Nuclear Proposals, Disposals

Nearly 50 years have passed since Albert Einstein sent a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, warning that it was essential for the United States to move quickly to develop the nuclear bomb.

In that half-century, the world’s inventory of these weapons has increased from zero to 50,000. And on average, each of these 50,000 has a destructive capability roughly 30 times that of the Hiroshima bomb. A few hundred of the 50,000 could destroy not only the United States and the Soviet Union but, through atmospheric effects, a major part of the rest of the world as well.

Weapons are widely deployed, supported by war-planning strategies. Detailed plans for their use are in the hands of field commanders. And the troops of each side routinely undertake exercises specifically designed to prepare for that use.

This situation has evolved over the years through a series of incremental decisions. I myself participated in many of them. Each decision, taken by itself, appeared either rational or inescapable. But they were made without any reference to an overall master plan. Because we lack a long-run plan for the nuclear age, the number of weapons continues to multiply. And now we appear on the verge of an escalation in the arms race that will not only place weapons in space, but will seriously increase the risk that one or the other adversary will be tempted, in a period of tension, to initiate a preemptive nuclear strike.

It is true that four decades have passed without the use of nuclear weapons. And it is clear that both superpowers are aware of the dangers of nuclear war. But history is replete with examples of occasions when emotions have taken hold and replaced reason.

During the seven years that I served as secretary of defense, confrontations carrying a serious risk of military conflict developed on three separate occasions: Berlin in August, 1961; the Cuban missile crisis of October, 1962; the Middle East War of June, 1967. In none of these cases did either side wish war. In each, we came perilously close to it.

In the tense atmosphere of a crisis, each side will feel pressured to delegate the authority for firing nuclear weapons to field commanders. A single nuclear submarine could unleash more firepower than man has unleashed against man throughout history. And as the likelihood of attack increases, these field commanders face a desperate dilemma. Either use the weapons or risk losing them.

Now, because the strategic nuclear forces and the complex systems that are designed to command and control them are perceived by many to be vulnerable to a preemptive attack, they will argue the advantage of a preemptive strike. But the West has not found it possible to develop plans for the use of nuclear weapons in a conflict with the Soviet Union that would both assure a clear advantage to the West and avoid the high risk of escalating to all-out nuclear war. The risk that military conflict will escalate into nuclear war is far greater than I am willing to accept on military, political and moral grounds.

The conviction that we must change course is shared by groups and individuals as diverse as the anti-nuclear movement, the majority of the world’s top scientists, Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev and President Ronald Reagan. All agree that we need a plan to reduce the long-run risk of nuclear war. But there’s no consensus on what course to take; five quite different proposals have been presented:

--Achieving political reconciliation between East and West.

--Eliminating all nuclear weapons through negotiation, proposed by Gorbachev.

--Replacing deterrence with defense, elimination of offensive nuclear weapons by the substitution of defensive forces, as proposed by the President.

--Strengthening deterrence by adding defensive forces to offensive forces, as proposed by Henry A. Kissinger and others.

--Accepting the proposition that nuclear warheads have no military use whatsoever except to deter an opponent’s use of such weapons.

The East-West military rivalry is a function of the political conflict between two blocs. Many people have argued therefore that any long-term attempt to reduce the risk of nuclear war must begin by addressing the source of the tensions: the political rivalry. A long-term stable relationship between East and West is, I think, both desirable and attainable even in an atmosphere of competition and mutual suspicion. There are common interests. This relationship must rest on twin pillars of firmness and flexibility. Detente without defense would amount to surrender on the installment plan. And defense without detente would increase tensions and the risk of conflict. So I strongly urge that we embark upon a program of what might be called sustained engagement. But this process will require time, patience, consistency of purpose--and there are limits to the results. It is not, therefore, a substitute for other actions designed to reduce the risk of military conflict.

Steps to control and reverse the arms race must go forward in parallel with efforts to reduce political tensions. Therefore, let us look at four different approaches to controlling the volume and the use of weapons.

First, Gorbachev’s proposal. He suggested that the United States and the Soviet Union aim at achieving total elimination of nuclear weapons by the year 2000. Is a nuclear-free world desirable, assuming it’s attainable? I believe it is. I think most Americans would agree but the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s military strategy is based on the opposite premise. Most U.S. military and civilian experts--and most European experts--believe that nuclear weapons are a necessary deterrent to Soviet aggression by conventional forces. Zbigniew Brzezinski, for example, President Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, has called Gorbachev’s proposal “a plan for making the world safe for conventional warfare.” My criticism of Gorbachev’s vision, however, is that it’s infeasible under present circumstances. Unless we can develop technologies that would ensure protection against any nation or terrorist group building a single nuclear warhead, any agreement for total nuclear disarmament will almost certainly degenerate into an unstable rearmament race.

Next, President Reagan’s proposal, put forward in that famous speech on March 23, 1983, when he launched the Strategic Defense Initiative. It was to be a vast program promising an impenetrable shield to protect the entire nation against a missile attack. With the shield in place, the President argued, we’d be able to discard not just nuclear deterrents but nuclear weapons themselves. The President and the secretary of defense continue to promise that the strategic revolution is at hand. But virtually all others associated with SDI have recognized and admitted that achieving such a leak-proof defense is so far in the future, if ever, that it offers no solution to our current dilemma. They therefore advocate missions for a “Star Wars” system other than a perfect security shield. And these alternative missions range from defense of missile sites to partial protection of our population. For the sake of clarity, let us call these alternative programs “Star Wars” II to distinguish them from the President’s initial proposal, “Star Wars” I. It is absolutely essential to understand that “Star Wars” I and II have diametrically opposite strategic objectives.

The President’s program, if achieved, would substitute defensive for offensive systems. In contrast, all “Star Wars” II systems have one characteristic in common: They require that we continue to maintain offensive forces and add the defensive system to them. Until there are devices not yet invented, a defense strong enough to replace deterrence remains a pipe dream.

Mutual assured destruction is not, as alleged, an immoral policy. It isn’t any policy at all. But it is a grim fact of life in this nuclear age. Former Secretary of State Kissinger essentially agrees that achievement of “Star Wars” I in a time period relevant to the current problem is impossible. But Kissinger has become a strong supporter of “Star Wars” II; he believes that deploying strategic defenses while maintaining offensive systems will strengthen deterrence. And he says even a partially effective defense would introduce an element of uncertainty into Soviet attack plans and would thereby enhance deterrence. But any suspicion the Soviets may harbor about our wishing to achieve a first strike capability--and they do indeed hold such views--would be inflamed by partially effective defense.

Why will the Soviets believe that deployment of “Star Wars” II is designed to support a first-strike strategy? Because, put simply, a leaky umbrella offers no protection in a downpour. But it’s quite useful in a drizzle. That is to say such a defense would collapse under a full-scale Soviet first strike but it could cope adequately with the Soviet second strike, when the depleted forces that had survived a U.S. first strike would be fired in retaliation. And that’s the problem.

The President, in a little-remembered sentence from that same 1983 speech, recognized it when he said, “If paired with offensive systems, defensive systems can be viewed as fostering an aggressive policy and no one wants that.” He was concerned that the Soviets would regard a decision to supplement rather than replace offensive forces as an attempt to achieve first-strike capability.

And that is exactly how the Soviets interpret our program. It would be foolhardy to dismiss as mere propaganda the Soviets’ repeated warnings that a nationwide U.S. strategic defense is highly provocative. Their promise to respond with a large offensive buildup is no empty threat. We have said we would respond to a Soviet strategic defense plan exactly the same way. So we can safely conclude from both U.S. and Soviet statements that any attempt to strengthen deterrence by adding strategic defenses to strategic offensive forces will lead to a rapid escalation of the arms race.

So we cannot have both deployment of “Star Wars” and arms control. And that proposition was, I think, confirmed at Reykjavik. I see no way for U.S. deployment of an anti-ballistic-missile defense to strengthen deterrence.

We are left with the final proposition: A re-examination of the military role of nuclear weapons. Since no one has ever developed a plan for initiating the use of nuclear weapons with benefit to the West, any case for retaining current NATO strategy must rest on an ability to deter a Soviet aggression by conventional forces--and being worth the risk of nuclear war if that deterrence fails. But more and more Western political and military leaders publicly recognize that the launch of strategic nuclear weapons, or even the use of battlefield nuclear weapons, would bring greater destruction to the West than any conceivable contribution they might make to its defense. There is now less and less likelihood that the West would authorize the use of any nuclear weapons except in response to a Soviet nuclear attack.

You can’t make a credible deterrent out of an incredible action. And that’s what we’re trying to do. Moreover, compared with the huge risks we now run by relying on increasingly less-credible nuclear threats, recent studies have pointed to ways by which the West’s conventional forces may be strengthened at modest military political and economic cost.

There is a slow but discernible movement toward acceptance of three facts:

--The West’s existing plans for initiating the use of nuclear weapons, if ever implemented, are far more likely to destroy Western Europe, the United States and Japan than to defend them.

--Whatever deterrent value remains in our nuclear strategy is eroding.

--The strength and hence the deterrent capability of Western conventional forces can be increased substantially within realistic political and financial constraints.

On the basis of these facts I propose that we acknowledge that nuclear warheads have no military use whatsoever, other than to deter an opponent’s use of them. And I propose that for the long run, we base all military plans, defense budgets, weapons deployments and programs for arms-control negotiations on that proposition. The ultimate goal should be a state of mutual deterrence at the lowest levels consistent with stability. Now if the Soviet Union and the United States were to agree in principle to the propositions that Reagan and Gorbachev put forward at Reykjavik--that each side’s nuclear force would be no larger than was needed to deter a nuclear attack by the other--how might the size and composition of such a limited force be determined?

By an arms agreement restricting each side to a small number of warheads. That is quite feasible with current verification technology.

Most Americans are unaware that Western strategy now calls for early initiation of the use of nuclear weapons in a conflict with the Soviet Union. As a matter of fact, 80% of them believe we wouldn’t use such weapons unless the Soviets used them first. They would be shocked to learn they’re mistaken. And they’d be horrified to know that senior military commanders believe that to carry out our present strategy would lead to destruction of our society. But those are the facts.

In truth, the emperor has no clothes. Our current nuclear strategy is indeed bankrupt. Reagan’s intuitive reaction is correct--that we must change course. He has said time and time again that since nuclear wars cannot be won, they must never be fought. What he was attempting at Reykjavik was the first step to ensuring that they never would never be fought. And he was absolutely right.

The arms negotiations now under way, and particularly the proposals put forward at Reykjavik, represent a historic opportunity to change course. We can lay the foundation for entering the 21st Century with a totally different nuclear strategy, one of mutual security--with vastly smaller nuclear forces, something less than 1,000 warheads instead of 50,000, and with a dramatically lower risk that civilization will be destroyed. We’ve reached this current dangerous and absurd confrontation by a long series of steps, many of which seem to be rational in their time. Step by step we can undo much of that damage, to develop a strategy to restore confidence in the future.