Foreign Relations of the United States, 1989–1992, Volume XXXI, START I, 1989–1991

3. Memorandum From the Vice President’s Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs (Watson) to Vice President Bush¹

Washington, May 11, 1988

SUBJECT

• NATO Trip: Issues

Last week I travelled to Brussels, stayed with Al Keel, dined there with Will Taft, and visited USNATO and SHAPE. I wanted to hear what people thought on alliance issues such as burden-sharing, post-INF NATO, and conventional defense improvements. I visited a UK arms firm and was briefed on anti-armor projects—a significant part of our conventional defense efforts. I also attended a two-day IISS² conference on the START negotiations. I was asked, as was a Democratic defense advisor, to analyze the future of START, if President Reagan signs it before January 21, 1989, or alternatively, how the next President would approach it in 1989. In one week I was able to pack in reviews of conventional defense, INF, and START—the full range of our defenses, and our deterrence spectrum.

In short, the allies are pulling their share of the NATO burden. The popular perception is that “those rich Europeans do nothing for their own defense; and we Americans have over 300,000 troops there, at great cost—they ought to do more.” The European view, and Frank Carlucci’s, is that everything they do can’t be quantified—for instance, as a percent of GNP. They also feel that political and environmental factors (overcoming public opposition to INF deployment, constant exercises, artillery firing ranges, sharing a border with the enemy) should count. Frank Carlucci recently put out a report³ on burden-sharing, and last week Will Taft met with the North Atlantic Council and toured NATO capitals seeking greater contributions from our allies. There was concern that in seeking greater burden-sharing (i.e., sharing the risks, the costs, the responsibilities, and the benefits) we treat them as friends, not “them Europeans” with whom only coercion works.

On conventional defense issues everyone spoke of the desirability of emphasizing the stability aspect of the (Vienna) Conventional Stability Talks. Asymmetrical reductions to equal levels are desirable, but opinion was split about confidence building and early warning measures. To a man, all pushed me to urge you to speak in support of conventional defense improvements (such as: mobility, reinforceability, reserves, war reserve stocks, interoperability, cooperative research, and production programs—all embodied in the NATO Force Goals).

As for US troops in Europe, we ought to always consider them a deterrent, and a force to fight, rather than just there to get the US and our nuclear might involved. We don’t want to see them as part of the long ago discarded “tripwire” concept.

Even as INF was being negotiated, NATO began thinking about maintaining its nuclear capability. The Montebello (Canada) 1983 meeting, Luxembourg 1985, and the NATO 1988 Summit all looked towards modernizing NATO’s nuclear deterrent. Without Pershing II’s and GLCMs, NATO is looking to a Lance missile follow-on of about 400 km, and a longer range Tactical-Air-to-Surface Missile on a Dual-Capable Aircraft. This would require an increase in the START range limitation from 600 to 1500 km.

I saw the very latest in anti-armor technology at Hunting Engineering, a leading UK arms firm. The U.S. Army has for years been trying to cope with quantum leaps the Soviets are making in tank armor—[1 line not declassified] One approach has been to improve “smart” weapons making them brilliant. Another approach, by Hunting, has been to rethink and refine the old shaped-charge technology. [3 lines not declassified]

This project, like many others will probably become a joint US-UK project and thus qualify for funding under Senator Sam Nunn’s NATO cooperative project amendments. The cost-saving feature of a project like this is that it can be fitted onto the existing missiles as it is only a warhead charge. These type advances are cheaper as no change in the launcher and guidance system is required. This also preserves the expensive training given the troops on the basic system. Of course, the road is long and must twist through more R & D, competitive bidding, and production. What needs to happen is for the US to end the research and buy a system that can be deployed. Research doesn’t stop Soviet tanks; deployed weapons do.

Al Keel is doing well and having a healthy effect at NATO. The word is that Mack Mattingly (as Robin Beard before him) is doing well pushing NATO arms cooperation forward.⁴

You may want to ask Frank Carlucci to review NATO issues with you over the next few months. (I talked to Frank yesterday and suggested a conversation. He agreed.)

START: The IISS conference outside London was organized by Hans Binnendijk (formerly with the SFRC and Senators Percy and Lugar).

Our allies like the arms control process (frequent consultations, summits, NATO meetings, involvement in US-Soviet relationship) as much as they do the results. After years of the process, many conference participants claimed not to know if we understood why we were in START or how we fit it into our larger strategic concept. They don’t seem to see “stability” and a lessened first-strike threat as enough but aren’t sure what else or more they’d recommend.

The European participants, and some Americans, had one valid critique: the US hasn’t thought through its future (START-constrained) force structure.⁵ This leads to their fear that after INF banned long-range ballistic missiles and ground-launched cruise missiles, START will further delink us from Europe. In fact, they fear we won’t be able to maintain our commitment of 400 SLBM warheads to NATO as we reduce. Several ideas such as surface or submarine based SLCMs (if Paul Nitze’s proposal to denuclearize the Navy can be beat back), or long-range ALCMs were explored. It was a tossup whether it would be politically easier to deploy new ground-launched systems or to deploy tactical air-to-surface missiles on dual-capable aircraft (I think it would be tough either way but on aircraft, they’re far less visible—at least until one crashes). Alternatively, a sea-based system keeps the commitment but is unseen, thus losing the reassurance effect on one hand, and not meeting Helmut Kohl’s criteria that he who benefits should accept basing on their soil.

Brent Scowcroft was somewhat critical of START but concluded saying it should be ratified. Brent’s main critique was that if START was intended to lead to greater stability then missiles should be de-MIRV’d by going to a small mobile such as Midgetman. Hal Sonnenfeldt was concerned with “fluidity”—we are negotiating over forces we’re still debating at home, such as, mobile ICBMs, small ICBMs, advanced technology bombers, and SLCMs. Sonnenfeldt also felt reductions and stability are not central issues unless we have a settled strategic doctrine. Hal felt we couldn’t plunge off into new negotiations as there will be infinite disputes about Soviet compliance.⁶

Walt Slocombe (Harold Brown’s arms control man during the Carter Administration) felt Dukakis would be entirely happy with START but if handed an uncompleted negotiation, he would increasingly put his own stamp on START the longer it went on. One senior UK official commented it would be a nightmare if a new Administration set out to improve the Reagan START agreement.⁷ Walt said they would not go back and reopen settled issues. Walt opined they could hold off the Radical Right (naming Senator Helms and John Lehman). He thought it important to see how INF on-site inspection goes before nailing down START verification provisions. Walt disagreed with me about looking back at the SS-18 heavy ICBM issue—I said we should focus on highly-fractionated missiles as the issue had moved beyond just heavy missiles. I said we should capture the SS-18 with its ten warheads (possibly capable of carrying twelve to fourteen) and also seek special reductions and limits on the new SS-24 which carries ten. Walt thought that negotiations could go through January 1989—“we have only one President at a time”—though the temptation to meddle during the transition would make negotiations difficult. He said Dukakis would look seriously at Nitze’s proposal (denuclearize the Navy), and question why we’d permit Soviet SS-24 (MIRV’d) and SS-25 (single warhead mobile) while banning our own mobiles.

After caveating my comments, saying I would not talk about whether you would do things differently in START, I spoke mainly about future arms control. Laced throughout my comments were reassurances to the allies present that I thought you’d continue the healthy pattern of Congressional and allied consultations done so well over the past seven years. I also left a sense of reassurance that you’d support INF, START, conventional defense, flexible response (MC14/3)⁸ and close cooperation with our allies. This was well received.

I explained I thought you’d want President Reagan to complete START and would cheerfully take on getting it through the Senate. I spoke to the need to look at NATO’s conventional deterrent and defensive capability in conjunction with the Conventional Stability Talks; adding that smaller steps such as confidence building measures and greater transparency might be possible during the CST negotiations. I also urged all there to support negotiations to ban chemical weapons while challenging them to find ways to monitor compliance, or at last study it intensively, rather than just concluding it can’t be monitored with a confidence high enough for us to sign up. I especially challenged a conference participant from Los Alamos Labs who was a nuclear non-proliferation verification specialist to think about CW. I said I thought strategic nuclear arms control would need a rest of several years so we could absorb and assess the impact of INF and START—we’ve gone through twenty years of arms control theory followed by twenty active years of negotiation.

More than a few Europeans wanted me to know how much reassurance they took from your governmental experience and preparation for the Presidency. In Europe, it is difficult for a newcomer to break into national politics—one gets there only by long training. A French Socialist said he’d vote for you.

One theme ran through comments at NATO and the London conference—the Discriminant Deterrence study that Fred Ikle, Albert Wohlstetter, Henry Kissinger, Zbig and others did should not be the basis for future national security planning. Few Americans or Europeans had much good to say about it. One went so far as to say it adopted the Soviet view: one continuum of weapons—a merger of nuclear and conventional forces where nuclear forces are only more powerful artillery pieces. Others say it pushes changes in NATO’s basic strategy of defense changing it to a new and unwanted offensive strategy of attacks deep into Eastern Europe. It is seen as nullifying flexible response, and seriously de-linking us from Europe by confining a nuclear war to Europe. It is seen as a change being forced on NATO by the US without consultation and study—the Europeans I spoke with have nothing against thinking about, or rethinking the strategy—they want to be part of the study, not hear about it after “you Americans” decide to “publish a pamphlet.”

1. Source: George H.W. Bush Library, Bush Vice Presidential Records, Office of National Security Affairs, Samuel J. Watson Files, OA/ID 19865–006, EUR [Europe]/NATO—NATO. No classification marking. Sent through Gregg.
2. International Institute for Strategic Studies.
3. Reference is to Carlucci’s report to the United States Congress in March 1988, “Report on Allies Assuming a Greater Share of the Common Defense Burden.” (Bush Library, George H.W. Bush Vice President Records, Office of National Security Affairs, Samuel J. Watson Files, EUR [Europe]/NATO—NATO.)
4. Bush drew a vertical line in the left-hand margin beside this paragraph.
5. Bush underlined this sentence.
6. Bush drew a vertical line in the left-hand margin beside this paragraph.
7. Bush drew a vertical line in the left-hand margin beside this sentence and the two sentences that followed.
8. Dated January 16, 1968. (NATO Strategy Documents, 1949-1969, pp. 345–370)