2. Memorandum From the Vice President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Gregg) and the Vice President’s Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs (Watson) to Vice President Bush1
SUBJECT
- START: Anne Armstrong’s Letter
On reading her letter (attached)2 you keyed on the PFIAB assertion that the Soviets have better passive and active defenses than we do, and then asked why we would be worse off if both sides reduced by fifty percent under a START treaty.
The PFIAB assessment is really just the tip of an iceberg that could become quite serious for our strategic relationship with the Soviets and which will certainly be highlighted in any ratification hearings on a START agreement. The question will come up, repeatedly, whether a START agreement improves our security or detracts from it.
If the Soviets have better defenses then our post-reduction counterattack force would deter even less.3
This could dramatically alter the fundamental strategic equation between us.4
Some say this would give the Soviets strategic superiority such that they would be able to apply political and military pressure forcing us to back down in a crisis.
If all other things were equal then fifty percent reductions would begin and end at the same place, and leave each side with quantitatively and qualitatively equal forces. All said, the US and the USSR have very different forces, of different quality, different defenses, and experience tells us the Soviets have a strong propensity to cheat.
The PFIAB considered several factors in reaching their assessment on the effect superior Soviet passive and active defenses would have on the strategic equation. These are: [Page 7]
- —
- they have air defenses against heavy bombers and ALCMs (we have none);
- —
- they have concentrated their strategic defenses (ABM) around Moscow creating a preferential defense (we have no ABM anywhere);
- —
- they have protected their missiles by: hardening them, making them mobile, hiding them through cover, concealment, and deception;
- —
- their defenses (air, strategic, and dual-capable SA-10 and SA-12 air defense systems) could disrupt our retaliation so much so that our deterrence would be seen as ineffective;
- —
- [2 lines not declassified]
- —
- [3 lines not declassified]
As is their charter, the PFIAB has analyzed the verification (more correctly, monitoring) aspects of a START agreement. They conclude that a major problem exists: we already know our ability to confidently monitor the agreement is in question. (Our memo5 covering Ambassador Armstrong’s letter laid out some of the innovative monitoring techniques being explored that would raise our confidence to monitor a START agreement.)
If we cannot improve our monitoring ability through innovative new techniques, or in the negotiating process and Soviet passive and active defenses are better, then Soviet cheating is even more troublesome. To paraphrase a sensitive arms control paper6 recently prepared by the NSC staff:
“deep reductions in US strategic nuclear forces require that we have great confidence in Soviet compliance. If the Soviets were able to cheat significantly on its START obligations, it could obtain major military advantages it would not otherwise obtain absent START. If mobile ICBMs were allowed, [1 line not declassified] such cheating would be facilitated. In this event, a significant portion of Soviet START reductions could be negated both through covert production and storage of mobile missiles and launchers.”7
- Source: George H.W. Bush Library, Bush Vice Presidential Records, Office of National Security Affairs, Donald P. Gregg Files, Subject Files, OA/ID 19863–001, START [1]. Secret.↩
- Attached but not printed. See Attachment, Document 1.↩
- Bush underlined “If” and placed a checkmark in the left-hand margin beside this sentence.↩
- Bush placed a checkmark in the left-hand margin beside this sentence.↩
- See Document 1.↩
- Not further identified.↩
- Bush drew a vertical line in the left-hand margin beside this paragraph.↩