U.S. Orders Bombers Off Alert in First Stage of Nuclear Cuts : Disarmament: Cheney also directs a ‘stand-down’ for 450 ICBMs. He challenges Soviet Union to take similar action.

U.S. forces operating strategic bombers and some ballistic missiles were ordered Saturday to “stand down” in the first moves to implement President Bush’s dramatic nuclear-arms-reduction package.

Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, acting on the President’s orders, directed the crews of 280 U.S. strategic bombers and 450 Minuteman II missiles to relax the hair-trigger alerts they have maintained for more than 30 years.

Speaking to reporters a day after Bush unveiled a package of unilateral nuclear-arms initiatives, Cheney challenged the Soviet leadership “to match their words with their deeds” and to respond with concessions of their own.

“This morning, I have signed the executive order taking our strategic bomber force and our Minuteman II missile force off alert status, thereby implementing the first part of the President’s decision,” Cheney said at a Pentagon briefing Saturday morning. “It is, in my opinion, the single biggest change in the deployment of U.S. nuclear weapons since they were first integrated into our forces in 1954.”

But Cheney warned that the relaxation of U.S. vigilance would not continue in the absence of similar moves by the Soviet Union, noting that many of Bush’s initiatives can be reversed in 24 hours.

Gen. Colin L. Powell, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that of the 280 B-52 and B-1 long-range bombers in the U.S. Strategic Air Command fleet, 40 are on short-notice alert at any given time. And all of America’s intercontinental ballistic missile silos are staffed 24 hours a day, ready for launch at a moment’s notice. “They will all be off alert by the end of the day,” Powell said.

Powell said the 40 aircraft are capable of carrying “several hundred” nuclear bombs and missiles, but he declined to be more specific, saying the exact number of weapons is classified.

“It is a historic turning point” in the U.S. global military posture, said Powell, appearing with Cheney at the Pentagon briefing. “If the Soviets respond fully and in kind, I think we’ll go a very, very long way to allowing both nations to finally begin to step down the thermonuclear ladder after some 40 years.”

In Moscow, Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev said Saturday that his reaction to the Bush initiative is “very positive.” He called the proposals “serious steps forward toward the nuclear-free world.” But he said Bush’s plan is too complex to respond to immediately and in detail. He added that he and Bush have agreed to discuss the proposals at some time in the near future.

Russian Federation President Boris N. Yeltsin called for parallel cuts on the Soviet side to match those announced by Bush.

White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said the Administration was pleased by the Soviet reply. “The President believes this is a positive response, and we will continue to consult with the Soviets,” he said.

In Paris, French officials Saturday proposed holding a summit on nuclear weaponry in the near future with the United States, the Soviet Union and Britain.

The Soviet nuclear arsenal today contains about 27,000 warheads, including 10,000 ground-launched, short-range weapons such as those the United States will eliminate. The stockpile also includes an estimated 7,000 nuclear bombs carried aboard aircraft.

Several thousand of the Soviet warheads are based in republics that have asserted independence from Moscow. They are considered a threat because they could fall into the wrong hands or be used in a civil conflict, officials said.

The changes announced Friday by Bush directly eliminate fewer than 3,000 U.S. nuclear weapons out of the total U.S. arsenal of about 22,000. And about two-thirds of those affected already had been declared obsolete and due for retirement.

Cheney said that the failed coup in the Soviet Union in August, and its aftermath, prompted the dramatic change in Administration thinking on arms control. Cheney acknowledged that he would not have advocated such steps as removing nuclear weapons from Navy surface ships or standing down the bomber fleet even as recently as two years ago.

Cheney said the Administration hopes to capitalize on the political turmoil and economic crisis in the Soviet Union to push Moscow toward drastic reductions in its nuclear stockpile.

“The leaders of the Soviet Union have expressed profound skepticism themselves about the massive strategic nuclear arsenal and the resources that they have continued to invest in maintaining that force,” Cheney said. “Both Presidents Gorbachev and Yeltsin have talked about their desire to reduce the nuclear arsenal. We want to give them an opportunity to do this, to match their words with their deeds.

“These moves also challenge the Soviets to do what we’re doing by following up with initiatives of their own,” he added. He said military spending in the Soviet Union and its republics is “an expensive drag on the economy which they do not need and cannot afford.”

He said Bush’s proposals--including unilateral U.S. elimination of most battlefield tactical nuclear weapons--would allow the Soviets to shift away from their defense-oriented economy. “It gives the Soviets the incentive they need to shift their country away from the business of cranking out nuclear weapons and toward the work of building democracy,” Cheney said.

Cheney and Powell offered additional details of the President’s plan. Among the highlights:

* The United States will destroy about 2,100 land-based tactical nuclear weapons, including 8-inch and 155-millimeter artillery shells and 850 Lance single-warhead missiles. Of the total, 1,700 warheads are deployed overseas--mostly in Europe and South Korea--with the rest in storage in the United States.

* An estimated 500 tactical nuclear weapons deployed at sea will be returned to the United States and placed in secure storage depots. The weapons include nuclear bombs and depth charges and nuclear-tipped Tomahawk cruise missiles carried on surface ships and attack submarines. Half will be stored for use in emergencies; the other half, including all the depth charges, will be destroyed. Of the 350 nuclear Tomahawk missiles in the Navy inventory, about 100 are deployed at sea at any given time.

* Cancellation of the three programs cited by Bush in his Friday speech will eventually save about $20 billion. The rail-car basing for the 10-warhead MX missile would have cost $6.8 billion over the life of the program; the mobile small intercontinental ballistic missile carried a price tag of $11 billion; and the short-range attack missile known as SRAM-2 was a $2.2-billion program. But Cheney cautioned that early cancellation of the programs would carry short-term costs, particularly penalties that the Pentagon will have to pay contractors for dumping the contracts.

Although the reductions outlined this weekend are dramatic, Cheney and Powell emphasized that the United States retains a formidable nuclear deterrent, beginning with the virtually invulnerable fleet of Trident and Poseidon ballistic-missile submarines, 12 of which are on alert at all times.

The United States will also maintain a fleet of medium-range bombers in Europe equipped to launch nuclear cruise missiles and drop gravity bombs. The Air Force will keep on alert 50 MX Peacekeeper missiles, each carrying 10 highly accurate warheads, and 500 three-warhead Minuteman III missiles.

“The world has changed, but insurance is still a good idea,” Cheney said. “And under this plan, we believe we will have enough.

“I am absolutely confident, based upon the work that we’ve done, that we can say with confidence that our security and that of our allies is protected,” he added. “Even with these initiatives, we will retain sufficient nuclear forces, and we are committed to keeping them up to date and effective.”

Cheney said Bush hopes to initiate a new round of negotiations with the Soviets aimed at eliminating all ground-based, multiple-warhead missiles under the guidelines of the recently signed Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START). Such missiles are considered destabilizing because they present rich targets for preemptive attack.

But Cheney repeated the longstanding U.S. objection to any limits on submarine-based multiple-warhead rockets, saying that submarines are almost impossible to target and therefore do not tempt a first strike in case of a crisis.

The Soviets have resisted any talks on cutting multi-warhead missiles unless sea-based systems are included. Cheney did not say what the United States would do if Moscow rejects that part of the package.

Bush also invited the Soviets to enter discussions about deploying defenses against ballistic missile attack, which are sharply limited by the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. The United States wants to amend or abrogate the treaty to allow it to press forward with the “Star Wars” anti-missile system while the Soviets have for years tried to block the controversial program.

Rep. Les Aspin, the Wisconsin Democrat who chairs the House Armed Services Committee, said Saturday that the submarine issue may account for Gorbachev’s lukewarm response to Bush’s initiatives.

He said it is likely that the Soviets will respond with a proposal that addresses multiple-warhead missiles on submarines, as well as Moscow’s interest in banning all nuclear testing.

Powell said U.S. military doctrine has been moving away from reliance on short-range nuclear weapons for several years as the accuracy and power of conventional munitions has improved.

“We can now do conventionally much more efficiently things we thought we could only do with tactical nuclear weapons,” as demonstrated by the Persian Gulf War, Powell said.

But the four-star Army general added: “You can be absolutely sure that we are in as strong a deterrent posture today as we were yesterday, and it will improve in the future. We are doing nothing that would put the nation at risk.”

End of Alert Here are 11 Air Force bases where long-range nuclear bombers were removed from full-time alert: * Barksdale AFB, La. * Carswell AFB, Tex. * Dyess AFB, Tex. * Ellsworth AFB, S.D. * Fairchild AFB, Wash. * Grand Forks AFB, N.D. * Griffiss AFB, N.Y. * McConnell AFB, Kan. * Minot AFB, N.D. * K.I. Sawyer AFB, Mich. * Wurtsmith AFB, Mich. Source: Associated Press