Foreign Relations of the United States, 1981–1988, Volume I, Foundations of Foreign Policy

223. Editorial Note

On December 19, 1984, Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger delivered remarks at the Foreign Press Center. Weinberger noted that prior to President Ronald Reagan’s reelection, the President “told the American people where he stood on the most important issue before us: how to prevent nuclear war and build a more secure world, so that this generation—and future generations—will live in peace with freedom.

“President Reagan has made it clear that he wants to reduce the threat of all nuclear weapons, particularly the most dangerous ones—the nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles. By strengthening conventional forces—through both traditional and new technologies—he has begun with our allies to restore a balanced deterrent and to reduce reliance on nuclear arms in Europe. And now, by initiating a research and technology program on defenses against ballistic missiles, he has opened the door to a future in which nuclear missiles will become less and less capable of their awful mission, until we could hope for the day when the threat of nuclear weapons could be removed entirely.

“The American people have overwhelmingly endorsed these objectives. In the second Reagan administration, the President is determined to meet his commitment to the American people . . . and to America’s allies. For in presenting the challenge of strategic defense, he said of our global allies: ‘their safety and ours are one; no change in technology can, or will, alter that reality.’

“This journey to a safer world will not be easy, . . . nor short. The strategic defense research program will have to bear fruit before we will be in a position to make any decisions on deployment options. I am confident, though, that we can master the technical task before us, as we have accomplished so many other technical miracles in the past.

“For twenty years now, the Soviet nuclear missile forces that threaten our nation and our allies have grown relentlessly. I am afraid they will continue to do so, unless we can convince the Soviet leadership that we can mutually agree to reduce the nuclear ballistic arsenals through negotiations. We are also embarked on a program that we, and I am sure all men and women of good will, hope will render these missiles impotent and obsolete. The President’s Strategic Defense Initiative can contribute to curbing strategic arms competition by devaluing nuclear missiles and thus imposing prohibitively high costs on the Soviets, if they continued in their quest for missile superiority.

“In the 1960’s and early 1970’s, we had different expectations. For example, one of my predecessors even predicted the Soviets would be satisfied with a few hundred ballistic missiles. He said they had given up trying to match, much less surpass, our strategic force. We thought our self-restraint in offensive nuclear forces, combined with a ban on missile defenses, would lead the Soviets also to restrain their offensive arms, abandon defenses, and accept mutual nuclear deterrence between our countries for the indefinite future. The United States acted on this expectation.

“Through the 1960’s until the end of the 1970’s, we cut the budget for nuclear forces every year. Today, the total megatonnage of the U.S. stockpile is only one-fourth the size of our 1959 stockpile. Seventeen years ago, we had one-third more nuclear warheads than we do today. We thought this would induce the Soviets to restrain the growth of their nuclear forces.

“We also thought we could reinforce Soviet restraint and facilitate limits on offensive arms by guaranteeing our own total vulnerability to a Soviet ballistic missile attack. We unilaterally gave up all defense, not only of our cities, but of our Minuteman silos as well. We did so even though the ABM Treaty permitted each side one ABM site. Advocates of this policy reasoned that if the Soviets could easily strike American cities, they would have no incentive to deploy more missiles.

“In the mid-1970’s, however, the scope and vigor of the Soviet build-up became apparent. Once more, we tried to restore stability by negotiating the SALT II Treaty. Despite the lessons of SALT I, American negotiators again expected that the Soviets would curb their build-up if we continued to deny ourselves protection against Soviet missiles.

“Again, we were wrong. Improvements and additions to the Soviet missile force continue at a frightening pace, even though we have added SALT II restraints on top of the SALT I agreements. The Soviet Union has now built more warheads capable of destroying our missile silos than we had initially predicted they would build, even without any SALT agreement. We now confront precisely the condition that the SALT process was intended to prevent. That is why the President and I have always criticized the SALT II agreement so vigorously. It will not reduce arsenals. And the so called ‘limitation’ of arms permitted, and indeed accepted, the Soviets build-up of nuclear arms.

“Moreover, as the President reported to Congress, the Soviet Union has violated several important SALT provisions, including a ban on concealing telemetry of missile tests. Since that provision was designed to allow verification of the SALT Agreement, even President Carter stressed that ‘a violation of this part of the agreement—which we would quickly detect—would be just as serious as a violation on strategic weapons themselves.’

“The vast majority of Americans are deeply concerned about this pattern of Soviet violations. Yet some people who pride themselves on their expertise and concern for arms control have taken an upside down view. Instead of recognizing the problem of Soviet violations, they have criticized President Reagan for informing Congress about those violations. They argue that this showed he was ‘not sincere’ about arms control; as if sincerity required that we ignored Soviet violations.

“I do not wish to be captious about past mistakes. My point here is that we must learn from experience. Some people who refused to learn from the past now assert that President Reagan must choose between having his initiative on strategic defense, or trying to obtain set arms reductions. Yes, a choice is necessary. But the choice is between a better defense policy that offers hope and safety and which could bring us genuine and significant reductions, or to continue with only disproven strategic dogmas that have put us in a far less secure position.

“The real choice is between strategic defense which will facilitate genuine reductions in offensive arms with greater security for East and West; or a perpetuation of our total vulnerability to any attacking missiles—whether launched by accident or by design—in the hope, twice proven vain, that this would slow the Soviet arms build-up.

“We are all agreed that nuclear war must be prevented. This is the overriding imperative for our defense policy today, and has been for decades. However, we need to recall the United States and the Soviet Union have experienced vast changes in their relative strength, in their basic strategies, and in the types and number of weapons each possesses.

“During the first four years of the nuclear era, there was no mutual nuclear deterrence—we had a monopoly. Because the monopoly was ours, no one seriously feared nuclear war. Even Stalin—often described as defensive minded—violated the Yalta Agreement on Poland, crushed democracy in Czechoslovakia, blockaded Berlin, and encouraged North Korea’s attack on South Korea. He had no fear, paranoid or otherwise, that the U.S. would use its nuclear monopoly to maintain compliance with Yalta, much less to launch an unprovoked attack.

“Later, when the Soviet Union also built nuclear weapons, there was still no mutual deterrence based on absolute vulnerability. For during the 1950’s we spent some $100 billion (in current dollars) to defend against Soviet strategic bombers—then the only nuclear threat to the United States. At that time, some of today’s loudest critics of strategic defense advocated a large expansion of defensive systems against the bomber threat, and urged development and deployment of a ballistic missile defense for both our cities and our critical military forces.

“It was not until the Kennedy and Johnson administrations that we began to abandon our efforts to defend against nuclear attack, and instead base our entire security on the odd theory that you are safe only if you have no defense whatsoever. It came to be known as Mutual-Assured Destruction, or MAD. It has played a central role in the U.S. approach to arms control for the past 20 years; even though for many years now, actual U.S. strategy has adjusted to the fact that the original MAD concept was flawed. Our strategy has moved well beyond this to the point that it now seeks to avoid the targeting of populations.

“Today, supporters of the traditional simplistic MAD concept supply most of the criticisms of the President’s Strategic Defense Initiative. Sometimes they admit that if both sides could protect themselves perfectly the world would be better off, but they oppose any effort, including seeking major arms reductions, that could move the world in that direction.

“True believers in the disproven MAD concept hold that the prime, if not the only, objective of the strategic nuclear forces of both the United States and the Soviet Union is the ability to destroy each other’s cities. They believe that any U.S. defense against this threat is ‘destabilizing.’ It will, they say, inevitably provoke an overwhelming increase in Soviet forces and will increase Soviet incentives to strike preemptively in a crisis. They fail to appreciate the deterrent value of missile defenses, because they wrongly project upon the Soviet military their own irrational idea of the purpose of a Soviet attack. In fact, the Soviet military have designed their offensive forces to be capable of destroying Allied and U.S. military forces, in particular our silo-based missiles and military targets in Europe. At the same time, the Soviet Union has never abandoned its objective of defending its homeland against nuclear attack.

“The ABM Treaty never blinded the Soviets to the need for effective defenses. They have continued to place great emphasis on aid defense. They are now ready to deploy a defense system with capabilities against both aircraft and many ballistic missiles. They have a massive program of underground shelters. They have built five ABM radars, with another one under construction, that give them double coverage of all ICBM approaches to the Soviet Union; and they have exploited fully the provisions of the ABM treaty and—what is more—almost certainly violated it, as they advance their capacity for deployment of a widespread ballistic missile defense. Since the signing of the ABM Treaty, the Soviet Union has spent more on strategic defensive forces than on strategic offensive forces. Clearly, the Soviets do not share the MAD philosophy that defenses are bad.

“So, it is quite wrong to argue that the President’s initiative on strategic defense would ‘upset 35 years of mutual deterrence,’ and spoil a successful approach to arms control and stability. On the contrary, the President’s initiative will finally correct the conventional wisdom, which is so often wrong.

“As we proceed, we will of course not give up our triad of deterrent offensive systems. Rather, we continue to maintain deterrence, and indeed strengthen and modernize all three elements of our triad, because we do not know when we will actually be in a position to put our strategic defense system in place. But reliance exclusively on these offensive systems, without pursuing effective defenses, condemns us to a future in which our safety is based only on the threat of avenging aggression. Our safety and that of our allies should be based on something more than the prospect of mutual terror.

“Another mistake critics of strategic defense make is to contend that effective defense is technically unobtainable. History is filled with flat predictions about the impossibility of technical achievements that we have long since taken for granted. Albert Einstein predicted in 1932: ‘There is not the slightest indication that [nuclear] energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will.’

“Based on our research so far, we cannot now say how soon we will be in a position to make decisions on defensive options; nor can we today describe all the specific forms of such defenses. But clearly, the Soviet military and their scientists at least are confident that strategic missile defenses will be effective. Their extensive effort to acquire such defenses gives ample evidence of their conviction, as does their major effort to stop us from proceeding with our defense initiative.

“We all recognized from the outset that a complete system, or combination of systems, for strategic defenses could not be deployed overnight. There could be a transition period when some defenses would be deployed and operating before others would be ready. Some have argued that this transition would be particularly dangerous, that it would upset the present deterrent system without putting an adequate substitute in its place.

“The opposite is the case. If properly planned and phased, the transitional capabilities would strengthen our present deterrent capability, which is one of President Reagan’s high priorities. In fact, they could make a major contribution to the prevention of nuclear war, even before a fully effective system is deployed.

“If the Soviet leaders ever contemplated initiating a nuclear attack, their purpose would be to destroy U.S. or NATO military forces that would be able to oppose the aggression. Defenses that could deny the Soviet missiles the military objectives of their attack, or deny the Soviets confidence in the achievement of those objectives, would discourage them from even considering such an attack, and thus be a highly effective deterrent.

“But we would not want to let efforts towards a transitional defense exhaust our energies, or dilute our efforts to secure a thoroughly reliable, layered defense that would destroy incoming Soviet missiles at all phases of their flight. Such a system would be designed to destroy weapons not people. With such a system we do not even raise the question of whether we are trying to defend missiles or cities. We would be trying to destroy Soviet missiles by non-nuclear means. And I emphasize again—by non-nuclear means—before the Soviet missiles get near any targets in this country or in the Alliance. The choice is not between defending people or weapons. Even the early phases in deployment of missile defenses can protect people. Our goal is to destroy weapons that kill people.

“Thus, based on a realistic view of Soviet military planning, the transition to strategic defense would not be destabilizing. In fact, initial defense capabilities would offer a combination of benefits. They would contribute to deterrence by denying Soviet attack goals. And should deterrence ever fail, they would save lives by reducing the scope of destruction that would result from a Soviet military attack. The more effective the defenses, the more effective this protection would be. This objective is far more idealistic, moral, and practical than the position taken by those who still adhere to the Mutual-Assured Destruction theory, namely that defenses must be totally abandoned.

“I know that some Europeans fear that our pursuit of the defense initiative would tend to ‘decouple’ America from Europe. This is quite wrong. The security of the United States is inseparable from the security of Western Europe. As we vigorously pursue our strategic defense research program, we work closely with all our allies to ensure the program benefits our security as a whole.

“In addition to strengthening our nuclear deterrent, such defenses would also enhance NATO’s ability to deter Soviet aggression in Western Europe by reducing the ability of Soviet ballistic missiles to put at risk those facilities essential to the conventional defense of Europe—airfields, ports, depots, and communications facilities, to name just a few examples. An effective strategic defense would create great uncertainties in the mind of the aggressor, reduce the likelihood of a successful conventional attack on Western Europe, and thereby reduce the chance the Soviet Union would contemplate such an attack in the first place.

“Yet some of the discussions of the President’s initiative, are based on the assumption that the United States can prevent indefinitely Soviet deployment of defenses merely by abstaining from our research and technology program.

“Soviet history, the doctrines elaborated by their military leadership, and their current programs amply show that the Soviet leaders do not feel they are restrained by the ABM Treaty’s prohibition against a widespread defense against ballistic missiles. If the Soviets develop such a system from their intensive research program, in all probability they will deploy it.

“Recent political comment on the relationship of arms control and strategic defense fails to confront that reality. Our Strategic Defense Initiative truly is a bold program to examine a broad range of advanced technologies to see if they can provide the United States and its allies with greater security and stability in the years ahead by rendering ballistic missiles obsolete. We have approached this program from the beginning according to the principle that SDI and arms control should work together . . . that each can make the other more effective. SDI is a research and development program that is being conducted completely within the ABM Treaty.

“In the near term, our initiative on strategic defense also provides a powerful deterrent to a Soviet breakout from the ABM Treaty, a prospect made more worrisome by recent compliance questions—such as the new Soviet radar which is almost certainly in violation of the ABM Treaty. Our strategic defense research program also makes clear that we take seriously the Soviet build-up in offensive arms. We have reminded the Soviet Union that both sides agreed to the ABM Treaty in the first place, with the understanding that it would be followed by effective limitations on offensive arms. The Strategic Defense Initiative is not only the strongest signal we can send that we mean what we agreed to, it is the only real hope for a future without nuclear weapons. So we cannot accept the refusal of the Soviet Union to agreed to real reductions in offensive arms, as we pursue the Strategic Defense Initiative.

“In the long term, strategic defense may provide the means by which both the United States and the Soviet Union can safely agree to very deep reductions and, someday, even the elimination of nuclear arms. Many talk about such reductions, but we are working on the means by which they could actually come about without creating dangerous instabilities. We have sought to engage the Soviet Union in comprehensive discussions on how to make arms reductions more effective in the near term and on how to provide a safer future for all mankind.

“This is not a process that will be aided by partisan or uniformed rhetoric aimed at forcing unilateral restraint upon the United States, as the history of the ABM Treaty itself has shown us that.

“Progress toward a more secure future will, instead, require both a determined strategic defense R&D effort, and persistent and patient dialogue with the Soviet Union in the months and years ahead.

“Of course, we must negotiate with the Soviet Union—not for the purpose of freezing forever the vast numbers of existing warheads or permitting more and more of them—as SALT II did—with their hideous threat of total destruction and mutual vulnerability. No, we should negotiate with them to find a path to escape from that horror. That is why President Reagan holds before us the vision of a future world free from the threat of nuclear destruction. We must try to get the Soviet Union to join us in making such threats impotent, so that we can someday rid the world of the nuclear arms that underly such threats. This goal may seem far away, but difficulties should never cloud an inspired vision, nor slow us in our constant striving to realize that vision for all humanity. Let us move on to the bright, sunny upland where there is hope for a better future for all, of which we all dream.” (News Release, Office of Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs), No. 648–84, December 19, 1984; Public Statements of Caspar W. Weinberger, Secretary of Defense, 1984, volume IV, pages 2524–2529; all brackets are in the original.)