‘Star Wars’ Funds in Deep Trouble, Rep. Aspin Warns

President Reagan’s $4.8-billion funding request for the “Star Wars” missile defense system is in “serious trouble,” the House Armed Services Committee chairman, Rep. Les Aspin (D-Wis.), said Tuesday.

Although some Democrats have threatened to slash “Star Wars” allocations as a way of demonstrating their opposition to Reagan’s decision to abandon the 1979 strategic arms limitation treaty, Aspin said that growing sentiment against the space-based system has little to do with the SALT II pact.

Citing the results of a poll of members of his committee, Aspin said that many of the most conservative House members believe that the “Star Wars” program--formally known as the Strategic Defense Initiative--is too expensive in a time of high federal deficits.

‘Low Priority’

“I think SDI is in serious trouble,” Aspin said at a breakfast session with reporters. “I was surprised how low on everybody’s priority list SDI was.”

The President’s “Star Wars” request for the next fiscal year, starting Oct. 1, is nearly double the $2.5 billion appropriated by Congress for the current year. Aspin predicted that he would get only slightly more for 1987 than he got in 1986.

He also said that Democrats seeking reelection in November are hoping to capitalize on fears created by Reagan’s decision to abandon the SALT pact. The Democrats, Aspin added, will raise the issue during the campaign.

Aspin said that Reagan’s decision causes voters to question whether he is serious about negotiating an arms control agreement with the Soviet Union. He said that this is just one of several issues on which Americans fear extremism by the President.

Two Tracks

Aspin said House Democrats have decided to simultaneously pursue two different legislative approaches, binding and non-binding resolutions, in an effort to reverse Reagan’s decision to abandon the 1979 pact. Both types of legislation have been offered in the Senate--by Republicans as well as Democrats.

Before Reagan’s remarks on the SALT treaty May 27, more than 220 House members and more than 50 senators wrote to him asking that he continue to uphold the treaty limits, even though the pact had never been ratified by the Senate. But Aspin said he does not know how many of those who wrote the letters would vote for one form or another of the legislation.

The House is expected to vote within the next week on non-binding legislation, to be offered by Rep. Dante B. Fascell (D-Fla.), chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, calling on the President to reverse himself. Assuming that the bill fails to persuade Reagan to do that, Aspin said, the Democrats are prepared to offer mandatory legislation--writing the treaty limits into law--as an amendment to a bill authorizing Pentagon funds.

Aspin noted that the advantage of amending it to the Pentagon spending bill is that “it’s hard for the President to veto the defense bill.”

In the Senate, a bipartisan group led by Sen. Dale Bumpers (D-Ark.) is drafting a non-binding measure similar to the Fascell legislation that will be offered as an amendment to the Pentagon spending bill. In addition, Sens. Joseph R. Biden (D-Del.) and William S. Cohen (R-Me.) have sponsored a bill that would prohibit any expenditure of U.S. funds for weapons that exceed the SALT limits.

Aspin said that Reagan’s announced intention to abandon SALT is “nuts” because the Soviet Union is prepared to benefit from an ending of compliance with the strategic arms accord’s provisions while the United States is not. He said there is nothing beyond treaty allowances that the United States plans to do before 1989, when the mobile Midgetman missile will be ready for testing.

Looking humorously at the Administration’s approach to arms control negotiations, Aspin said it reminds him of an old Groucho Marx line--”I wouldn’t be a member of any club that would have me.” In Reagan’s view, he said, “anything that the Soviets would agree to is obviously inadequate.”