Foreign Relations of the United States, 1981–1988, Volume XLIV, Part 1, National Security Policy, 1985–1988

45. Memorandum From Secretary of Defense Weinberger to President Reagan¹

Washington, June 5, 1985

SUBJECT

• Interim Restraint Options.

From 1982 to the present, your policy toward SALT II has been conditional: we would adhere to it so long as the Soviets did—and, by implication at least, no longer. It is now nearly two years since we reported to Congress that the Soviets are violating SALT II and several other agreements, including the ABM Treaty. Moreover, we have intelligence that several new Soviet strategic systems, whose testing or deployment would constitute additional violations, are being readied. So the expanding pattern of violations is likely to continue.

Even without violating its terms, the SALT II Treaty continues to legitimize Soviet force increases. The Soviets have added some 4,000 new strategic warheads since SALT II was signed in 1979 and, as I mentioned on Monday,² the Treaty permits them to add thousands more. While supporters of SALT II argue that it has required the Soviets to dismantle several hundred weapons (and would oblige them to dismantle more in the future), the fact is that these “dismantlements” have consisted of the conversion of obsolete launchers for single warhead missiles into new launchers for multiple warhead systems or sea-launched cruise missile submarines. These “dismantlements” account for nearly all of the 4,000 strategic warheads the Soviets have added since SALT II. In other words, their “dismantlements” have actually been part of their modernization plans whereby they have substituted new, more effective warheads and systems for older and, in some cases, obsolete warheads and systems.

By contrast, continued adherence to the SALT II Treaty will require the U.S. to dismantle as many as 2,500 warheads in the next several years, nearly twice as many as the Soviets would be required to retire—if they were fully to comply, which is doubtful at best. (See attached chart.)³

This is the essential background which has led me to recommend against continuing the SALT regime after December 31 when the unratified SALT II treaty will expire.

In my judgment, the case against continuing the SALT regime after its expiration is overwhelming. SALT has been the antithesis of your approach to arms control with its rightful emphasis on deep reductions. The Treaty was, and is, “fatally flawed.” Whatever merit there was in interim adherence on a reciprocal basis has been swept away by the wave of Soviet violations and their intransigence at Geneva.

Ending what has become virtually our unilateral adherence to SALT would be a clear, direct and understandable answer to Soviet violations and an essential signal to the Soviet leadership that, while we have no plans to exceed the modernization you have requested from the Congress, we will not propagate the myth that SALT has led to Soviet restraint or full compliance. By contrast, a decision along the lines of Option C, to respond to Soviet violations by violations of our own, retaining in force the main body of the SALT “constraints,” would be a half-hearted and contradictory policy. We would yield the high ground of our past strict compliance. We would place in Soviet hands the initiative to choose those provisions they find convenient to retain, while casting aside those that might impinge on their ambitious buildup. A clear change in policy as in a combination of Options D and E—brought on by the Soviets themselves—could be explained and justified in a way that a policy of “exceptions,” which would be understood around the world as U.S. violations, could not. Adoption of Options D/E would put the spotlight where it belongs—on Soviet violations and U.S. restraint.

A decision not to continue SALT beyond December 31 should, I think, be accompanied by a statement that we are not proposing increases to U.S. forces beyond our present modernization plans, plans that have been explained in detail to the Congress and our allies, many of which have their roots in prior administrations.

This statement would describe a new policy of independent restraint. There would be no surge on our part. And, because the SALT limits fully accommodate Soviet building plans, we would not expect a surge (beyond what they are at work on now—ostensibly within SALT—which is considerable) from the Soviet side either. We would, of course, reiterate our strong desire to achieve reductions in the nuclear forces on both sides—reductions that have been resisted by the Soviets even as they wrap themselves in the mantle of SALT-type arms control.

You have proposed far-reaching reductions in Geneva. The accomplishment of a treaty entailing deep and real reductions, unlike SALT I and II, would set a standard of arms control of which we can be proud and would give a level of security, for both sides, that would make the world vastly safer. The Soviets will cling to agreements like SALT that permit substantial increases for as long as they are able to gain our concurrence. We should clear the path to genuine arms reductions by permitting SALT to expire into the past.

You and the many Senators who opposed ratification of SALT II were right in 1979. When SALT’s inherent flaws are deepened by Soviet cheating and the prospect of more to come, you have an opportunity—and perhaps a unique one—to let it expire as the Treaty itself provides.

I have attached a proposed statement concerning our own restraint program in the event you should wish to use it.⁴

Cap

1. Source: Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Weinberger Papers, Department of Defense Files, Box CL828, Subject File, 1985, President—Memoranda to # 149–197 (4). Secret. A stamped notation on the memorandum reads: “Signer’s Copy.”
2. June 3. See Document 43.
3. Attached but not printed is an undated chart entitled “Projected Dismantling Under SALT I and II.”
4. Attached but not printed is a draft presidential statement.