Tentative Decision Expected This Week on SALT II Compliance

With the Joint Chiefs of Staff taking a new stand, President Reagan met for the final time with the National Security Planning Group on Wednesday on whether the United States should continue to comply with the 1979 strategic arms agreement and what tangible steps should be taken to compensate for Soviet violations.

His tentative decision is expected Friday or Saturday, after which two senior advisers, Paul H. Nitze and Edward L. Rowny, will consult with allies in Europe and Asia on the issue. Reagan will make his final decision before leaving April 25 for the Tokyo economic summit.

The issue is coming to a head because a new 24-missile Trident submarine will begin sea trials next month. The United States must withdraw two old 16-missile Poseidon submarines from service by then to stay within the ceiling of 1,200 multiple-warhead missiles of this type set by the second Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty.

Some experts believe that a decision to breach the treaty--which was never ratified by the U.S. Senate, although both the United States and the Soviet Union have agreed to abide by its provisions--could doom efforts to reach new arms agreements for years. Senior Administration officials, however, doubt such serious consequences.

‘Go the Extra Mile’

Last June, faced with a comparable decision, the President decided to “go the extra mile” and to continue to comply with the treaty, despite alleged Soviet cheating.

Administration hard-liners, including Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger, are urging that the United States should break out of the agreement. The minority for continued compliance, whether stated or unstated, is led by Secretary of State George P. Shultz.

The lineup is essentially the same as last year except for the Joint Chiefs, who then recommended staying within SALT II but failed to identify any U.S. actions to compensate for Soviet treaty violations.

This year, according to two senior Administration officials, the Joint Chiefs abstained from making a policy recommendation and said that the President’s decision should turn on political rather than military considerations. They also identified four military actions that could be taken in violation of arms treaties to compensate for Soviet violations, but only if several hundred million dollars in new supplemental funds are requested by the Administration.

These steps are rehabilitating the two older Poseidon submarines, putting three warheads onto several hundred Minuteman missiles that now have only one warhead, stepping up defenses against biological and chemical warheads and encoding the information radioed to Earth from missile tests.