141. Electronic Message From Robert Linhard of the National Security Council Staff to Rodney McDaniel and Robert Pearson of the National Security Council Staff1
SUBJECT
- NST Experts Meeting—Final (I hope)
Admiral,
Summary: Seven dwarfs go to Moscow: Nitze, Kampleman, Perle, Lehman, Giltman, Linhard and—Rowny—.
This has been one long day! As previous notes indicate, at about 10am I got wind of a session2 with SECSTATE in which Paul would recommend that, given the composition of Soviet delegation (heavy on negotiators, and Ron Lehman’s counterpart, Obukov present), we should include Ron Lehman. In short, the composition of the US team would be opened up. I sent you a profs3 outlining the options that existed prior to the session.
At about 11:45, I got a secure call direct from SECSTATE who wanted to know our views on options. He said he had two: (1) keep the agreed 4; or (2) go to six by adding Ron and Mike. It was clear that he felt that 6 was right. He said that he didn’t want to undercut Ron, and that since we wanted to move in INF, we should have Mike too. As he put it, we are so serious we are sending both our Geneva team and our Washington team. I raised Rowny, and he didn’t bite at all. I told him that I would like to talk to you, but that I’d get back to him by mid-afternoon at any case.
Chaired a prep session at 2pm. After it, explained to Timbie my specific concern about the developments, and why Rowny now should go. On the one hand, once the SECSTATE upped the anty to 6, Rowny would surely go ballistic is not included. Given the current voting on the defense bill in both the House and the Senate, and that Rowny is spring-loaded to make a stink, it wouldn’t take much to have 5 or 6 on the right (Coulter, Laxalt, Kemp, etc.) to come up on the net in Rowny’s defense at this critical vote time to really catch the attention of the L&L community and the President. (We just defeated the Bennet-Johnson and Exon amendments on SDI by one vote each.) If there is [Page 560] any risk that we would cave to this, better to avoid the situation and have Ed participate now. On the other hand, given that we don’t like the Soviet mix of delegates anyway (Karpov, Obukov, Chervov and Detinov), if we add 3 they may add one or two to make the mix more interesting. In any case, at 6 the issue of adding 1 more is different than at 4—and while there is a clear risk of not having Ed, the argument against adding him eroded to simply that “he has nothing to add.”
Asked Timbie to ensure that SECSTATE understood my concern about Ed and my arguments—especially my fear of unnecessary extra grief right in the middle of the Hill defense program battle.
Shortly got a call from Nitze’s staff telling me that if Ed went, then Paul doesn’t want to go. I told his staff that he should discuss his personal travel plans with SECSTATE—not me.
Act IV. At about 6:30pm, SECSTATE called and simply said that he had heard both my concerns and the views of others in State and felt that we were right—that he preferred 7 go (with Rowny) and that if we agreed, that would be the deal. He said that this will need extra management, and that he would have a problem with Paul, but that if I’d help on the management, he’d handle Paul. I gave him a prompt aye-aye.
We may still see the Soviets balk at the Magnificent Seven—and Paul may throw a fit—but I think that we are down on this one. We need to work the Rowny issue once the dust clears. We need to give him the Medal of Freedom and a retirement ceremony.
Hope all this is ok. Boy is this fun!