don’t make sense, as I would say our press is.”