Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume XXXII, SALT I, 1969–1972

Editor:

Erin R. Mahan

General Editor:

Edward C. Keefer

United States Government Printing Office
Washington

Office of the Historian
Bureau of Public Affairs

Table of Contents

• Preface
• Sources
• Abbreviations and Terms
• Persons
• SALT I, 1969–1972
• Preparations for SALT, January 27–November 12, 1969 (Documents 1-40)
• Opening Round at Helsinki and Preparations for Vienna, November 17, 1969–April 15, 1970 (Documents 41-70)
• Round Two at Vienna, April 18–August 13, 1970 (Documents 71-102)
• From Stalemate to Breakthrough, August 24, 1970–May 20, 1971 (Documents 103-160)
• From SALT Announcement to Summit Announcement, May 27–October 12, 1971 (Documents 161-204)
• Narrowing the Issues, October 19, 1971–April 18, 1972 (Documents 205-258)
• Kissinger’s Secret Trip to Moscow and Aftermath, April 19–May 17, 1972 (Documents 259-281)
• The Summit and Congressional Approval of the SALT Agreements, May 19–October 4, 1972 (Documents 282-343)
• Index

Overview

The Strategic Arms Limitation Talks produced a series of comprehensive arms control agreements between the United States and the Soviet Union that for the first time limited the deployment of ballistic missiles and anti-ballistic missile systems. Commonly referred to as “SALT I,” the agreements were signed by President Richard Nixon and the General Secretary of the Soviet Union Leonid Brezhnev at the Moscow Summit in May 1972. This volume documents the negotiations leading up to the agreement, the internal deliberations among U.S. policy makers, and reveals the play of political and national security considerations that factored into U.S. policy decisions.

The volume is organized chronologically covering the period of analytical preparation before SALT began, the various rounds of negotiations with the Soviet Union alternating among the cities of Helsinki, Geneva and Vienna, the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs Henry Kissinger's secret trip to Moscow in April 1972, discussions between President Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev at the Moscow Summit in May 1972, and the Nixon administration's efforts to secure congressional approval of the SALT agreement and ratification of the ABM treaty.

Sources for this volume include documents generated in the White House, the National Security Council, the Department of State, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. The editor included extracts from memorandums of conversation between Henry Kissinger, and Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin, telephone transcripts and meeting memoranda prepared by chief SALT negotiator, Gerard Smith, and a significant number of backchannel messages among Smith, Kissinger and Alexander Haig, Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs. Additionally, the editor transcribed specifically for this volume more than twenty excerpts from conversations recorded among the President and his advisors on the secret White House taping system.