253. Editorial Note
On May 27, 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed National Security Decision Directive 307, “Review of United States Arms Reduction Positions in Preparation for the Moscow Summit.” The NSDD set the following U.S. goals for the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks for the May 29–June 2 summit: “We will continue to advocate a legally binding sublimit of 3300 ICBM RVs and will discuss how to record the current Soviet intentions with regard to their program”; “We will provide the Soviets details of our proposed verification scheme for mobile ICBMs based upon the decisions reflected in guidance issued on my behalf by the National Security Council staff on May 24, 1988. [Page 910] Based on Soviet receptiveness to this verification approach, I will make the decision in Moscow whether to discuss specific numerical limits on mobile ICBMs and, if so, what limits to propose”; “If warranted by Soviet movement in other areas, I am prepared to agree to allow testing and modernization of silo-based heavy ICBMs subject to appropriate restrictions on the modernization of such missiles (but not on other ICBM modernization) and subject to the United States having an equal right to heavy ICBMs.” (Reagan Library, Executive Secretariat, NSC National Security Decision Directives (NSDD), NSDD 250) The guidance of May 24 was not found.
In a section on Soviet Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty Non-Compliance and the ABM Treaty Review, the NSDD stated that U.S. officials would reaffirm their “long-standing concern with Soviet failure to comply with and to correct Soviet violations of the ABM Treaty” and “make it clear that we will not sign any strategic arms agreements, either in START or in Defense and Space, while the issue of the illegal Soviet Krasnoyarsk radar remains unresolved, and that we consider the only appropriate resolution to be dismantlement or destruction of the radar.” (Ibid.)
President Reagan arrived in Moscow on May 29 and delivered remarks alongside Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev at the opening ceremony of the summit. (“Remarks at the Opening Ceremony of the Soviet-United States Summit Meeting in Moscow,” May 29, 1988; Public Papers: Reagan, 1988, Book I, pages 672–674) In a one-on-one meeting that afternoon in St. Catherine’s Hall of the Kremlin, Reagan and Gorbachev discussed previous meetings, human rights, and religion. (Memorandum of Conversation, May 29; Department of State, Executive Secretariat, S/S Records, Memoranda of Conversations Pertaining to United States and USSR Relations, 1981–1990, Lot 93D188, Moscow Summit 5/29–6/1, 1988) The memorandum of conversation is printed in Foreign Relations, 1981–1988, volume VI, Soviet Union, October 1986–January 1989, Document 156.