First Published: The Call, Vol. 8, No. 20, May 21, 1979.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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The U.S. and the Soviet Union announced May 10 that they had reached agreement on a new treaty covering strategic (nuclear) arms. The treaty is to be signed June 15 in Vienna by President Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet leader, before it goes to the U.S. Senate for ratification.
The Carter administration lost no time in singing the praises of the SALT II agreement, claiming that it “will lessen the danger of nuclear destruction, while safeguarding our military security in a more stable, predictable and peaceful world,” as Carter put it.
“With this treaty,„ echoed Secretary of State Cyrus Vance, “we take an essential step toward a safer America and a safer world. It will restrain the nuclear arms race. It will lessen the likelihood of nuclear war.”
With claims like these, who could possibly oppose the SALT II agreement without appearing to support a less stable, less peaceful world teetering on the brink of nuclear destruction?
The fact is, however, that SALT II provides for the nuclear arms race to continue and expand. This is because U.S,-Soviet relations are inherently unstable, as the U.S. superpower seeks to preserve its dominant position and the Soviet superpower seeks to upset it in its striving for world hegemony.
This is the fourth arms agreement signed between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The three previous agreements proved to be little more than scraps of paper as each side continued to arm at a rate where today the Soviet military budget takes up 20 of its gross national product and the U.S. spends 5.2% of its GNP – $120 billion per year – to develop and maintain its military.
Far from being peace agreements, these pacts have merely tried to disguise the inherently warmongering character of both imperialist regimes, which will eventually go to war to achieve what they could not get by political or economic means.
Why all the importance attached to the SALT II treaty, which was seven years in negotiations since the first strategic arms agreement was signed between the superpowers in 1972? Why is SALT the centerpiece of one of the biggest political splits in U.S. ruling circles in years, with the Carter administration staking its political future on the ratification of the treaty?
SALT is important as a bellwether of U.S.-Soviet contention for world hegemony.
As a bellwether, the current furor over SALT II demonstrates that the “detente” policy which underlies it is in trouble and that U.S.-Soviet relations are entering a period of heightened contention, Gone are the days of “detente euphoria” when the SALT I treaty of 1972 was approved by the Senate with only two dissenting votes.
Today, opposition forces within the U.S. ruling class who argue that SALT II gives nuclear superiority to the Soviets, have gathered enough strength to possibly override the treaty.
At issue in the debate within the ruling circles is how best to contend with the Russians and protect U.S. imperialist domination around the world. The pro-SALT wing argues that this arms agreement gives the Soviets a vested interest in maintaining a stable world and that it will, therefore, curb and restrain the Soviets from aggression. They argue that the Soviets accept the doctrine of mutual assured destruction (MAD) which holds that nuclear war is deterred so long as each side is roughly equal in strength and therefore, able to survive an enemy first-strike and retaliate by inflicting unacceptable damage on the attacker.
Anti-SALT forces among the imperialists, however, maintain that the Soviets are not interested in stability but are out for nuclear superiority in the form of being able to launch first strike and survive retaliation. While anti-SALT forces are being dubbed “warmongerers” for wanting to keep the USSR from developing a significant nuclear edge, in fact it is the pro-SALT appeasers of Soviet aggression who are heightening the war danger by allowing the USSR the opportunity to gain first-strike power.
In any event, the Senate battle over whether to approve or reject the treaty is expected to last into January or February of next year. The Carter administration says it will oppose any efforts to amend the pact. This puts SALT’s supporters on even more of a collision course with Senate opponents who want at least to see the agreement modified.
White House reluctance to accept any amendments indicates the fragility of its position with the Russians, who rejected proposal after proposal from the Carter administration during the negotiations, while stalling for time to modernize their strategic forces.
Senate approval of the treaty will hinge to a large extent on what kind of announcement the White House makes regarding modernization of U.S. nuclear forces. While the Carter administration tries to don the image of “peacemaker” for public consumption, it is widely understood in the Senate that U.S. arms spending is going to increase. It was reported last week, for instance, that the Carter administration had narrowed its choices to two options, anyone of, which would increase arms spending by over $150 billion in the next 20 years. Carter’s decision on which option to exercise is due soon.
An analysis of the treaty itself, furthermore, shows that the two superpowers have merely agreed to place limitations on weapons systems which have already been sufficiently developed, while leaving loopholes for new weapons systems whose development is sure to escalate the arms race.
For example, proponents of the treaty argue that it allows each side to develop only one new land-based missile until 1985 when the treaty expires. But there are no limits on the development of new submarine-based missile systems known as SLBMs. The Soviets have already tested two new SLBMs – the SS-NX-J7 and the SS-NX-18 – and as a result these are deemed eligible for deployment. The Soviets are also expected to develop a new SLBM, the Typhoon, while the U.S. will develop a, new, long-range SLBM called the Trident II.
Treaty advocates argue that the three-year protocol bans the deployment of long-range, ground and sea-launched cruise missiles. But this prohibition is meaningless because the U.S. has no capability to deploy those missiles during the next three years. On the other hand, further testing and development of these missiles is permitted under the protocol so that at the end of the three years, either side would be in a position to deploy these new weapons. Meanwhile, the agreement permits both sides to go ahead with air-launched cruise missiles.
Another advantage of the treaty is said to be that it places ceilings not only on the numbers of land-based and sea-based missiles but also on heavy bombers.
This is misleading, however, because the USSR will be permitted to continue building its Backfire bomber which has intercontinental capability. Moreover, each side will be able to increase the number of nuclear warheads in their arsenal, the U. S. from 8,526 to more than 12,000; the Soviets from over 4,000 to more than 8,000.
Finally, the treaty puts a ceiling on the total number of missiles each side may have and calls for a reduction to 2,250 by 1981. Under this “ceiling,” however, the U.S., which presently has 1,054 missiles, can build another 196 missiles.
The major inequality in the treaty, acknowledged by even the pro-SALT forces, lies in the ability of the Soviet Union to keep its force of 390 heavy missiles, which are capable of carrying many warheads, while the U.S., which has none, may not develop heavy missiles under the agreement. This is important because it is a major factor contributing to the “vulnerability” of the U.S. land-based missile system to Soviet attack. In theory, just 100 Soviet SS-18 missiles, with 10 warheads permissible, could destroy the 550 U.S. Minuteman sites and B-52 bases in a surprise first strike.
Both Secretary of State Vance and Defense Secretary Harold Brown conceded last week that with or, without SALT II, the Soviet Union will have by the early or the mid-1980s the capability to destroy most, of the U.S. ICBM force. Some estimates say that the Soviets would only need to use about 20 of its own ICBM force in the attack because of their heavier missiles. It is this impending ICBM “vulnerability” that has led the Carter administration to pledge to “modernize” U. S. strategic forces, a development which is sure to escalate the nuclear arms race.
This becomes especially clear in examining the two options the Carter administration is currently weighing to modernize U. S. weapons. One is the MX, a mobile ICBM that can be transported around the country so that the Soviets could not have an exact idea of where all U.S. land missiles are located. The Air Force has invented an ominous version of the old shell game, with nuclear missiles replacing the peanut.
The Air Force has suggested three ways of deploying the MX missile: building a large number of underground tunnels and shuttling the missiles to and fro; carrying them aboard cargo planes; or putting them on large trucks that would continuously roam the nation’s highways – all to keep the Soviets guessing.
According to a Congressional Budget Office study, this option would cost about $30 billion to build a force of 300 MX missiles and 8,500 shelters, while the operating cost would amount to $7.6 billion per year – total cost $156 billion through the year 2000.
But even this estimate is deceptive because it does not take into account that the Soviets could adopt the system themselves and the new rivalry in these arms would heighten arms spending.
The second option facing Carter is the development of the Trident submarine and the Trident II, a submarine-launched missile. The total cost of this program is estimated at $153 billion.
With this type of arms development permitted under SALT II, it is difficult to see how the treaty is any different from the “nightmare of unrestrained arms competition” which Carter said would result from its defeat.
The Call will publish several commentaries on the SALT II debate. The first appeared in the May 7 issue.