‘Grand Deal’ for CTB Would Likely Leave US Without Either Missile Defenses or Safe, Reliable Nuclear Deterrent

(Washington, D.C.): Today’s New York Times telegraphs the arms control punch the Clinton Administration and its allies on Capitol Hill hope to deliver in coming weeks: In a bid to engender heretofore absent Republican support for the Comprehensive Test Ban (CTB) Treaty Senator Joseph Biden (D-DE) (who serves as the ranking minority member on the Foreign Relations Committee) told the Times that "There ought to be the makings of a grand deal in all of this."

Such a "grand deal" would reportedly purchase Senate advice and consent to the unverifiable, ineffective and counter-productive CTBT ¹ by: 1) obtaining some new commitment from President Clinton to proceed with the deployment of limited anti-missile defenses; 2) securing an agreement from the Kremlin clearing the way for the U.S. to do so, in exchange for 3) a new nuclear arms reduction agreement that would reduce American and Russian strategic forces to perhaps as few as 1500-2000 weapons.

Not So Fast

Unfortunately for those like Senator Biden, whose attachment to arms control approaches the theological, negotiated limits on weaponry have exceedingly limited, if any, utility in a world filled with myriad dangerous regimes, none of whom can be relied upon to honor its international commitments. As President Truman once observed, "If you can’t trust a man’s word, it won’t help much to have it in writing."

There are a number of other problems with the Biden "grand deal" — which resembles in important respects the "Grand Bargain" called for early in the Clinton presidency by Robert Bell, the National Security Council arms control czar who is leaving his post to go to NATO, just as the CTBT fight gets underway. ² In particular, it is not clear that the United States can prudently reduce its nuclear forces to the low levels contemplated by Messrs. Biden and Bell.

Catalyst to an Arms Race: For one thing, those levels are sufficiently low as perhaps to inspire other nations to seek to become first-tier nuclear powers, with forces roughly comparable to those of the United States and Russia. For example, Britain and France, although U.S. allies, could do so with relative ease. More troublesome is the prospect that China may have already set its sights on that objective. It is not clear whether such a dynamic will prove conducive to peace and stability — which is, after all, the putative goal of nuclear disarmament.

Compounded Risks: For another, lower U.S. inventory levels will probably entail reliance upon a smaller number of weapons designs. This will exacerbate the risks associated with a permanent prohibition on underground testing. The "zero-yield" CTBT will surely have an adverse impact on the safety and reliability of America’s nuclear forces. The fewer the weapons types, the greater the danger that an undetected failure in one could gravely undermine the American deterrent.

The Russian Veto: Third, even if President Clinton were committed to deploying effective limited U.S. missile defenses, the Russians have evinced no willingness to give their permission to him to do so. They can exercise a veto, thanks to Mr. Clinton’s abject fealty to an earlier arms control accord, the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. That fealty, borne of a theological attachment to the ABM Treaty as "the cornerstone of strategic stability," recklessly ignores the utter inappropriateness of such a complete prohibition on national missile defenses in the face of burgeoning ballistic missile threats. ³ It also fails to address the reality that, under international legal precedent and practice, that 1972 accord lapsed when the other party, the Soviet Union, became extinct. ⁴

Clinton’s Unreliability: Finally, there is the problem that President Clinton has shown no willingness to make a commitment to deploying even limited missile defenses, let alone the sort of more comprehensive deployment that might be required in the future. He most recently made this abundantly clear — to the point of giving offense to congressional supporters of missile defenses — as he signed the Missile Defense Act of 1999. Even though that legislation explicitly establishes U.S. policy to be to deploy effective, limited anti-missile protection for the American people as soon as technologically possible, Mr. Clinton announced that : "No decision on deployment has been made….In making our determination [on deployment in the future], we will also review progress in achieving our arms control objectives, including negotiating any amendments to the ABM Treaty that may be required to accommodate a possible NMD deployment."

Such progress is going to be all the more improbable since, in addition to the aforementioned Russian attitude, the Clinton Administration has accepted terms of reference for such negotiations that effectively preclude it. As the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Floyd Spence (R-SC) put it in a recent report:

The [20 June 1999 Joint Clinton-Yeltsin Statement initiating negotiations that began on 17 August and that will resume in Washington on 17 September] reasserts the centrality of the ABM Treaty to U.S.-Russian relations, and has "the Parties reaffirm their commitment to that Treaty." According to the statement, the purpose of talks on the ABM Treaty is, "to strengthen the Treaty, to enhance its viability and effectiveness in the future." Thus, it appears that a higher priority is being placed on adhering to the 27-year old treaty than on allowing the development of effective missile defenses. (Emphasis added.)⁵

 

In short, any promise to deploy missile defenses at some point in the future that President Clinton might feel compelled to make in order to sell the CTBT is likely to prove just another cynical bait-and switch. It will not translate into actual protection for the American people against missile attack.

The Bottom Line

The effort to package the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty with other inducements to Senate action tacitly confirms the central contention of opponents of the CTB: This treaty is sufficiently defective that — if considered on its merits — it should not, and will not, garner the support of two-thirds of the U.S. Senate.

¹ For a detailed critique of this treaty see Kathleen C. Bailey, "The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty The Costs Outweigh the Benefits" (15 January 1999).

² See National Security Alert (No. 99-A 30, 13 August 1999)

³ See the Center’s Decision Briefs entitled Critical Mass # 2: Senator Lott, Rumsfeld Commission Add Fresh Impetus to Case for Beginning Deployment of Missile Defenses (No. 98-D 133, 15 July 1998) and ‘The Most Important Thing’: Columnist Safire Asks Why Television Media is Largely Ignoring Rumsfeld Warnings? (No. 98-D 136, 20 July 1998).

⁴ See Definitive Study Shows Russians Have No Veto Over Defending U.S. (No. 99-P 11, 22 January 1999).

⁵ See the Center’s Security Forum entitled Chairman Spence Warns of Perils for America’s Strategic Equities in New U.S.-Russian Negotiations, ‘Grand Bargain’ (Rep. Floyd Spence, No. 99-F 12, 16 August 1999).