Baker Backs Nuclear Russia as a Deterrent

Secretary of State James A. Baker III agreed Thursday that Russia should retain part of the massive Soviet nuclear arsenal, even though most of the missiles are aimed at the United States and its allies, because a nuclear-free Russia would upset the concept of deterrence that has kept the peace for the last four decades.

Recounting his just-completed talks in the Russian Federation and four other republics of the disintegrating Soviet Union, Baker said he received assurances that all Soviet nuclear weapons deployed outside of Russia would be destroyed, leaving President Boris N. Yeltsin’s government as the sole successor to Soviet nuclear power.

Asked if he believes Russia, too, should denuclearize, Baker said he does not because “I am not prepared to walk away from the concept of nuclear deterrence that has kept the peace for more than 40 years.”

“I would like to see zero weapons targeted on the United States, but I am not prepared . . . to subscribe to the philosophy of denuclearization,” Baker said.

Baker declined to be specific about which country Russian nuclear weapons might serve to deter.

“No,” he said in response to a question, “and I won’t be more specific about whom our weapons are deterring. But over the past 40 years, they have served as a substantial and significant deterrent.”

It appeared that Baker interpreted the question to mean denuclearization of both the United States and Russia, and perhaps even denuclearization of all nations. Most experts reject that goal as utopian, since the technology of nuclear weapons cannot be unlearned by scientists. Also, the world could be a more dangerous place if all nations disarmed but one renegade country, such as Libya, suddenly obtained one atomic weapon.

The Administration has long taken the view that total nuclear disarmament is perilous for U.S. security, which has relied on nuclear weapons as the ultimate sanction. This argument stems from concern about the nuclear programs of lesser military powers, including China, and others that could produce nuclear weapons.

Arms experts have also made the point that if all Soviet nuclear weapons were eliminated, external and internal pressures would build on the United States to do the same, leaving Washington without the ability to deter future nuclear blackmail.

Nevertheless, Baker told a press conference after a meeting of NATO foreign ministers that the three republics, besides Russia, where Soviet nuclear arms now are stationed have agreed to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as non-nuclear states, once they become fully independent. This would require them to get rid of the arms they now possess.

His assertion that Kazakhstan, the republic with the second largest number of Soviet nuclear arms after Russia, is ready to give them up unconditionally contradicted remarks made earlier this week by Kazakh officials who said the Central Asian republic would retain some weapons as long as Russia did.

With Baker standing at his side, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev told reporters Tuesday that he favors total elimination of the Soviet nuclear arsenal, but until that happens, he said that at least some weapons would “stay both in Russia and Kazakhstan.”

Nazarbayev’s press spokesman, Seit-Cazy Matayev, said it was “not acceptable” to destroy all nuclear arms deployed in Kazakhstan while nuclear weapons remained in Russia.

But in Brussels, Baker said Nazarbayev told him privately that Kazakhstan would join Ukraine and Belarus, the other two republics where nuclear arms are deployed, in signing the Non-Proliferation Treaty as a non-nuclear power. He said the only condition Nazarbayev attached to his commitment was that Kazakhstan become “a sovereign nation and is regarded (by the rest of the world) as such.”

Baker dismissed as a “misunderstanding,” caused by a faulty translation, the reports of Kazakh reluctance.

“None of the three want to be a nuclear state,” Baker said of Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus. He said the anti-nuclear feeling was especially strong in Ukraine and Belarus because of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster. Chernobyl is located in Ukraine near the border with Belarus.

In any event, Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus all told Baker that they have agreed to place under a joint military command all Soviet nuclear weapons that remain after the destruction required by existing U.S.-Soviet arms reduction agreements.

Baker said his talks “certainly open up the possibility that there can be these remarkable changes in the Soviet Union that could take place in a way that will not proliferate the number of nuclear states.”

As a result of the trip that ended early Thursday before Baker flew to Brussels, the secretary of state was able to tell his fellow North Atlantic Treaty Organization foreign ministers that one of their hopes for the future of Soviet power seems to be on the way to being satisfied.

In a final communique, NATO said: “We expect the leaders of the union and the republics to ensure the safe, responsible and reliable control of nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction. We are ready to respond as fully as possible to requests for practical assistance in achieving these objectives.”

Baker said, in effect, that he has already obtained such a commitment.

U.S. experts are expected to arrive in all four nuclear republics next month to offer assistance and advice in destruction of Soviet nuclear arms. The U.S. government is prepared to contribute $400 million of the cost. And Baker said that other NATO countries could also send experts to help out.

Meantime, the foreign ministers offered to transport and distribute “urgent” humanitarian assistance to the disintegrating Soviet Union, their former adversary.

NATO Secretary General Manfred Woerner declared that now is a “critical moment for our alliance” and said that NATO would draft plans for delivering aid of various kinds.

For his part, Baker said NATO could send “no better political signal” than coordinating humanitarian assistance to show that the alliance is purely a defensive one.

Times staff writer Robert C. Toth, in Washington, contributed to this story.