Administration Spurns Nixon, Kissinger View

Reagan Administration officials bluntly rejected the arms control advice of former President Richard M. Nixon and former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger on Sunday, saying their objections to a proposed nuclear missile deal with the Soviet Union are “unrealistic.”

Nixon and Kissinger, speaking jointly for the first time since they left office, warned President Reagan in a column written for Sunday’s Times that he is heading for “the wrong kind of deal” on medium-range nuclear missiles.

The Administration and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev, hoping to hold a superpower summit meeting later this year, have agreed on the broad outlines of an agreement under which both countries would withdraw all their intermediate-range nuclear weapons from Europe.

Two Major Changes

But Nixon and Kissinger urged Reagan to insist on two major changes in the agreement now being negotiated: First, that the pact be linked to ending the Soviets’ overwhelming advantage in conventional military forces in Europe, and second, that it be widened to eliminate Soviet intermediate-range missiles in Asia as well as Europe.

The Administration issued a polite official response--”We genuinely welcome everyone’s view on this issue,” White House spokesman Dan Howard said--but other officials swiftly dismissed the Nixon-Kissinger critique.

“I think their two suggestions have some merit,” said Kenneth L. Adelman, director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, “but I don’t believe that either is sufficient to warrant not going ahead with the INF (intermediate nuclear forces) deal.”

Adelman and other officials said the Administration does not believe there is any prospect of reaching a useful agreement to reduce Soviet conventional forces in Europe soon. They said that insisting on such a link would make the proposed medium-range nuclear pact impossible.

‘Killer Amendment’

“That’s a killer amendment,” Adelman said in a telephone interview Sunday evening. “If it’s in there, we will not have INF.”

“It’s just unrealistic,” said a White House aide who spoke on condition that he not be identified. “As a practical matter, negotiating that kind of omnibus treaty is simply impossible.”

As for Nixon and Kissinger’s proposal that all intermediate-range nuclear weapons be eliminated, Adelman and other officials noted that the Administration has sought such an agreement but settled for a compromise that allows each side to keep 100 medium-range warheads.

“The ideal of getting rid of the 100 warheads in Asia has long been a priority of ours,” but if the Soviets insist on keeping them, that won’t “bust the deal,” Adelman said.

The extraordinary criticism from Nixon and Kissinger, two of the Republican Party’s most respected foreign policy elders, followed earlier warnings about the INF deal from such figures as Senate Majority Leader Robert C. Byrd (D-W. Va.), Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) and Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sam Nunn (D-Ga.).

“For six years, people have been complaining that Ronald Reagan was too tough to negotiate an arms deal with the Russians,” one Administration official said. “Now he’s almost got one, and they’re complaining that he’s too soft.”

Criticism Returned

“A lot of people in the Reagan Administration were quite critical of the Nixon-Kissinger arms control policies when they were in office,” Adelman noted. “So it’s quite understandable why they’d be critical of our arms control effort. One turn deserves another, I guess.”

In their article, Nixon and Kissinger said the final withdrawal of U.S. intermediate-range missiles from Europe should be linked to the conclusion of an agreement to end Soviet conventional superiority on the Continent. Otherwise, they warned, the withdrawal of nuclear weapons “would simply make Europe safe for conventional war.”

“If we strike the wrong kind of deal, we could create the most profound crisis of the NATO (North American Treaty Organization) alliance in its 40-year history,” they warned.

Adelman responded that the imbalance in conventional forces existed well before the United States deployed intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Europe.

“If we withdraw (the missiles), it’ll be the same imbalance that was there before,” he said.

He noted that the United States and the Soviet Union have negotiated for more than a decade toward reductions in conventional forces, with virtually no results.

“I don’t believe conventional imbalances can be remedied through arms control negotiations,” Adelman said. “They can be remedied, if ever, by the Europeans building up their conventional armament.

“Kissinger and Nixon were there at the outset of MBFR” talks on the reduction of conventional forces in Europe, he said. “They realized nothing ever came of them.”

Warheads in Asia

Nixon and Kissinger also argued that the Soviets should not be allowed to keep 100 medium-range warheads in Asia. They charged that those weapons could still be used in Europe or could threaten Japan, China and South Korea.

“Our negotiators must hold their ground on these points,” they said. “No deal is better than a bad deal.”

Responded Adelman: “We’re working to get a good deal. . . . It would be nice not to leave the last 100 warheads there. But is it worth it to get a 5-to-1 reduction in Soviet (medium-range warheads)? The answer is yes.”

The agreement under consideration would eliminate 1,335 Soviet warheads and 216 U.S. warheads.

A former Kissinger aide, Helmut Sonnenfeldt, said he agreed with the Administration that negotiating a conventional arms reduction agreement along with the nuclear pact is “probably impossible.”

He added that withdrawing intermediate-range nuclear weapons will not leave Europe without any usable tactical nuclear weaponry, as Nixon and Kissinger argued.

“I think they underrated the role that manned aircraft (with nuclear bombs) and cruise missiles can play,” he said.

Nixon Interviewed

Meanwhile, in an interview with Time magazine published Sunday, Nixon repeated his criticism of the Administration’s position--but added that he believes the medium-range talks can become a step toward a “comprehensive compromise.”

“There will be a summit, and there will be an agreement at the summit,” Nixon said. “The question is, how can we use the agreement to make progress on fundamental issues?

“Gorbachev is the ablest of the Soviet leaders I’ve met,” Nixon said. “He’s charismatic, eloquent and highly intelligent. If he were a candidate in our elections, he’d be a sure-fire winner. He’s even interested in reforms. But he’s not a philanthropist. So why is he accepting the zero option? Why is he willing to give up more intermediate-range warheads than we would have to give up?

“It’s because he’s playing chess while we’re playing checkers. He’s not just looking at numbers of weapons. He’s looking at the board in broader political and military terms. He has to be taking pleasure that the prospect of this proposal is causing consternation in Europe. He wants to decouple the U.S. from Europe.”