Office of the Historian

34. Memorandum From Robert Linhard of the National Security Council Staff to the President’s Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs (McFarlane)1

Washington, August 23, 1982

SUBJECT

  • Draft NSDD on Non-Deployed Missiles (S)

I received a call today from John Poindexter, who relayed a question that you had with the draft NSDD2 on non-deployed missiles. He told me that you had asked why the numerical range of 30–50 percent was not included in the discussion of the quantitative limit on total inventory. He asked me to talk to you about this so that we could resolve this issue and get the NSDD signed.

We intentionally did not include the 30–50 percent number in the draft NSDD even though it had been discussed at the NSC meeting.3 Our rationale was that the essence of the President’s decision was to place an inventory limit on non-deployed missiles. The interagency paper clearly identified the fact that we had in mind a limit of about 30–50 percent; however, if we were to include that number in the NSDD, we felt we would be unnecessarily restricting the implementation of the President’s decision. For example, if on further review the community were able to agree on a limit set at 25 percent, given the President’s remarks, we are sure that such a limit would be preferable to the President.

All agencies are aware that the 30–50 percent number was included in the interagency paper supporting the NSDD. Simply put, we thought [Page 110] the President would be best served by not locking the interagency into those specific limits as tightly as would be the case if those numbers were included in the NSDD. This approach and rationale were discussed with both State (Howe) and Defense (Perle); both agencies agreed.4

Recommendation

That the NSDD be approved as written.5

  1. Source: National Security Council, National Security Council Institutional Files, Box SR 079, NSDD 053, START IV. Secret. Sent for action. Sent through Boverie, who did not initial the memorandum.↩
  2. Not found.↩
  3. See Document 32.↩
  4. An unknown hand underlined this sentence.↩
  5. McFarlane initialed his approval. NSDD–53 is printed as Document 36.↩