180. Memorandum From the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (Perry) to Secretary of Defense Brown and the Deputy Secretary of Defense (Claytor)1
SUBJECT
- M–X Status Report—INFORMATION MEMORANDUM (U)
1. M–X Steering Committee (U)
(S) The M–X system is facing formidable opposition from a variety of sources and for a variety of reasons—some real, some imagined, and some politically inspired. We have established a Steering Committee to correct the real problems, dispel the imaginary problems, and cope with the politically-inspired problems. The committee, which I chair, consists of Gen Bob Mathis, Toni Chayes, Robin Pirie, Tom Ross and Jack Stempler. We had our first meeting last Monday2 and will meet about once a week to plan strategy and coordinate tactics on actions bearing on substantive program issues and public/congressional relation issues.
2. Program Issues (U)
(S) The focus of the engineering effort is to effect a design simplification so that we can reduce cost. We have dropped the dedicated railroad track which connects the valleys in favor of a dedicated road, which is significantly cheaper. We are exploring a variation of the horizontal-dash (racetrack) system in which the transporter is detachable from the erector launcher and only the latter goes into the horizontal shelter. This design is several billion dollars cheaper, but permits only road-to-shelter dash instead of shelter-to-shelter dash. We are working on an operational plan for this design which maintains the high confidence in survivability we had in the baseline (horizontal-dash) system.
(S) We continue work on the Environmental Impact Statement, focusing on the “narrowing” issue. We are eliminating a number of regions for operational or geotechnical reasons but are not eliminating regions for reasons of increased basing costs. As a result, we will probably end up with two acceptable regions—the Nevada/Utah basin, and the Northern Texas/New Mexico plateau. That means we have [Page 774] three alternatives—Nevada/Utah, Texas/New Mexico, or split basing, with the first one preferable, the second one more expensive (and with greater public impact); and the third most expensive (by $2 to $5 billion). While these results will clearly indicate the desirability of sticking with Nevada/Utah basing, I don’t believe the EIS study should reach that conclusion; rather, that decision gets bucked to SECDEF and—if we were to decide to propose the split basing at the extra cost-to the President for approval and Congress for appropriation.
3. Congressional/Public Interface (U)
a. House (U)
(S) The FY 81 M–X request will be supported by the HASC without crippling amendments. HAC is still an unknown, but could be a problem. Gunn McKay is taking a real position of leadership here. He held a constructive hearing last week which cleared up a lot of misinformation on M–X basing. I will be meeting with him tomorrow morning (at his request) to plan a strategy for getting the bill through the house and for interfacing with State Officials. I will seek his advice on how to handle the split basing issue (clearly Nevada and Utah would prefer this, but the Congress probably would not accept the additional cost).
b. Senate (U)
(S) SASC will probably support the FY 81 request, but may be looking for restrictive language. I see Sen Nunn as the focal point on the Democratic side and will meet with him to discuss strategy. Sen Warner has offered to take the leadership in bringing around the Republicans, whose opposition is partially state oriented (Sen Garn) and partially politically inspired. Sen Warner will argue that a bipartisan approach is indicated for this important national security program, and that Republican opposition to M–X “because its the wrong design” is transparent and could backfire on them. He is planning an additional M–X hearing this Wednesday3 at which he will invite some dissident Senators, not on the committee, to give them a chance to get onboard. Additionally, I plan to meet one-on-one with Sen Garn to see if I can determine how much of his objection is a real concern with the system (which we can deal with) and how much is Utah politics.
c. State Leadership (U)
(S) I met with Gov Matheson and Gov List last week4 and gave them a chance to express their concerns. I explained in detail why other basing options (air mobile, SUM, etc.) are unattractive. We talked about the split basing option; I assured them that the Air Force EIS study would not foreclose the split option, but that the extra cost would be a [Page 775] significant negative factor in considerations of OSD, the President, and the Congress. I will be visiting them on a monthly basis from now on, and will invite them to join me in some M–X site visits. Gov Matheson is sponsoring a two hour TV debate that will be nationally broadcast (PBS) on 24 April. I proposed that Dave Aaron, Toni Chayes and I represent the Administration’s position (Policy, Public Interface, and Military/Technical). Bill Moyer will be the moderator and will select three “Doves” and three “Hawks” to round out the debate. Sounds interesting.
d. Public Information (U)
(S) We also are coordinating through the Steering Committee a series of public speeches with local groups in Nevada and Utah. I’ll have a schedule for your review soon. Also, Tom Ross is preparing a schedule for one-on-one interviews with influential journalists.
4. Tactics (U)
(S) I believe that we should take the initiative with our design changes. We should be able to settle on them when the Defense Science Board review is completed (in a few weeks). At that time, we should brief the committees and be sure that the FY 81 language is consistent with this design. Ichord and McKay in the House, and Nunn and Warner, in the Senate, will probably take the lead in reviewing and validating that these actions are desirable and responsive to the Stevens Amendment.
(S) I don’t have a plan yet on dealing with the split basing problem. I feel that the initiative on that should come from the Congress through language in the 81 bill. I will discuss this further with McKay and Nunn. If we were to ultimately go with split basing, there would be some “credit” which probably should go to Gunn McKay and shared somewhat by the governors. If split basing were ultimately to be rejected on cost, it is better not to raise expectations and to put this in the clear perspective of something to which we are giving a fair hearing but about which we are not optimistic.
- Source: Carter Library, National Security Affairs, Staff Material, Office, Presidential Advisory Board, Box 84, Sensitive XX: 4/1–11/80. Secret. Smith sent the memorandum to Brzezinski and Vance via Alpha Channel under cover of an April 3 memorandum, on which Brzezinski wrote: “JW/your reaction? ZB.”↩
- March 24. No minutes of the meeting were found.↩
- April 2.↩
- No minutes of this meeting were found.↩